On Sep 12, 5:05Â pm, "bigflet...@
gmail.com"
gmail.com>
wrote:> On Sep 13, 4:40Â am, Shrikeb...@
gmail.com wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>> On Sep 10, 5:19Â pm, "bigflet...@
gmail.com"
gmail.com>
>> wrote:> Some, because they will kill without remorse. Some because they have>>> enough problems trying to come to grips with this life, let alone past
>>> lives, and some because they are frightened of what they may see if
>>> they look.
>
>> On Sep 10, 5:19 pm, "bigflet...@
gmail.com"
gmail.com>
>> wrote:>
>>> Some, because they will kill without remorse. Some because they have
>>> enough problems trying to come to grips with this life, let alone past
>>> lives, and some because they are frightened of what they may see if
>>> they look.
>
>> Or perhaps we don't have past lives.
>
>> Just a suggestion. Â Hell, we don't even
>> know if we really have a current life. Â We
>> could be Brains in a Vat or a butterfly's
>> dream. Â All this certainty about the
>> unknowable just makes me cringe.
>
> Ive yet to read anyone with that pov , to write "Hell, *I* dont even
> know".
The sage awoke from a dream he was a butterfly and
didn't not know whether he was a man dreaming he
was a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he was a man.
-Chuang Tzu
> You do get points however  for 'its just a suggestion" :-).Shows your
> mind isnt deadlocked :-)
Well, my point is that yours seems to be. You are
far too certain about things you could not possibly
be certain (in my epistemology.)
> When you get to know, you will be empathetic to those who are where
> you are now. That saves a lot of strife. There is always a temptation
> to try to inflict your experiences on 'them', and that can be
> traumatic.
> Most actually believe we *are* brains in a vat. The vat being skull
> shaped and made of bone.:-)
Heh. Yes, but the "Brain in a Vat" reference alludes to a
well-known epistemological problem. If we were merely
brains being fed simulated experiences, there would be no
way for us to know it. In fact, everything could be illusory,
including the idea that our brain is a bunch of grey stuff
in a skull made of bone. The Matrix immediately comes
to mind. The biggest problem with the premise of that
movie was that the machines allegedly used the humans
as energy plants, when human beings don't generate
energy at all. They burn glucose. The machines would
get more energy burning the glucose directly. So I felt
that a movie made by people who were so ignorant of
thermodynamics as that probably had nothing to show
me about epistemology.
But as far as reincarnation, I'll leave you with Modest
Mouse:
"Maybe we'll get lucky and we'll both live again,
I don't know, I don't know, I don't really think so."
And I find accounts of rememberances of past lives
completely unconvincing.
