Thought Experiment: Life and Afterlife

25 Sep 2024 Leave a comment

by zeuslyone in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , ,

Let’s take most standard discussions of a Christian afterlife for granted as a thought experiment: some sort of celestial sphere where people go when they die and stay there for eternity as a reward.

Now let’s explore some conceptual corollaries of this that have haunted me as a thought experiment.

Let’s say we have all the people from 1650s England who died in a particular section of this realm. When they died, their souls (we’ll get back to this element in a bit) are transported to their new afterlife home. They’re there with others they’ve known in life. They can share their time with them forever.

First question: what do they do? Do they sing hymns with the angels? If so, isn’t that a fundamentally different idea? Same with the idea that they continue to do, explore, etc. This isn’t life – there isn’t further growth and development to do. Do they bask in the glory of the creator but are otherwise fully passive? Just an overwhelming spiritual high forever? If so, what was the point of the time in a body, in life, etc.? Do they continue to spend time with their community and extended family from past and future speaking over memories of what they did when they were alive (and maybe continuing to view the events of the living)? – Let’s take that last idea as given for our next question.

Second question: given the idea that they’re sharing the memories of their lives forever, what are the structural consequences of this afterlife? – 1) the afterlife is a static data suppository for lives and memories: a true cloud for data that (unlike real technological clouds where data will corrupt eventually) never changes; 2) if they communicate using their learned languages from life – they can only communicate with family a few generations before and after them, giving another degree of being static within humanity’s flow of change on Earth. Furthermore, they have no hope of communicating with the larger array of all the other souls from history. There’s a lingering question here whether new skills (such as new languages) can be learned here as there’s an unaddressed metaphysical problem of what a soul can learn, and furthermore there’s no indication in our framework of some sort of organized learning system for people to study languages or share them with others.

Third question (a bonus question): which version of the person goes to the afterlife? A soul isn’t a body – so it’s fundamentally strange to have it line up with a particular iteration of a person across their lifespan (like an image of the person in their prime, as a baby, or at their oldest moment when they died). However, most any description of the afterlife is one describing a human perspective of being in a place with others, which is inherently one of embodiment – having a particular human form, not some nebulous cloud or something even more abstract which a truly metaphysical dimension would almost necessarily require – it would be a metaphysical place, not a physical one (i.e. not anything akin to the bodily places and experiences we have).

Something about this conceptual idea (which again, is right inline with perspectives I’ve heard described throughout my life) is incredibly cold and inhuman. I find it terrifying to be essentially an element of data for an eternal databank, a storehouse of human memories and experiences forever. This is fundamentally an anti-life, not just an afterlife. Life is about the flow of development. It’s about being a burgeoning and decaying human body-mind in a dynamic little planet with billions of years of history. The idea of being a static data upload set to an eternity of being functionally a human memory/experience data file is perhaps the most inhuman version of a telos to life that I can imagine, and part of that is that that entire data file is not only static but will be static forever. It is there to never be forgotten. There’s something incredibly freeing about our memories in life that we don’t have perfect recall. We forget the vast majority of moments from our lives, and on a larger scale, history is mostly dust – forgotten and turned to fresh soil for future generations to live and create anew. The organic nature of life, society, and our world is precisely what makes life vibrant. Of course, certain experiences both personally and culturally are maintained or “remembered” in the way that all memories are a construction of parts that may be reinterpreted over time, but this is only done insofar as it is adaptive to further function. Some is held onto that is dysfunctional, but it is in burying it and letting it become fully the dust of the past that it becomes room for something new. In summary: I very much affirm the idea of dissolving into this world and disappearing after death, transforming into a different unfolding of the ten thousand things that is not this current, unfolding life of a human body-mind. That seems so much more beautiful and soothing to disappear into the physical earth than for the deeds of my life to be transcribed into a metaphysical sky to statically exist forever.

Feeling Negativity, Leaning Into Compassion

10 May 2021 Leave a comment

by zeuslyone in Buddhism, The Dhammapada, Uncategorized Tags: , , , ,

Note: I feel that things have progressed since starting this post in ways that highlight some personal misunderstandings on one side and the very need for compassion and an open heart and how healing that is on the other – the message I started writing here last week. As such, I decided to finish the post with that message. So, even though the opening lines don’t feel current now, I still feel like this post should be completed and shared.

When we are rejected and shamed by those we care about, they are some of the hardest moments to be upright in a mindful practice. I’ve spun in this a lot recently. I will readily admit I’ve failed for the most part, rolling hard in my own patterns and stories, looking for a magic solution or reversal rather than calmly adapting to conditions with the equanimity of wisdom.

Although friends and articles on psychology and relationships have helped me, I have found a certain part of The Dhammapada to be crucial to healing. I’ve written here before of key passages in the first chapter of The Dhammapada regarding realization of mortality, hatred, peace, and quarrels (for instance, this post on a previous experience and this passage is still one of my most popular, even a couple years later). This passage has acted like an anchor, allowing me to transform my pain into understanding and empathy, rather than continuing to be pulled along by emotional reaction. I’d like to talk about this passage a bit again.

I recently downloaded a different translation of this by Acharya Buddharakhita that left me pondering this passage again. I’m going to share several lines and then make a small comparison.

“He abused me, he struck me, he overpowered me, he robbed me” — those who harbour such thoughts do not still their hatred.

“He abused me, he struck me, he overpowered me, he robbed me” — those who do not harbour such thoughts still their hatred.

Hatred is never appeased by hatred in this world; by non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is an eternal law.

There are those who do not realize one day we all must die. but those who realize this settle their quarrels.

The Dhammapada, Chapter 1: Verses 3-6; Trans. Buddharakkhita

“He abused me, attacked me, defeated me, robbed me!” For those carrying on like this, hatred does not end.

“She abused me, attacked me, defeated me, robbed me!” For those not carrying on like this, hatred ends.

Hatred never ends through hatred. By non-hate alone does it end. This is an ancient truth.

Many do not realize we here must die. For those who realize this, quarrels end.

The Dhammapada, Chapter 1: Verses 3-6; Trans. Fronsdal

First of all, both of these follow the opening of this chapter’s focus on how mind shapes a happy life or a life of suffering. We’re shown an existential depth to this that we should recognize our transience, our mortality, and let go of the poison of animosity — the ultimate toxin of desire, aversion, and ignorance. It’s a colossal mental shift to let go of this kind of victimhood – the drama of our lives – but if we can see the passing nature of things, there’s an opportunity to make that shift and see things from a larger perspective. Second of all, I like the difference in how the end of these two selections are translated. One says “settle their quarrels”, emphasizing that the recognition of mortality is a motivator to take action, actualizing that my mind is not only my personal thoughts but my deeds based on those thoughts and those deeds in relation to others. There’s great wisdom in making a move to show that you hold no hatred for someone else and wish them well (I will return to this below). The other translation has it as “quarrels end” as though the realization of the mark of impermanence leads to an immediate washing away of negativity. I think this focuses on the power of the realization in a way that is incredibly poetic, but it does lack that extra element of action. I think this idea is best highlighted by thinking of both of these translations.

One of the basic forms of meditation in some of the Theraveda traditions is that of metta or “loving-kindness” meditation. I’ve actually read a book focused on this approach that argues it was all the Buddha claimed was needed for Enlightenment, and honestly, given passages like that in The Dhammapada above, I can understand that position, especially because I’ve had some of my strongest feelings of insight and compassion from doing metta meditation (as well as the similar, in my mind at least, Tibetan practice of tonglen).

The practice develops loving-kindness for oneself and expands it, offering it eventually to those who we see as hurtful to us. This, then, is a practice about letting go of the painful reactions to ourselves and others in our lives, and practicing it in earnest really can help open the heart and mind. I’ve linked the book I mentioned above and here again, The Path to Nibbana, and here is a shorter description of how to do the meditation. I’ve been trying to take time to do the meditation myself recently, but beyond that, I’ve been trying to take the intention of it, the version of the mantra of old that I have in my mind from practicing it in the past, and put it out there in the world where I can, even if I don’t sit and meditate today.

May you be happy.

May you be healthy.

May you be at peace.

May you live with ease.

I find when I approach the world with this mindset, I find more understanding for others and more love for myself and my own failures (of which, there are many). Recently, when I’ve felt hurt, I’ve tried my best to develop this mindset, and it has made everything much better, and ultimately, I feel like it may even heal the hearts of others a little — perhaps just that intention has some impact in the world.

May this inspire others to cultivate loving-kindness and compassion, especially when it feels difficult. May this help other see that our lives are short, and quarrels are misguided.

Gassho!