From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Thu Apr 07 2005 - 06:10:24 BST
Ham,
Unless I am misreading, this a little unfair...
> In case you didn't see this dual-choice question in my previous postings,
> here it is.
>
> Suppose that at your death you are faced with having to make a
> voluntary choice between the following two options:
>
> Option 1 (Nothingness): You may choose that, effective immediately, your
> proprietary awareness, including all memory of your life-experience will be
permanently erased. Your "consciousness-of-self" will, in effect, return to
> the nothingness from whence you came.
>
> Option 2 (Somethingness): You may choose "psychic continuity" in a form or
mode that is presently incomprehensible to you and that can only be revealed by
choosing it beforehand.
>
> Which would you choose, and why?
In this case you seem to presuppose that "belief in continuation" provides
"continuation". If "Somethingness" was merely a function of "believing in it",
this whole discussion would have to be seriously adjusted.
If "somethingness" was what awaited, even the "non-believers" would attain it.
And, if "nothingness" existed, even the "believers" would fall into it.
Jung had posited that we are witnessing a crisis of age, and I see this
worsening every year. People are more and more afraid of aging and death, are
running from it on the physical, social and emotional levels. I agree with Mark
that religion opiates this fear, but only temporarily, and undealt with it
grows in the psyche until we see thanatophobia epidemics. Religion historically
has manipulated this fear by saying that "somethingness" is guarded by
nationalistic or tribal bounds. Only "some" will achieve "somethingness", which
echoes your options above. Religion asks you to "choose" somethingness or
nothingness, as if your choice effects the outcome. Or rather, it presupposes a
"somethingness" that is open only to those who believe in the "somethingness".
Since most people have not been helped to achieve peace with "nothingness",
they run away from this, and right into religion's open arms.
Whether "somethingness" or "nothingness" awaits us, the key is to be at peace
with that. Ultimately, this is the psychological maturation people should
strive for, not dogma that tells us it has the answer, but strength not to need
the answer, and to be at peace.
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