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How does the great void of death not disturb you? (programming.dev)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by Flagstaff@programming.dev to c/exchristian@lemmy.one

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Or does it?

I know we were once nothing, but it is still terrifying and depressing to me to think about returning to this. In fact, as of late, I've been unable to not think about it: the loss of all experience and all memories of everything, forever. All the good times we had, and will have, with anyone or anything ever will totally annihilate into nothingness. All our efforts will amount to nothing because the thoughtless void is ultimately what awaits everything in the end.

The only argument against this would have to be supernatural, like another cause of the Big Bang or somehow proof of reincarnation, but if my consciousness won't exist for me to experience it, then what does it matter either way?

There is no comfort in Hell, either. The anvil of death weighing down, infinitely, on all values and passions is becoming unbearable for me, so I could really use any potentially helpful thoughts about this matter.

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[–] Didros@beehaw.org 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yeah, everything you listed as a negative to fear I take a different positive spin on.

I will lose all sense of regret, loss, pain, fear, and guilt instantly.
The good times are still there in the memories of the living, where they belong.
The universe being a huge uncaring void means it doesn't matter that the world is... infected with humans. That, too, one day, will pass.
Nothing matters. Be free.

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I will lose all sense of regret, loss, pain, fear, and guilt instantly.

Well, sure, if you're endlessly haunted by that stuff, yeah, but thankfully, I'm not, at least for now, so the ending of everything else would feel like a net loss to me. My view really only applies to people who like, not dislike, their life situation.

infected with humans.

You sound like a prime candidate to join the VHEM.

[–] Didros@beehaw.org 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

You don't think if you lived FOREVER you would come to regret?

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

It's your choice to let your past decisions haunt you, though. You can either focus on the pain or on the lessons learned. The past can't be changed either way, right? It's a matter of perspective.

I'm generally grateful for my current life situation, even if it could be better in certain ways and even though I could have certainly made better decisions in my past; the results of my choices, optimal and suboptimal, have still shaped my thinking and current day-to-day life into what it currently is. So that combined with the crumbling of my conviction of the existence of souls is what has driven me into this existential crisis, I suppose.

[–] Didros@beehaw.org 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

And how many eons could you last with an intact mind and nothing to do but to think about your past?

Also, would you have perfect recall of your entire life? Memory is a flaw of the flesh. Would you perfectly remember every moment? See the well hidden disappointment in your mom's face you never noticed?

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Well, the hope/fantasy would be that humanity would survive and figure out the universe's heat death problem, and that we'd carry forward together. There is no point to just surviving alone, true.

Memory is a flaw of the flesh.

Memory is flawed but is not a flaw; it's perhaps the single greatest thing we've (all of us organisms, human or not, have) got of life experience. If I knew I was gonna succumb to dementia and it was deemed irreversible then kill me now lol. But since we don't know that... it'd sure be nice to retain, and have the opportunity to form new, memories and not just see all our joys or the fruit of our labor come to an end.

[–] Didros@beehaw.org 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Yeah, I meant to say "memory is only flawed because of the flesh"

It sounds like you had an imagining of an afterlife where people were alive and living together in some form. How would that work? Sounds like a huge hassle to me personally.

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

had an imagining

You do know which community we're commenting in, right? It's not like everyone can just immediately slice off decades-long-held beliefs right away...

[–] Didros@beehaw.org 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Uhh, okay. Good talking with you. Have a good one!

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Huh? I don't understand your dismissal; not every ex-believer instantly goes atheist, you know.

[–] Didros@beehaw.org 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It seemed you didn't want to talk to me anymore and instead started making assumptions and addressing those.

[–] Flagstaff@programming.dev 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

I was trying to understand what you really meant when you had said, "an imagining of an afterlife"; I didn't understand where that statement came from to begin with, because I don't think it's possible for consciousness to survive death (or else I wouldn't have felt angst enough to make this post in the first place)... which I hope I'm wrong about, but just can't see any conclusive evidence of.