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Cessation of Existence & Afterlives.

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IraTheSquire Since: Apr, 2010
#351: Apr 26th 2012 at 11:19:17 PM

I don't know. I just don't dream. As in, that "waking up with no memory of sleeping" happened quite often.

UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#352: Apr 26th 2012 at 11:48:53 PM

There are ways to dream every night, but they involve a lot of practice.

Or there's the way which involves less practice which is gauging your sleep cycles and setting an alarm for just the right moment.

edited 26th Apr '12 11:49:11 PM by UltimatelySubjective

Aondeug Oh My from Our Dreams Since: Jun, 2009
Oh My
#353: Apr 26th 2012 at 11:57:16 PM

Keeping a dream journal worked for me in terms of remembering my dreams nightly. Though even without one I tend to remember mine very well.

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah
BestOf FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC! from Finland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: Falling within your bell curve
FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC!
#354: Apr 27th 2012 at 1:11:54 AM

There are people who as a rule don't remember their dreams. They might remember a dream every now and then, but it's so rare that they're actually surprised when they notice, upon waking up, that they do remember details of the dream.

I'm not one of those people. When I wake up, I remember the last dream I had maybe once every two weeks or so. So usually I don't remember it, but it's not so rare that I'd be surprised when I do.

That said, it's been proven that everyone dreams every time they go to REM sleep, and everyone goes to REM sleep if they can stay asleep for a couple of hours or more. So most dreams are forgotten and that's that.

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.
Lanceleoghauni Cyborg Helmsman from Z or R Twice Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: In my bunk
#355: Apr 27th 2012 at 1:12:53 AM

for me, my sleep is blank. it is a black loading screen for the next day.

It's a big deal when I remember a dream.

"Coffee! Coffeecoffeecoffee! Coffee! Not as strong as Meth-amphetamine, but it lets you keep your teeth!"
dRoy Professional Writer & Amateur Scholar from Most likely from my study Since: May, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Professional Writer & Amateur Scholar
#356: Apr 27th 2012 at 1:14:03 AM

During rainy seasons, which I usually have hard time having good sleep, I am more prone to vivid dream. I always forget them within hours, though. I should keep a dream journal.

Continuously reading, studying, and (hopefully) growing.
Thorn14 Gunpla is amazing! Since: Aug, 2010
Gunpla is amazing!
#357: Apr 27th 2012 at 8:33:57 AM

Just because my brain is AFK during that time though doesn't mean I not exist. A simple sound can get me awake.

Being AFK is very different from "Computer exploded"

Sarkastique Hey, gorgeous from Baltimore Since: Dec, 2010
Hey, gorgeous
#358: Apr 27th 2012 at 6:06:32 PM

No, your brain is not afk, "you" are afk. Actually, afk is more for humor than accuracy, because you aren't afk; you effectively don't exist. There is no you to be afk.

Your personality is simply not there. The lights are on, but nobody is home. A simple sound wakes you up because completely unconscious neurological processes respond to the stimulus and turn you back on to investigate the scenario. You don't wake up, because you don't exist when you're asleep. The conscious self we identify as "I" assembles itself suddenly at the point of waking, and evaporates just as suddenly when we fall asleep.

That's why there's no real difference between sleep (at least, deep sleep) and death. They're functionally the same thing from a subjective point of view, death is just permanent.

Memento Mori
UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#359: Apr 27th 2012 at 7:03:08 PM

Are you sure about that?

I was under the impression that we still hadn't pinned down consciousness and self-awareness.

Which part of the brain is the part in question when we're talking about not existing during sleep? It must be more than just the memory part right?

edited 27th Apr '12 7:03:27 PM by UltimatelySubjective

Sarkastique Hey, gorgeous from Baltimore Since: Dec, 2010
Hey, gorgeous
#360: Apr 27th 2012 at 7:11:31 PM

I don't mean that parts of your brain stop existing. I just mean that the ego is simply not there when you're in deep sleep. I don't think this is really a controversial thing to say scientfically.

The whole point of being unconscious is that you are, well, not conscious. There's no persona running around in the dark while you sleep getting bored. The brain is capable of all sorts of things while unconscious. People can and have murdered people in their sleep, or driven to a familiar location, all while the usual mental processes we usually think of as "I" are simply inactive.

Your body is perfectly capable of getting along just fine without the ego, and that's exactly what it does when you sleep every night. You're right that we haven't pinned down consciousness, but it's not to soon to say that a person in a coma is simply not experiencing it.

edited 27th Apr '12 7:15:42 PM by Sarkastique

Memento Mori
UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#361: Apr 27th 2012 at 8:02:30 PM

As an individual I can't tell the difference between not being conscious and not being able to remember.

Well, except in dreams where I have been without a sense of self.

Ghuy42 vermnicious k'nid from Inside Your Mind Since: Jul, 2011
vermnicious k'nid
#362: Apr 27th 2012 at 8:44:30 PM

Sorry to change the subject a bit, but if death and cessation of existance are inevitable, then what is tue point? Near the beginning of the thread, people were talking about how most people aren't remembered for long after they're dead, which in my point of veiw would be the entire point of existing: doing something so that one's memory, or genetics, live on for all of eternity. Though, by that logic, Hitler (Godwin's Law!) was the most sucessful person on Earth. It is much easier to be remebered for doing horrible things than for doing good things.

"On the internet, no one knows if your quotations are real" - Benjamin Franklin
Enthryn (they/them) Since: Nov, 2010
(they/them)
#363: Apr 27th 2012 at 8:56:21 PM

[up] Why do you care if you're remembered?

Sarkastique Hey, gorgeous from Baltimore Since: Dec, 2010
Hey, gorgeous
#364: Apr 27th 2012 at 9:31:30 PM

Looking for point or meaning in existence is looking for something that doesn't exist, at least objectively.

You're free to assign whatever goals or meaning you want to your existence, but asking what sort of metaphysical "point" there is to life is creating a mystery where none exists. There isn't one.

Memento Mori
UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#365: Apr 27th 2012 at 9:47:56 PM

Or to put it another way, don't over-estimate your position in the universe.

Scientifically your life doesn't matter, but of course you should never actually take that to heart.

It's natural to want your life to achieve something though, but it's better to think of immediacy and meaning in your own life, rather than some far off future you won't see.

What can I say other than strive for it if that's what you really want.

But perhaps one perfect moment in your own life is worth all the memories after you die.

Look, just listen to Iskander!Rider. He would have traded in his entire "immortalisation" in history for a single extra year of life.

Carciofus Is that cake frosting? from Alpha Tucanae I Since: May, 2010
Is that cake frosting?
#366: Apr 28th 2012 at 1:26:50 AM

Scientifically your life doesn't matter, but of course you should never actually take that to heart.
Science has nothing whatsoever to say about what does or does not matter.

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.
Qeise Professional Smartass from sqrt(-inf)/0 Since: Jan, 2011 Relationship Status: Waiting for you *wink*
Professional Smartass
#367: Apr 28th 2012 at 1:39:09 AM

Humans don't matter (yet: I have high hopes) on a cosmic scale. I honestly don't care if I don't matter on a cosmic scale, I operate on the human scale.

Laws are made to be broken. You're next, thermodynamics.
Carciofus Is that cake frosting? from Alpha Tucanae I Since: May, 2010
Is that cake frosting?
#368: Apr 28th 2012 at 1:57:37 AM

Sapient beings (leaving open the possibility of intelligent aliens, A.I.s and so on) certainly do matter on a cosmic scale. They are pieces of the universe with the ability of creating representations of the whole universe. As somebody (Sagan, perhaps, or Dawkins — I don't remember) said, we are the only way in which the universe can think about itself.

I think we are even more than that; but that alone is awesome.

edited 28th Apr '12 1:59:45 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.
IraTheSquire Since: Apr, 2010
#369: Apr 28th 2012 at 2:22:27 AM

Scientifically your life doesn't matter, but of course you should never actually take that to heart.

Design me a method where you can detect whether something "matters" or not.

UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#370: Apr 28th 2012 at 2:34:06 AM

Perhaps I phrased that wrong. Science doesn't care about how your life goes, implies life is an accident and only mentions humans are a pixel on the cosmological timescale.

Yes, all value systems are subjective though. Except in specific cases.

Carciofus Is that cake frosting? from Alpha Tucanae I Since: May, 2010
Is that cake frosting?
#371: Apr 28th 2012 at 3:06:54 AM

I think that one must be careful when talking about purposes and so on.

Scientific evidence does not imply that life is an accident; it strongly supports the idea that life spontaneously originated from some nonliving physical phenomenon (although the details are rather hazy still), and it makes it basically certain that humankind is the result of environmental pressures and unpredictable mutations.

Perhaps I am drawing too fine a point; but as far as I can tell, nothing in the available scientific evidence suggests that life is an accident in the same sense in which me spilling some coffee on the table is an accident. Nor, to be fair, there is any scientific evidence that it happened for a purpose, in the same sense in which me cleaning the spilled coffee with a napkin happened for a specific purpose (I didn't want my table to be dirty).

edited 28th Apr '12 3:09:21 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.
Sarkastique Hey, gorgeous from Baltimore Since: Dec, 2010
Hey, gorgeous
#372: Apr 28th 2012 at 3:28:39 AM

The idea of "mattering" is an arbitrary primate construct. There's no sense in which anything objectively matters at all. As romantic as the universe "thinking about itself" is, association of some sort of universal metacognition with "mattering" is monkey-talk.

I'm not even sure what it means to say that something "matters." The best definition I can come up with is "of concern to humans," but that's a pretty vague definition. The concept itself seems vague anyway, so maybe that isn't a mark against it.

Memento Mori
UltimatelySubjective Since: Jun, 2011
#373: Apr 28th 2012 at 3:29:00 AM

[up][up] Perhaps instead of "accident" I should have used the word "unlikely".

Your point about accidents implying lack of intent, when science isn't going to find an "intent" stands.

But seriously.

As far as we know, life will only develop on an Earth like planet, at a certain temperature, distance from the sun, given the presence of certain elements etc. Hence unlikely. Also it seems we may have been lucky with cosmological constants as well (some details in the link below).

Unless you buy the anthropic principle, life doesn't even have to exist in the universe. So in that sense the physical laws work the same either way (or do they?).

I don't buy that the universe bends over to allow life, nor that only universes that support life are likely, so that's what I meant by "unimportant [to the universe]".

edited 28th Apr '12 3:31:04 AM by UltimatelySubjective

Carciofus Is that cake frosting? from Alpha Tucanae I Since: May, 2010
Is that cake frosting?
#374: Apr 28th 2012 at 4:06:50 AM

The idea of "mattering" is an arbitrary primate construct. There's no sense in which anything objectively matters at all.
That's a philosophical position, not a scientific one. That's not a criticism, in itself — I certainly don't think that something has to be scientific in order to be worth examining — but it has to be kept in mind.

Now, what is instead a criticism to this position is that it is a deeply uninteresting one. If the idea of "mattering" is an arbitrary primate construct, so is the idea of "not mattering". Or, for that matter, even the idea of "idea".

Assuming that you are right, and that nothing matters, I may as well keep thinking that there instead is something that matters and keep searching for it. It will be pointless; but no more pointless than thinking that there isn't anything that matters.

I mean, unless you believe that Truth is preferable to non-Truth — or, in other words, that Truth matters. tongue

[up]Yes, I agree on "unlikely". It is certainly true that if we look at a random location of the universe, we will almost certainly not find any life over there; and it is also true that nothing, as far as we know, makes an universe without life inconsistent.

But of course, likelihood is subjective — it is a measure of uncertainty given available evidence, nothing more. In a sense, the probability that the universe supports life is one, since, well, it does.

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.
BestOf FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC! from Finland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: Falling within your bell curve
FABRICATI DIEM, PVNC!
#375: Apr 28th 2012 at 4:29:36 AM

"Purpose" and "idea" are things that can't exist in the Universe I believe in. Or rather, they can't exist objectively, but they can exist in the minds that exist in the Universe.

For those minds, thinking about "purpose" is built-in (and it has to be, because an animal that didn't assume narratives and agents in patterns would have a lower degree of paranoia about strange sounds and movements that usually turn out to be the wind but sometimes are indeed "agents" - predators.)

In other words, we have evolved faculties for pattern detection that are more sensitive than they usually have to be because at times in our history they have had to be primed to be very sensitive indeed. Because we detect patterns even where there aren't any, we develop constructs like "agent" and "purpose." This is not a bad thing, by the way. It's just an observation.

We can't turn our pattern detection faculties off. We can't stop looking for purpose where we know there objectively aren't any. And I don't mind, as long as I don't forget about the reality. I don't mind at all that my goals and values are entirely subjective. Doesn't make them any less important. Doesn't take away any of the "point" of life that everything is subjective and temporary.

All I can ever have is my finite, subjective experience, and frankly I don't even know why anyone would try to have or want more than their finite, subjective experience. I don't get why anyone would want their experience or values to "carry on" or "matter" objectively.

When I hear "I want my experience to go on beyond me" or "I want to matter beyond my own existence," the sensation I get is the same as if they had said "I want this water in the cup to be in the cup and outside it" or "I want the sun to be hot and cold simultaneously." It doesn't even begin to make any sense except as an exercise of shifting definitions and perspectives into a convoluted mess just to justify an idea that isn't compatible with everything else.

I can imagine an argument that would end with the conclusion that in some sense, water in a cup is also outside it, but I can't imagine why anyone would do that. Similarly, I can imagine an argument that ends with the conclusion that "my life matters even if in the future there are no sentient beings in the universe" but I can't imagine why anyone would make that argument.

...OK, I gave it some more thought before clicking "send," and actually I can imagine one truly meaningful (and to me personally, very interesting,) point that can be derived from "my life matters even if in the future there are no sentient beings in the universe." It is this: if life ceases to exist but leaves some artefacts, such as some kind of "panspermia" project, then it can have meaning in potentia.

If life ceases to exist completely when there's a shuttle moving to an Earth-like planet, and the shuttle is carrying some ingredients for life that make certain reactions much more likely, and the "seed" in the shuttle ends up causing a chain of events that leads to new intelligent life (billions of years later,) and those life-forms then find out about their origin, then to them you will have mattered if you were somehow involved in the project. So while there was no sentient life, you didn't matter, but as soon as sentient life emerges and holds the idea of "meaning," then to them you can retroactively start to matter when they find out about you.

In other words, you "mattered" in potentia, much like a lifeless universe only "matters" in the case that it eventually generates sentient life or is observed by sentient life in another universe.

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.

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