What does it mean to you, what do you want from it?

An Alzheimer's patient will lose their memory, the accumulated data that they have kept for years and years, they'll lose their personality, and eventually die. The same will happen with someone with brain damage. To use a less extreme example, as we age our entire personality will change.. our likes and dislikes change, and our perspectives change.

Considering that, what of the afterlife then? What of the mind, what of the soul? Is it really realistic to believe that someone who dies will live on in some spiritual world? What if they died of mad cow? Are they cursed to an eternal soul-life cursed by the last moments of the diseases crippling effects on the mind? Or is there some separation between the mind and the brain? If there is, then why do people's mind's change for physical reasons? Cut out a piece of brain and someone's whole personality changes? That sounds like the "mind" is inherently physical, and if that's the case, won't it cease to be upon death?

I, myself, find it absolutely incredible that we've evolved to the point that we can ponder such things.


I believe that humans think far too much of themselves.
Souls? Not a shred of physical evidence that they exist.
Divine placement from a higher being? Plz, you're hairless, smarter monkeys.
Personalities? Different life experiences ensures we come out different from one another. You're different now than you were when you were 10, so of course, you'll change as you age.


And, really, think about it. From a purely evolutionary viewpoint, how the hell did WE succeed as the dominant race? No natural weapons, proportionally weaker than almost every other species, extremely little body hair, and our instincts are piss-poor for survival. Something frightens us, what do we do? Scream. Way to go!
Maybe 3,000+ years of civilized living has tamed us, but still, you have to admit that our only advantage is intelligence.




tl;dr: Get over yourselves, humans. You're not special. Hell, it's probably pure dumb luck that you've come to the point that you have.










But then, that's my viewpoint. I haven't really seen anyone else that thinks the same.

Life is, quite simply, that thing that happens before you die. What I want is to be able to look back on it as I die and not be disappointed in myself or feel like I've wasted my time.

I know little of Alzheimer's, but I know it damages the hippocampus. Which primarily means destruction of access to short-term memory. I agree that the physical brain is largely dominant over how a person acts, but I have heard brain damage used as shorthand for "having no control over themselves." So...as to the metaphysical aspect of the mind and soul, I would assume the memories would still be there. It's a door, but the key is lost. Assuming that there is a soul and an afterlife (which I will on the basis of religion, mock me if you wish), I think that the essential self will still be there.

Of course, maybe I'm full of idealistic bull.

But what is the "essential self?"

I don't know, and I'm not sure anyone really does. It's the kind of thing people spend years studying psychology and theology to try and find an answer to. I'm not sure if you'd call it the soul, the self, identity, or what, but my best guess is it's a core of being, something that makes you the person you are throughout your life and a constant through fluctuations of mood. I don't know that there is a clear and concise answer, as it crosses into other debates that have no certain answer - "what is the meaning of life?" and "is God real?"

I guess my question is more along the lines of: "If someone gets a piece cut out of their brain and it changes their entire personality" then what does this say about the possibility of "essential self"?

I don't know if I believe in the afterlife or souls and whatnot. I believe that if the Bible is correct and there is a God that values faith so much that it would be impossible to prove his existence. So I'm more concerned about what I can do and what I should do while I'm here. As far as I'm concerned the most important thing to do while you live is to help other people. It might be partially selfish as helping other people seems to be one of the few things that genuinely makes me happy even if the moment is brief. If I got to the end of my life and it turns out I didn't dot all my Is and cross all my Ts and so I'm denied eternal peace or whatnot then that would suck surely but any God that would damn people for eternity for that is simply the devil in a white robe. I think that as long as I try to help the people around me and even those that I don't see I'll be able to look back and be happy with myself for being a 'good person.' I've kinda gone off on a tangent here and not responded to any of the later questions in Pink's post but right now this is all I feel like typing.

I agree wholeheartedly with Gilgamesh. If I were to post something without looking at the other posts I probably would have been closely identical to his.

I'm also with Swifto when he says that humans think too much of themselves. Humans also are very wasteful compared to other living things and sometimes make the choice of being ignorant instead of being potentially innocent like other animals.

Despite last year as a Christian, though, I don't think there's any evidence of souls or afterlife. And if there actually were souls and afterlife, it would be impossible to tell. I've never had any big, metaphysical or spiritual experiences per say, and that's part of why I can't hold the faith that there actually is something or someone that made the universe.

That's sorta straying from the topic, though. When it comes to the actual meaning of life, I don't think it could ever be an absolute meaning, and if there was an absolute meaning, we'd all miss it despite how wise we were able to become in later years. That's not to say that the "meaning of life" is essentially worthless. The "journey of life" so to speak is meaningful in itself in that it can take you places you never thought would be possible. Now I'm suddenly reminded of this good book but I can't think of the name.

I can only know of my own experiences and observances throughout life. The only evidence I have throughout other people's experiences is books, speeches, articles, etc., but I can never live out what they did. So to also say that when someone dies, they're kaput, I can't put absolute faith in that, either.

And about getting diseases that can change someone's whole personality--there's also the realization that someone's personality can change when it comes to what they experience in their environment and peers. That's been proven in the Stanford prison experiment which I'm sure a lot of people here are already aware of. People can change drastically when it comes to fear.

I've said a lot here so far so I think I'll shut up now. But yeah, that's how I see it as.

I don't know. This sort of question doesn't bother me at all. It's rather disturbing as an in the course of life issue, but I don't think it really says anything about the nature of the soul or has any impact on the afterlife. I don't see why any harm done to the brain or the "mind" in this life would carry over to the afterlife anymore than I see an issue in the changes that occur throughout life. Is an end of life change all that special? I don't really think so. In terms of the changes throughout life, well I think the soul encompasses the entirety of self throughout life and probably something beyond that too. The soul, or at least the resurrected body and soul (I'm Catholic, so that's what I believe, deal with it :p) stand outside time so I don't see why this wouldn't be the case. There are some issues that could be brought up in response to this. I don't really feel like writing about it right now unless someone brings them up though.

42.


There, I said it.

If we're already descending into insanity...

I'm really not sure why personality manifests as it does, but it's interesting to speculate, if depressing. For every trait, there's a counter, and my psych textbook actually labeled them as positive and negative. For instance, introversion is negative, which irritates me to no end.

What is it about life that we're able to say what's good and bad about the way a person is? Not acts, but is. How is it we claim to know so much about personality that we're able to tell people "You're doing it wrong" simply because they deviate from the norm?

I don't think we should be able to decide what alters personality until we understand it better, at least to a point where the my way or the highway mentality is the exception rather than the rule.


...and I seem to have gone off on a tangent. Again. I need to stop ranting when half-asleep.

On a more serious note, I mostly try to stay away from this question; my mind always seems to go to a bad place when I do stray into the subject.

Instead, I try to focus on what I intend to accomplish with my time.

I like my method: Laughing at people that think they're important.

I have a question that sort of ties in with this:
For those of you who don't (myself included), why do you not seize the opportunities you regret not seizing? And, when you do regret a lost moment, why do you let it fly when it comes by again?