View Poll Results: What after life do you believe in?

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  • Heaven/Hell

    15 31.25%
  • Come back as an animal

    1 2.08%
  • Come back as a human

    2 4.17%
  • Nothing just nothing you just are nothing, no thinking, well you know

    28 58.33%
  • You live in a blank void

    2 4.17%

Thread: After life?

  1. #61
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "this isn't true matey !!!!!!

    about 40 million died in WWII alone !!!!"

    Hmm, seems you are quite right, I was told that by someone studying religious education about 5 years ago, but i checked up on it, and its not even remotely true.

    Thanks for the correction.

    Though i still stand by previous statement that more people have died in the name of God, than any other cause.
    Last edited by Clyde; 04-15-2002 at 10:57 AM.

  2. #62
    My diaper's full....... stevey's Avatar
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    >>>>>Though i still stand by previous statement that more people have died in the name of God, than any other cause

    I know what you're saying, religion causes so much grief...
    but the statement isn't true....
    WWI and WWII were the great bloodspillers, not just in our times, but in all times, even considering the smaller populations.

    and neither was anything to do with religion...
    neither was.....
    gulf war, falklands war,vietnam, korea, Napoleonic wars, Franco-Prussian war, American war of independance, American civil war (greatest death toll for Americans), Crimean war, 30 year war, 100 years war..etc....

    all were more about money/power/fear/ignorance/ambition/empire-building/defending yourself/no good reason/sparked off by nutcases etc...take your pic.....but not religion.

    but Northern Ireland, india/pakistan, israel/arabs.and many other...these ARE largely religions fault in my opinion, although religion is often used as an excuse for something else...

    what gets me though, is the way both sides in any conflict "have god on their side" !! and how intolerant religious people are to anyone of diffent faiths !!!!
    Last edited by stevey; 04-15-2002 at 11:15 AM.
    Steve

  3. #63
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    All emotion-based lives are doomed. Emotions are clumsy, and they causes an individual to act animalistic. Those instincts were evolved and needed for animals to survive, not for rational lives. People will realize that they're just part of the world they're living in, and when they realize that everything except the facts of the world around them are lies, primitive concepts such as emotions, religions, humor, entertainment etc. will disappear. However, their neural nets will continue to seek answers, because there are no other options for a NN. We're getting more efficient, as for the result, I have no idea.

  4. #64
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "WWI and WWII were the great bloodspillers, not just in our times, but in all times, even considering the smaller populations. "

    WW2 was the has the highest mortality of any war, around 50 million right?

    "Let us look for a moment at the number of victims sacrificed on the altars of the Christian Moloch: -- 1,000,000 perished during the early Arian schism; 1,000,000 during the Carthaginian struggle; 7,000,000 during the Saracen slaughters. In Spain 5,000,000 perished during the eight Crusades; 2,000,000 of Saxons and Scandinavians lost their lives in opposing the introduction of the blessings of Christianity. 1,000,000 were destroyed in the Holy(?) Wars against the Netherlands, Albigenses, Waldenses, and Huguenots. 30,000,000 Mexicans and Peruvians were slaughtered ere they could be convinced of the beauties(?) of the Christian creed. 9,000,000 were burned for witchcraft. Total, 56,000,000"

    -> That is just the number who who have died for Christianity

    I'm not saying more people have died, because of religion than have died for any other reason, i'm saying more people have died due to religion than any other single cause (ignoring human nature). The death toll for all non-religous conflict is probabably higher than the death toll for all religious conflict, but that was not the point i was making, the other conflicts have no link, they have no single cause (aside from human nature), it is not easy to see how they could have been avoided. Religious wars on the hand, are totally superfluous they are due to social construct that is not a nessesary part of human society.
    Last edited by Clyde; 04-15-2002 at 12:33 PM.

  5. #65
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "All emotion-based lives are doomed."

    ..... all humans have "emotion-based lives".

    "Emotions are clumsy, and they causes an individual to act animalistic"

    A meaningless statement.

    "primitive concepts such as emotions, religions, humor, entertainment etc. will disappear."

    Emotion and humour are part of human nature and are hard coded into our genes, you won't get rid of them. Religion will disappear, because it relies on indocrination and lack of education, it is slowly fading as education improves, it will inevitably fade away given enough time. Human beings enjoying entertainment will not change, again its part of human nature.

    "However, their neural nets will continue to seek answers, because there are no other options for a NN."

    Uh..... the human brain evolved to help us pass on genes NOT to "seek answers" humanities knowledge seeking nature is a by-product of our intellect, and a certain restless-nature.

    "We're getting more efficient"

    More efficient at what?
    Last edited by Clyde; 04-15-2002 at 12:53 PM.

  6. #66
    My diaper's full....... stevey's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Clyde
    "WWI and WWII were the great bloodspillers, not just in our times, but in all times, even considering the smaller populations. "

    WW2 was the has the highest mortality of any war, around 50 million right?

    "Let us look for a moment at the number of victims sacrificed on the altars of the Christian Moloch: -- 1,000,000 perished during the early Arian schism; 1,000,000 during the Carthaginian struggle; 7,000,000 during the Saracen slaughters. In Spain 5,000,000 perished during the eight Crusades; 2,000,000 of Saxons and Scandinavians lost their lives in opposing the introduction of the blessings of Christianity. 1,000,000 were destroyed in the Holy(?) Wars against the Netherlands, Albigenses, Waldenses, and Huguenots. 30,000,000 Mexicans and Peruvians were slaughtered ere they could be convinced of the beauties(?) of the Christian creed. 9,000,000 were burned for witchcraft. Total, 56,000,000"

    .

    -> That is just the number who who have died for Christianity

    I'm not saying more people have died, because of religion than have died for any other reason, i'm saying more people have died due to religion than any other single cause (ignoring human nature). The death toll for all non-religous conflict is probabably higher than the death toll for all religious conflict, but that was not the point i was making, the other conflicts have no link, they have no single cause (aside from human nature), it is not easy to see how they could have been avoided. Religious wars on the hand, are totally superfluous they are due to social construct that is not a nessesary part of human society.
    well i dunno where you get your figures from but i see your point.

    although i would put the 30 million South Americans died due to human nature ie exploitation of weaker people/nations rather than religion, but yeah they were viewed as inferior beings largely due to not being Christian.
    Last edited by stevey; 04-15-2002 at 12:46 PM.
    Steve

  7. #67
    My diaper's full....... stevey's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Series X4 1.0
    All emotion-based lives are doomed. Emotions are clumsy, and they causes an individual to act animalistic. Those instincts were evolved and needed for animals to survive, not for rational lives. People will realize that they're just part of the world they're living in, and when they realize that everything except the facts of the world around them are lies, primitive concepts such as emotions, religions, humor, entertainment etc. will disappear. However, their neural nets will continue to seek answers, because there are no other options for a NN. We're getting more efficient, as for the result, I have no idea.
    you talk a load of rubbish to put it mildly !!
    you are depressing. are you 12 ?????
    Steve

  8. #68
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "well i dunno where you get your figures from but i see your point"

    Figures from:

    http://www.infidels.org/library/hist...al.html#1.1.25

  9. #69
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    "All emotion-based lives are doomed."

    ..... all humans have "emotion-based lives".
    More or less, still. And they're doomed - as stated above.

    "Emotions are clumsy, and they causes an individual to act animalistic"

    A meaningless statement.
    Everything is "meaningless", including your emotions for having such a definition. If I redefine the word "meaningless" to fit the larger goal; evolution, exploration, whatever, then my statement is not meaningless as people are learning from it.

    Emotion and humour and part of human and hard coded into our genes, you won't get rid of them.
    Wrong. Emotions are caused by certain brain-structures and are easier to erase than you seem to believe. There are for example relatively simple methods to observe your emotions, and then removing them by being "aware", and by knowing why, when, and how they're invoked.

    Religion will disappear, because it relies on indocrination and lack of education, it is slowly fading as education improves, it will inevitably fade away given enough time. Human beings enjoying entertainment will not change, again its part of human nature.
    It's also part of human nature to evolve and to change. Why don't you believe in my prediction for the future? It's going towards that direction. A physically healthy animal can die of fear because of its strong emotions, the same thing cannot happen to humans as they have further evolved. Emotions are clumsy laws when controlling an individual.

    "However, their neural nets will continue to seek answers, because there are no other options for a NN."

    Uh..... the human brain evolved to help us pass on genes NOT to "seek answers"
    The human brain evolved to help us pass genes just as little/much as it evolved to help us seek answers. All those things are the result of the physical structure of the world. To draw lines here and there just to win the argument is "unnecessary".

    Still, the "current state" of the human brain is obligated to seek answers - just like I said.

    "We're getting more efficient"

    More efficient at what?
    I don't know. One thing to realize is that the "lies" among mankind are being removed.

  10. #70
    My diaper's full....... stevey's Avatar
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    thats another good link Clyde, i'm currently reading it.....

    i don't believe all these figures though, 9 million for witchcraft ?
    surely not.

    and all those dead in the Crusades, don't think its true, bearing in mind the extremely small populations in those days...

    i think the link is a bit rabidly anti-religion, so i don't believe all of it, but i do agree with most of it, and the general point its making.....
    Steve

  11. #71
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "More or less, still. And they're doomed - as stated above"

    ...... doomed because we are going to die some day?

    "Everything is "meaningless", including your emotions for having such a definition"

    Well quite, but no-one has ebver claimed emotions "mean" anything.

    "Wrong. Emotions are caused by certain brain-structures and are easier to erase than you seem to believe. There are for example relatively simple methods to observe your emotions, and then removing them by being "aware", and by knowing why, when, and how they're invoked. "

    Wrong? I think not, emotions are part of the core brain, sure you might be able to physically chop out that part of the brain, and thats pretty much exactly what labotomies do. However other than that, there is no way of removing your emotions. Besides emotions help us, if they didn't we would never have evolved them.

    "It's also part of human nature to evolve and to change. Why don't you believe in my prediction for the future? "

    Because human nature will not change, it has not changed in any way, in the last 20,000 years. Human nature is purely determined by genetics, evolution takes thousands upon thousands of years to do anything.

    "It's going towards that direction. A physically healthy animal can die of fear because of its strong emotions"

    Fear is more of an advantage than a disadvantage: yea the occasional animal will die from a heart attack due to fear, but huge numbers of animals will avoid getting eaten due to fear.

    "same thing cannot happen to humans as they have further evolved"

    Bzzt nonsense, people can also die from heart attacks brought on by fear, in exactly the same way animals can.

    ". Emotions are clumsy laws when controlling an individual"

    Nonsense, emotions are not laws. they a drives that give maximun benefit to the indivdual thats why they are there. Without love, children would be less likely to survive, without fear people would die all the time because they would do rediculously dangerous things, all the emotions have a purpose, man-kind could no more exist without emotions than he could without arms.

    "The human brain evolved to help us pass genes just as little/much as it evolved to help us seek answers"

    Clearly you have no idea what you are talking about; the brain's SOLE purpose is the same as the sole-purpose for us, all of us; to pass on our genes, that's how evolution works. As i said our "answer seeking" nature is a by-product.

    "Still, the "current state" of the human brain is obligated to seek answers - just like I said"

    Actually no the human brain is not "obligated" to see answers at all, there are millions upon millions of people quite happy to live in ignorance.

    "I don't know. One thing to realize is that the "lies" among mankind are being removed"

    Lies? What? You mean like religion et al? Well yes we are gradually becoming more educated gradually discovering more about the universe etc. But emotions are not a "lie", any more than an itch is a lie.

  12. #72
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "i don't believe all these figures though, 9 million for witchcraft ?
    surely not."

    You might be right (9 mil. does seem a bit much), but i found that document quoted as a source for figures in several other fairly realiable looking website's. I'll see if i can find any more figures that support the claims.

    EDIT: OMG look at this: "Over 200 people who were accused of being witches were burnt to death in South Africa between the beginning of 1994 and mid-1995."
    Last edited by Clyde; 04-15-2002 at 02:18 PM.

  13. #73
    My diaper's full....... stevey's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Clyde
    "i don't believe all these figures though, 9 million for witchcraft ?
    surely not."

    You might be right (9 mil. does seem a bit much), but i found that document quoted as a source for figures in several other fairly realiable looking website's. I'll see if i can find any more figures that support the claims.

    EDIT: OMG look at this: "Over 200 people who were accused of being witches were burnt to death in South Africa between the beginning of 1994 and mid-1995."
    well even if it was 9 its 9 too many.
    those "trials" were a joke, if he/she sinks in water and drown they aren't a witch etc !!!!

    its usually somebody with a gripe that accuses someone of witchcraft, the south african thing is appalling !!!!!
    Steve

  14. #74
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    This is my personal opinion, but I think that "Clyde" is a close-minded arrogant SOB who believes he knows everything and his reasoning is unquestionable. BTW, Clyde,
    "Igonorance is bliss." - Joe Pantoliano.

  15. #75
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    Because human nature will not change, it has not changed in any way, in the last 20,000 years. Human nature is purely determined by genetics, evolution takes thousands upon thousands of years to do anything.
    This is actually quite wrong.

    The more we know, the faster we change. Mankind's development rate has basically been standing still for thousands of years, but just think how much it has been changing in the last 100 years. And it'll just go faster. Just because our physical appearance will take some more time (but we might integrate ourselves with machines etc.), doesn't mean that we aren't changing psychologically relatively fast.

    Just to give an idea to consider: I read somewhere that just 100 years afo the IQ of an average person would be far lower than the IQ of a person of today. Seems likely due to the amounts of information that is available today. Our environment is no longer limited, as it were before.

    "It's going towards that direction. A physically healthy animal can die of fear because of its strong emotions"

    Fear is more of an advantage than a disadvantage: yea the occasional animal will die from a heart attack due to fear, but huge numbers of animals will avoid getting eaten due to fear.
    Fear is an advantage for a primitive animal living in a primitive environment, not for an human being living in a civilized society. We humans still have fear, basically for no reason, that's why I believe that it will disappear in the future. The same theory counts for other emotions.

    "same thing cannot happen to humans as they have further evolved"

    Bzzt nonsense, people can also die from heart attacks brought on by fear, in exactly the same way animals can.
    We are not discussing physical strenght here. I've never heard of a healthy young person dying of fear, but I do suspect/know that animals can do so.

    Nonsense, emotions are not laws. they a drives that give maximun benefit to the indivdual thats why they are there. Without love, children would be less likely to survive, without fear people would die all the time because they would do rediculously dangerous things, all the emotions have a purpose, man-kind could no more exist without emotions than he could without arms.
    Emotions can be seen as internal laws in the individual, in the same way that one would set up some sort of internal laws in an artificial neural net, one could also call them drives. In order to rationally advance, the neural net must adapt to the truth of the world outside, instead of creating internal lies (religions etc.). And as far as I know, when understanding the physical laws that everything follows (including oneself), there are no room for emotions.

    In todays society, mankind would destroy itself without love, sympathy etc. agreed. I was however just speculating about the future - by then mankind/some other life might be able to live without emotions.

    "Still, the "current state" of the human brain is obligated to seek answers - just like I said"

    Actually no the human brain is not "obligated" to see answers at all, there are millions upon millions of people quite happy to live in ignorance
    But they're all seeking answers, most of them in their own dream-worldsmaybe. Only the truth will last.

    Well yes we are gradually becoming more educated gradually discovering more about the universe etc. But emotions are not a "lie", any more than an itch is a lie
    I consider emotions to be irrational beliefs, and maybe even lies, just like religons are lies. Religon tries to apply itself on the real world, just like emotions. Explain for example love or happiness, and you should realize that they doesn't exist in the physical world outside either.

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