Category Archives: Metaphysics

The Fears of Death

10 Monday Sep 2012

Posted by in Metaphysics, My Philosophy

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The fear of death is a primal and natural fear. Intellectually, I understand this as being the natural inclination of self-aware agents in a survival-of-the-fittest environment. This primal fear is not necessarily a conscious one. I’m talking about the reflexive behavior that we engage in when faced with danger. Reflexive behavior such as fight or flight.

Even religious people, those who believe in an afterlife for their personal essence, have this primal fear. Animals also have this primal tendency to avoid death. Without this inclination, life wouldn’t have survived in this hostile universe.

There is, however, a second fear of death that afflicts certain animals with high-functioning self-awareness. I’m talking about the existential angst that follows the realization that that which is I will at some point cease to exist. Many religions suppress this fear with the idea of an afterlife in which the essence of a person will never cease to exist. For the agnostic or atheist who has just left religion, this fear of death may have something to do with why life suddenly seems more pointless.

What exactly causes this existential angst, this second fear of death, and how might we suppress it as individuals without deluding ourselves with religion?

Suicide: Exploring the Afterlife

01 Saturday Sep 2012

Posted by in Metaphysics, My Philosophy, The Conversion

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There was a short period of time in my life when I was somewhere between pantheism and agnosticism. This was when I no longer held the dogmatic belief that suicide is inherently morally wrong but I had yet to release all hope for an afterlife. It was during this period that I toyed with the idea that suicide would be the ultimate adventure (I never actually seriously considered doing it myself).

Suicide: The Game of Life

Suicide: The Game of Life

I no longer believe in an afterlife but I still hold a small secret admiration for those that take their own lives. Many people call them cowards. I call them courageous. I would never commit suicide while I was physically healthy, but that’s partially because I’m a coward but mostly because evolution selected strongly against such tendencies–in other words, I don’t want to. Also, I’m a bit of a nihilistic fellow so I think suicide would be just as pointless as living. Why bother killing yourself? Even that is ultimately pointless.

If you believe in an afterlife, wouldn’t suicide be the ultimate adventure?

Questioning Reality

31 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in Metaphysics, My Philosophy

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What is reality? We assume that there is one objective reality and yet there is no way to prove that what we are experiencing is it.

What if this reality that we experience is a computer simulation being operated in the real reality? What if even that reality is merely a simulation running in a still more real reality?

What if I am dreaming? In this dream I might question the reality of my experiences. I might question the nature of reality itself. Then I wake up and realize that the experiences I dreamed were not real. Then I begin to question whether I’m still dreaming.

One time I wondered if I was dreaming. I pinched myself and upon feeling the pinch quite clearly, I concluded that I was not dreaming. At some later point, I awoke from this weird dream. Ever since then I am skeptical of reality. Am I still dreaming?

What if I’m trapped for eternity in nothing but dreams? Dreams inside of dreams. I wake up from one dream, not realizing that I’m still dreaming. No matter how hard I try, there’s no way to prove to myself that I’m not dreaming.

What if I died and went to heaven (not that I believe in heaven)? Would I question that reality too? Can I even conceive of a certain type of reality–one that I won’t question? The disconcerting answer is–No! If I died and went to this mythical heaven, no matter how perfect it might be, I would question its reality just like I question my reality now. The only conceivable universe or reality in which I would be content is one in which I did not have the ability to think.

All of the above bothered me for a long time. It doesn’t anymore. I have discovered (or decided) that reality is a subjective matter. Anything that experiences things will perceive those experiences as being real, it doesn’t matter if you’re dreaming or in a simulation. When I’m dreaming, that reality is just as real to me at the time as the reality that I experience after waking up. No longer is reality an objective state–it is relative.