FYI:
On the Science Channel one of my favorite documentary series, Morgan Freeman: Through the Wormhole starts a new season.
First up:
Is there life after death?: “Scientists and spiritualists try to define consciousness, and possibilities concerning life after death”.
Ought to be interesting.
Life after death is a contradiction in terms.
I agree, I dont like the term life (though if reincarnation is true then it would still be valid) used in this context. I prefer “existance” after death.
I just watched it, very interesting, I believe the first man in the show was the closest to the truth, Ebon(?) Alexander ( a teacher of neuro science and a neuro surgeon) contracted a rare form of Meningitis and fell into a coma and a vitual brain death that lasted 7 days. Within a month he made a recovery and is basically back to normal. What he could recall of the experiance was extemely intertwined with the divine, speaking about experiances he had in differant parts of nature and after that being pulled back to what he called “the core” and seeing the multiverse in front of him and feeling a warmth of the divine, what people would call god and feeling that love was a major part of what existance is.
He did not feel that anything that is known in neuro science could explain what he experianced and that it may be beyond what can be explained scientifically and within the realm of neuro science.
sounds pretty similar to drug experiences to me…don’t know if that’s in the realm of neuro science.
How so?
If one thinks in terms of human consciousness surviving death, it isn’t.
We can’t know this so perhaps all we can say is that “Life after death may be a contradiction in terms”.
What say you? 
I was actually thinking early this morning over my “French Roast” 
that perhaps THIS life is our actual death and that what happens after our so-called physical deaths is when actual life begins. Perhaps our dreams are psychic glimpses or clues given to us so that we may begin to discover and reflect upon what is to come when we actually Live our true lives. Sort of like inverted reincarnation. I haven’t figured it all out yet.
Or perhaps it’s simply the raging inferno that is bearing down and sweeping the Earth…too hot. Have the scientists discovered that the Sun is moving closer to the Earth?
When we say “life after death” what we really mean is, there is no such thing as death.
The question ought to be phrased, Is there such a thing as death? Phrased in this manner, the question presents itself more honestly, revealing what is really being inquired here: does life come to an end?
I think we really need to try and be less sloppy with language.
Good luck with that… seriously. 
But the concept of life after death can be arranged even if it didn’t already exist. A person’s consciousness can be transferred to a different body. Of course the only way that scientists could ever know how to do that would be to put it into android, but still even that would get the job done. Before science it was being done in more interesting ways that can still be done.
The problem is that people just aren’t bright enough. Would you want just anyone and everyone to live eternally? If not, how would you choose? While you choose, you ensure that you will not be one on the list.
Three Times Great wrote…
Well, we are thinking of ‘physical’ death there…where matter disintegrates.
Our consciousness living on may be a completely different form of life than the one we experience now. Are we to presume that the “I” and the ‘self’ which we are now will be experienced in the same way?
Yes, but wouldn’t you then have to define what You mean by ‘death’? The words Life and Death can hold different meanings to people. The words have to be not only defined but in such a way as to shed more light on their meaning, no? As you say…
I totally agree with this. Because of the meaning which we all attribute to something and because of the nature of our beliefs, it is not so easy to express what we are really trying to get across.
Um.
I hate to assume but I figure this was directed at JSS…and not towards me and my last post. Such synchronicity in moments. 
What reason do we have to think that such a highly complex and dependent system as consciousness can continue to exist after the brain is destroyed? Do we say a piece of firewood “still exists” after it has been burned up?
To me, death is defined as the ceasing of existence. When a form that previously existed no longer exists, it is said to have died. I do not think a definition of life is needed to appreciate the fact that energetic forms, however we wish to define their constitutions and makeup, cease to exist once they experience sufficient degredation.
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Yes that is true. That is why I think language needs to be used very carefully here, in this manner we can more precisely ‘tease out’ what we really mean and what we are really talking about.
Are you assuming that Your life is the life of your Body?
Are you assuming it isn’t?
It most definitely wasn’t (and isn’t) meant that way in the religions, so when I speak of such things, I use their language as well as I can.
What good is it to have different meanings to your words than those to whom you speak? Wouldn’t that be “sloppy”?
That would be so only if we truly understood the meaning of both. Not to mention that which mediates them in discussions like these: human consciousness.
Everything I know about this human consciousness tells me it is highly fragile and dependent. It can be modified, damaged, or destroyed. We do not need to “truly understand” life in order to observe its highly contingent and conditional nature.
What good is it to limit yourself and your thinking to the “religious” language of others? When I speak here, I specify and define my terms and meanings. I attempt to get to the level of content. If others are stuck in their closed terminology and superficial meanings, that has nothing to do with me. I do not pander to that crude level of misunderstanding, where one cannot see past the words one uses to the meaning and content underneath.
Three Times Great wrote:
None, I suppose. At the same time, it might depend on one’s beliefs or thoughts, no? Does ‘real’ and ‘actual’ consciousness occur within the brain or does it occur within the mind? I’m just giving you my musings here. For me, the mind is separate from the brain. That is not to say that I necessarily feel that personal human consciousness continues after the brain has completely shut down.
Atoms – do atoms continue on or can they be destroyed? At least the energy from atoms cannot be destroyed but can be transformed or re-directed. Am I wrong? Perhaps what we are just mingles with other energy.
Cease to exist in THAT form which had been our physical existence. But again, perhaps who we really is released and intermingles with what others really are – and all of that Energy is just transformed. After all, isn’t this the way we all began? As beautiful star stuff, energy and light that eventually became transformed into ‘fixed matter’ - but at the same time, maintaining that energy and light beneath and above, in a matter of speaking.
I like that express ‘tease out’. It aptly expresses a good way in which the journey of our discussions can go forward…how our thoughts and musings may lend themselves to further clarity…but that takes opening up and releasing the beetle in the box and showing ours to others.
Thank You. 
Agreed, but if you want to preserve something, it certainly helps to be certain of what it is that you are preserving.
Let me ask you this;
If your computer has acid poured into it, do you lose the programs and information within?
You will if you don’t take precautions to avoid it. It is “fragile”. But if you have stored those programs onto something else, not so fragile, a new body restores your computer and you can continue where you left off. Which is more important to you, the hardware or the programs and information within?
What they call you “spirit” is actually your efforts in life; of life. It is your “will” (as Schopenhauer and Nietzsche put it). And I don’t mean the paper you sign. Your will/spirit/efforts are your “program” analogy. By merely signing that paper and ensuring that someone responsible will take care of its concerns or by other means ensure that your life’s efforts continue, you have preserved your “spirit” in merely a different form of body.
To achieve eternal life takes a little more. But either way, you live beyond your body’s death (just as they have always said. “Though you shall die, you shall not die”).