Thork

Heaven
« on: January 14, 2014, 11:20:01 PM »
Heaven (or hell) are central to many religions. Kind of a reward or punishment for being a good/bad follower.

The thing I find most odd about it, is that you spend say 70 years trying to win a spot in heaven, and then the rest of eternity paying for how you lived your life.

Surely a better system would be to let you live in heaven, and then send you to earth if you misbehave until you learn how to live in heaven. It seems kinda backwards that you'd do it the other way around. Surely a 70 year sentence on earth should be punishment for groping an angel or being sick in Mohammad's beard?

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Offline jroa

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #1 on: January 15, 2014, 12:32:30 AM »
I think it is human nature to believe that, no matter how shitty things are now, there is still hope because it will be much better when you die. 

Also, perhaps we should bring back the pay-for-absolution system. 

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Offline Lord Dave

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #2 on: January 15, 2014, 01:05:03 AM »
Heaven (or hell) are central to many religions. Kind of a reward or punishment for being a good/bad follower.

The thing I find most odd about it, is that you spend say 70 years trying to win a spot in heaven, and then the rest of eternity paying for how you lived your life.

Surely a better system would be to let you live in heaven, and then send you to earth if you misbehave until you learn how to live in heaven. It seems kinda backwards that you'd do it the other way around. Surely a 70 year sentence on earth should be punishment for groping an angel or being sick in Mohammad's beard?
Pretty sure you just described reincarnation.

Also, Heaven is the actual Hell.
Why?
Boredom.

Just think, what will you do in a trillion years when you've seen and done everything in creation?
If you are going to DebOOonK an expert then you have to at least provide a source with credentials of equal or greater relevance. Even then, it merely shows that some experts disagree with each other.

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Online Rushy

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #3 on: January 15, 2014, 01:26:13 AM »
Valhalla, now that's a place to go after death. A place where you just drink and fight until the apocalypse comes, and then you fight it. You fight the fucking apocalypse. You know you won't win, but you fight it anyway because you and your friends are all the top badasses in the universe.



« Last Edit: January 15, 2014, 01:28:54 AM by Irushwithscvs »

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Offline Ghost Spaghetti

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #4 on: January 15, 2014, 09:00:41 AM »
Even if Heaven exists, nobody who has ever lived on Earth will ever see it. In order to make an eternity bearable, knowing that billions of your  fellow humans (Including loved ones) are being tortured in Hell (Or else simply not with you,) whilst being physically unable to sin would require such an intense re-write of most people's minds that it wouldn't be right to describe the beings going to Heaven as the same beings who lived on Earth.

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Offline Lord Dave

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #5 on: January 15, 2014, 11:39:06 AM »
Even if Heaven exists, nobody who has ever lived on Earth will ever see it. In order to make an eternity bearable, knowing that billions of your  fellow humans (Including loved ones) are being tortured in Hell (Or else simply not with you,) whilst being physically unable to sin would require such an intense re-write of most people's minds that it wouldn't be right to describe the beings going to Heaven as the same beings who lived on Earth.
Not really.
Just stick a metaphorical pin in the pleasure center of the soul brain.  You'll be too happy to care about anyone else.  Which makes my boredom argument moot.


So you're either totally bliss or totally bored.  Fun right?
If you are going to DebOOonK an expert then you have to at least provide a source with credentials of equal or greater relevance. Even then, it merely shows that some experts disagree with each other.

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Offline Ghost Spaghetti

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #6 on: January 15, 2014, 01:28:31 PM »
Even if Heaven exists, nobody who has ever lived on Earth will ever see it. In order to make an eternity bearable, knowing that billions of your  fellow humans (Including loved ones) are being tortured in Hell (Or else simply not with you,) whilst being physically unable to sin would require such an intense re-write of most people's minds that it wouldn't be right to describe the beings going to Heaven as the same beings who lived on Earth.
Not really.
Just stick a metaphorical pin in the pleasure center of the soul brain.  You'll be too happy to care about anyone else.  Which makes my boredom argument moot.


So you're either totally bliss or totally bored.  Fun right?

I am not just the good happy centres of my brain, I am the dark areas, the anger, the frustrations, the sadness, the unhappy memories, the bad experiences which have shaped who I am. If you lobotomise all those out of me then the being living in ignorant bliss is not 'me' in any meaningful sense.

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Offline Lord Dave

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #7 on: January 15, 2014, 03:43:55 PM »
Even if Heaven exists, nobody who has ever lived on Earth will ever see it. In order to make an eternity bearable, knowing that billions of your  fellow humans (Including loved ones) are being tortured in Hell (Or else simply not with you,) whilst being physically unable to sin would require such an intense re-write of most people's minds that it wouldn't be right to describe the beings going to Heaven as the same beings who lived on Earth.
Not really.
Just stick a metaphorical pin in the pleasure center of the soul brain.  You'll be too happy to care about anyone else.  Which makes my boredom argument moot.


So you're either totally bliss or totally bored.  Fun right?

I am not just the good happy centres of my brain, I am the dark areas, the anger, the frustrations, the sadness, the unhappy memories, the bad experiences which have shaped who I am. If you lobotomise all those out of me then the being living in ignorant bliss is not 'me' in any meaningful sense.

True.
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Re: Heaven
« Reply #8 on: January 15, 2014, 04:04:56 PM »
Even if Heaven exists, nobody who has ever lived on Earth will ever see it. In order to make an eternity bearable, knowing that billions of your  fellow humans (Including loved ones) are being tortured in Hell (Or else simply not with you,) whilst being physically unable to sin would require such an intense re-write of most people's minds that it wouldn't be right to describe the beings going to Heaven as the same beings who lived on Earth.
Not really.
Just stick a metaphorical pin in the pleasure center of the soul brain.  You'll be too happy to care about anyone else.  Which makes my boredom argument moot.


So you're either totally bliss or totally bored.  Fun right?

I am not just the good happy centres of my brain, I am the dark areas, the anger, the frustrations, the sadness, the unhappy memories, the bad experiences which have shaped who I am. If you lobotomise all those out of me then the being living in ignorant bliss is not 'me' in any meaningful sense.

If you are to believe in Heaven then you have to divorce these ego-driven notions of who you are from the equation.  Heaven obviously would not function as a place where all your Earthly desires are fulfilled and you are blissed out like on happy pills.  If you believe in Heaven you should expect you consciousness to be changed in such a way as to receive something heavenly.  In effect, your experience of existence would need to be transformed in such a way that you could not, on this plane, possibly fathom.

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Offline Ghost Spaghetti

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #9 on: January 15, 2014, 04:54:08 PM »
Then in what meaningful sense am I 'me?'

|If I've been changed so much that I couldn't even athom itthen why should I look forward to Heaven or draead Hell?

Re: Heaven
« Reply #10 on: January 15, 2014, 05:25:08 PM »
It wouldn't even make sense to change the self for Heaven or Hell.  Then the very concept of reward and punishment is lost.  You don't know nor understand why you are where you are (would be worse for someone in Hell for getting punished for unknown reasons). 

Chris makes a good point though. I'd rather be in Hell with someone I love than alone in Heaven.
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Re: Heaven
« Reply #11 on: January 15, 2014, 05:49:49 PM »
Chris makes a good point though. I'd rather be in Hell with someone I love than alone in Heaven.

Would you rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints?

Re: Heaven
« Reply #12 on: January 15, 2014, 06:40:28 PM »
I doubt that your self is merely your earthly desires.  Simply losing those desires doesn't necessarily mean you lose your identity.  Besides, you change yourself countless times throughout your life, what was important 5 years ago probably isn't so important now to you, why couldn't your spirit go through the same type of identity shift and still be you?

Re: Heaven
« Reply #13 on: January 15, 2014, 08:00:48 PM »
Wait, you're telling me that in heaven they get rid of the sad parts of our existence and we're permanently happy and you're not okay with that? Orgasms are awesome; depression sucks. You can speak that down parts are essential to our lives, but if I could replace the shitty parts of my life with orgasms I would take that deal in a heartbeat.

Speaking purely in a hypothetical heaven that is. On this earth, a constant orgasm would get annoying after a while.
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Re: Heaven
« Reply #14 on: January 15, 2014, 08:22:21 PM »
Wait, you're telling me that in heaven they get rid of the sad parts of our existence and we're permanently happy and you're not okay with that? Orgasms are awesome; depression sucks. You can speak that down parts are essential to our lives, but if I could replace the shitty parts of my life with orgasms I would take that deal in a heartbeat.

Speaking purely in a hypothetical heaven that is. On this earth, a constant orgasm would get annoying after a while.

Think of the mess you'd have to clean up.
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Re: Heaven
« Reply #15 on: January 15, 2014, 08:58:46 PM »
Wait, you're telling me that in heaven they get rid of the sad parts of our existence and we're permanently happy and you're not okay with that? Orgasms are awesome; depression sucks. You can speak that down parts are essential to our lives, but if I could replace the shitty parts of my life with orgasms I would take that deal in a heartbeat.

Speaking purely in a hypothetical heaven that is. On this earth, a constant orgasm would get annoying after a while.

Think of the mess you'd have to clean up.
I can't, I'm too busy orgasming.
You don't think I'm going to post here sober, do you?  ???

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #16 on: January 15, 2014, 09:08:13 PM »
That escalated quickly.
I don't even care to find out what you're doing wrong, but I'm sure you're doing something wrong.

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Offline Snupes

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #17 on: January 16, 2014, 02:45:52 AM »
I'd be inclined to agree that heaven is one of those things we just can't wrap our minds around, speaking purely hypothetically, as if it existed. Obviously I don't even slightly believe in it, but yeah, I think it'd be pretty hard to argue that being constantly in a state of happiness and bliss would suck because...well...that goes against the prerequisites that were just set

That said, I do agree with Chris that it'd be taking a hell of a lot away from one's individuality. I wouldn't really be the same person if I wasn't the way I am.

Chris makes a good point though. I'd rather be in Hell with someone I love than alone in Heaven.

Would you rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints?

Well obviously; the sinners are much more fun.
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Offline Ghost Spaghetti

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Re: Heaven
« Reply #18 on: January 16, 2014, 10:06:33 AM »
Wait, you're telling me that in heaven they get rid of the sad parts of our existence and we're permanently happy and you're not okay with that?

Yeah, because when I feel down, or angry, or frustrated, there are usually reasons for feeling that way. I feel sad because someone I love is lost to me, I feel angry because someone has wronged me, I feel frustrated because I want to get something done.

You could argue that in Heaven you simply have nothing to feel down about, but as we've said before, if loved ones aren't with you, you should feel sad (If I didn't I'd feel really guilty about insulting their memories. If I didn't feel guilty then I wouldn't be me.) . If you've got nothing to strive for and nothing to do, you should evenually feel bored.

I doubt that your self is merely your earthly desires.  Simply losing those desires doesn't necessarily mean you lose your identity.  Besides, you change yourself countless times throughout your life, what was important 5 years ago probably isn't so important now to you, why couldn't your spirit go through the same type of identity shift and still be you?

True, I'm a totally different person to how I was as a baby, but that change was a gradual shift to achieve continuity, not a sudden seismic shift from baby to fully-blown adult. If my future, heavenly, self was changed so much to not care about the suffering of others, the loss of loved ones, stymied of curiosity to prevent boredom and happily settled in what amounts to a permanant drug-fuelled fog then I don't want to go to Heaven because I don't like the person that I'll have become.

Re: Heaven
« Reply #19 on: January 16, 2014, 06:46:35 PM »
If you believe the crap in the bible etc... there's more people in hell than there are in heaven.

Hell's winning.