What's scarier: Eternal life, or death?

[Ultra Sarah]

alicommagali

Ultra Sarah

Everything that's great is difficult to get to.

Think: you don't have to work. You would just stop getting paid, and live in a friends or relative's house, maybe the street. It would be a lot easier than working.

until you get hungry.....

Bugs are a healthy, free, alternative food source.  

[nicholelodian]

Ultra Sarah

I was talking about this briefly with a friend.

So what do you think would be scarier, having eternal life, or knowing that one day you will have to face death?

I honestly think the second one is scarier, I couldn't imagine a life without life!

Your thoughts?

I think eternal life,because you would have to witness everyone else dying,right?  

[Ultra Sarah]

rubberducky#2

Ultra Sarah

I was talking about this briefly with a friend.

So what do you think would be scarier, having eternal life, or knowing that one day you will have to face death?

I honestly think the second one is scarier, I couldn't imagine a life without life!

Your thoughts?

I think eternal life,because you would have to witness everyone else dying,right?

We already witness so many people dieing in our life, it wouldn't be so bad if you think about it.  

[Luft Kreig]

Eternal life, immortality of the body, many sought it for various reasons.
Death, the ending of all bodily functions, very few desire this in regards to eternal life, and some have very good reasons.
Spend five minutes watching something in your room, it can be anything so long as it is not able to go out of sight. Have no music on, no television or anything that can distract you.
Now, it isn't that bad...at first.
Immortality is merely an infinite extension on your bodily functions, it doesn't guarantee that you will be forever entertained. It also doesn't grant you immunity from illness or the inevitable degradation that all human bodies go through. Immortality can't stop your mind from becoming a wasteland. After a certain amount of time, the human body will inevitably cease to function in one sense or another. Imagine your grandparents, imagine looking, feeling, thinking, and, in general, being just like them. Not to worry you only have a few millenia to go, then maybe you won't be able to have thought, therefore ending your suffering, though not solving the problem of what people are gonna do to that pile of flesh and bones, your body, that will never decompose.
Don't worry, they won't do anything to your body, although imagine yourself as Terri Schaivo, but unable to die. A metaphorical Hell on Earth.

Death is merely an ending of bodily functions. For some, the unknowns about death are too frightening to face willingly, for others, it is seen as the best thing to occur in their life. I don't want to start a big debate about what you believe happens when you die, I'm just saying this because it's required for my point. If you believe there is nothing after death, maybe eternal life is your better choice. Then again, vegetable for eternity doesn't sound like an affectionate nickname. If you believe in Heaven and Hell, such as Christian beliefs, or reincarnation until attaining the status of Buddha, such as Buddhism, duh, then eternal life could be the equivalent of Hell on Earth. Christianity for instance believes in eternal life after you have died, your soul exits your body and based on whether you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, you go to Heaven if you did, Hell if you didn't. In Heaven, you live for eternity in the glory of God in eternal happiness and wonder, in Hell, you forever are tormented for your sins on Earth. In this situation, you would be making the decision of which of the three planes you wanted to live on for eternity, Heaven, Hell, or Earth, which gets replaced after Christ's Second Coming. Again I don't want to make the thread digress into a "what you believe happens after death" debate.

Some other points previously raised are good also, although some are rather minuscule in the context of FOREVER.

... eek My deepest apologies for this brutally lengthy post. sweatdrop  

[Ultra Sarah]

Luft Kreig

Eternal life, immortality of the body, many sought it for various reasons.
Death, the ending of all bodily functions, very few desire this in regards to eternal life, and some have very good reasons.
Spend five minutes watching something in your room, it can be anything so long as it is not able to go out of sight. Have no music on, no television or anything that can distract you.
Now, it isn't that bad...at first.
Immortality is merely an infinite extension on your bodily functions, it doesn't guarantee that you will be forever entertained. It also doesn't grant you immunity from illness or the inevitable degradation that all human bodies go through. Immortality can't stop your mind from becoming a wasteland. After a certain amount of time, the human body will inevitably cease to function in one sense or another. Imagine your grandparents, imagine looking, feeling, thinking, and, in general, being just like them. Not to worry you only have a few millenia to go, then maybe you won't be able to have thought, therefore ending your suffering, though not solving the problem of what people are gonna do to that pile of flesh and bones, your body, that will never decompose.
Don't worry, they won't do anything to your body, although imagine yourself as Terri Schaivo, but unable to die. A metaphorical Hell on Earth.

Death is merely an ending of bodily functions. For some, the unknowns about death are too frightening to face willingly, for others, it is seen as the best thing to occur in their life. I don't want to start a big debate about what you believe happens when you die, I'm just saying this because it's required for my point. If you believe there is nothing after death, maybe eternal life is your better choice. Then again, vegetable for eternity doesn't sound like an affectionate nickname. If you believe in Heaven and Hell, such as Christian beliefs, or reincarnation until attaining the status of Buddha, such as Buddhism, duh, then eternal life could be the equivalent of Hell on Earth. Christianity for instance believes in eternal life after you have died, your soul exits your body and based on whether you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, you go to Heaven if you did, Hell if you didn't. In Heaven, you live for eternity in the glory of God in eternal happiness and wonder, in Hell, you forever are tormented for your sins on Earth. In this situation, you would be making the decision of which of the three planes you wanted to live on for eternity, Heaven, Hell, or Earth, which gets replaced after Christ's Second Coming. Again I don't want to make the thread digress into a "what you believe happens after death" debate.

Some other points previously raised are good also, although some are rather minuscule in the context of FOREVER.

... eek My deepest apologies for this brutally lengthy post. sweatdrop

Eternal life means you can kill yourself if you want ,,,

You'd be surprised of all the things people can come up with.

Bored = you're too dumb to figure out what to do.
Really.  

[Luft Kreig]

My apologies for not knowing that, I'm new to Gaia and not familiar with this debate. xp

Although fundamentally that was definitely a paradox in your response; eternal life=no death in my book. And while we're at paradoxical scenarios, why don't we add onto the death option the ability to come back to life if one so desires. You know, just to even it out a little.

In response to your bored remark, "There is nothing new under the sun." Originality died many years ago, and after living for an inordinate amount of time, one would start to notice, in their recently attained wisdom, the truth in this quote. You would see how similar such and such is to such and such, only newer, shinier, over-hyped, and, last but not least, redundant.

Also, I really wish you wouldn't attempt to insult others just because they're taking a different stance, this is after all, just for fun, right. razz
It also kinda seems like a desperate attempt to discredit someone without debating the true point at hand.
You also neglected to debate any of the things I mentioned in my post specifically, so either I assume you have no response and admit that you can't disprove any of them, or your "You'd be surprised of all the things people can come up with." remark is just a very generalized way of saying you think I'm completely incompetent. I would very much appreciate it if you would please tell me which one, and if you can disprove some of my points, by all means do proceed.
I personally believe you to be an intelligent person aside from those little flaws.
So care to have wine and cheese later? cheese_whine smile
I mean really; Why Not?  

[Ultra Sarah]

Well, let me exaggerate on what I meant, I don't think you got the point. I tried being obvious about it but ... you took that for immaturity. I don't know where you got the idea that I was insulting you.

If you're bored, you clearly aren't looking hard enough for something to do. I mean, just living long as the rest of humanity lives would be great already, altough I admit that after the rest of humanity dies it would get a little lonely. (Just a bit.) But basicly, there are endless things to do. And there are still original ideas. Most ideas are original, in fact. Some movies or books are blatant rip-offs, but most really aren't. And even if they are somewhat of a rip-off, it's still interesting to see a new take on the matter. And these new ideas come up all the time, there are many many things to do.

I suppose that the more interested you are in learning, the more interesting eternal life is. If you're the type that falls asleep in school, after having gotten twelve round hours of sleep, then eternal life would seem just as boring as school would.  

[Luft Kreig]

My deepest apologies for that error. I was slightly tired when I stumbled upon your response so I misread the intention of the post, I didn't accurately figure out what it was in response to.
I see your point, although I still say after an eternity of learning one would eventually notice a pattern, wouldn't you agree? Details can change but that doesn't make them original. Things we believe to be original today were thought of before, and either done, wrote, etc..., faded out of sight or was forgotten, and was redone later.
I still don't see how that disproves my statement, you can have a viscous drive for knowledge and wisdom and still find eternity boring. Once you have become intelligent enough, you will have gained the ability to figure our most things before they happen, ruining a few good books and movies, and you will have had more than enough time to come up with this yourself with more variants than you could give distinctive labels.
Now I don't fall asleep in class for any reason except a conflict between my circadian rhythm and the time school starts and even then I stay awake because I genuinely do enjoy learning. Even then, one can learn everything and then what? You will run out of things to learn eventually or you will have already figured it out way ahead of time to where you become the source of new knowledge, and others attempt to extort your drive for knowledge for selfish gain. Now this may sound rather outlandish but living forever allows near infinite possibilities, near infinite.
You also neglected to answer my wine and cheese question.
EDITED FOR CLARIFICATION  

[spearquest]

I would say eternal life would be scarier. death concerns us cuz we don't know what we will experiance. will there be an afterlife? or do we cease to exist?
I believe there has to be something beyond life because i believe there are different levels of existance. people who have near death experiances all say there is something beyond the point of death. and even if it is a way for people to except something beyond there control, it is still something. whose to say there isn't anything beyond death as well.
we live as physical beings, die and turn atherial, and then maybe something else happens. even if there isn't an afterlife, that does and doesn't worry me cuz we have no memory of millions of years that came before us and when we die we won't be aware of the millions of years that come later. death does worry me cuz i don't know what to expect, but like things in life, stuff happens, and i can't do anything to stop it.

living forever is worse for me, cuz even though it would be nice to see where events go, whose to say the future is something we want to experiance. living forever doesn't mean your involnurable to suffering. it just means you can't die in which case you suffer for an indeterminate amount of time with no sign of relief. and in the next million years when the sun goes nova and the world explodes, you'll suffer forever in space with no air cuz you can't die. "all good things must come to an end"  

[Sarallelogram]

He'll always be my

Eternal life, I feel, would be worse than death.

Imagine, you've been married for many years,
you love your spouse with all your heart.
You two always do everything together
and every second apart is painful.
Then one day the most terrible thing happens.
Somehow they die or are killed.
The intial sadness is enough to make you want to die.
You spend your first day without them,
the sadness digging deeper into your soul.
Then it hits you.
You can't die.
You can never die and be with them
in whatever afterlife you believe in.
They're gone forever
and in that moment you wish with all your heart
that you could one day join them in death.
But you will live forever.

S u p e r h e r o <3

 

[Sarallelogram]

Ultra Sarah

Well, let me exaggerate on what I meant, I don't think you got the point. I tried being obvious about it but ... you took that for immaturity. I don't know where you got the idea that I was insulting you.

If you're bored, you clearly aren't looking hard enough for something to do. I mean, just living long as the rest of humanity lives would be great already, altough I admit that after the rest of humanity dies it would get a little lonely. (Just a bit.) But basicly, there are endless things to do. And there are still original ideas. Most ideas are original, in fact. Some movies or books are blatant rip-offs, but most really aren't. And even if they are somewhat of a rip-off, it's still interesting to see a new take on the matter. And these new ideas come up all the time, there are many many things to do.

I suppose that the more interested you are in learning, the more interesting eternal life is. If you're the type that falls asleep in school, after having gotten twelve round hours of sleep, then eternal life would seem just as boring as school would.

He'll always be my

After all the rest of humanity dies off
and you're the last one,
who will be there to think up new ideas.
The original will become just as boring as what's not.
You will have read and seen everything and still live on.
Sure, it will take many years for you to do everything,
but you'll do it all and have nothing new to experience.

S u p e r h e r o <3

 

[xogirllyox]

Hi I just wanted to say im allie im new to this guild

eternal death is a scary subject i hate talking about it.

I would never ever want to die  

[xogirllyox]

Oh im sorry i read the post wrong I think that eternal life is way better than death.

I would love to live forever, exept with all the girl drama.  

[spearquest]

death is scary for some because they don't know what to expect. but for others, death is a relief that can be giving for those that have some type of suffering or pain in their lives.
life may be painful with the experiance of loss, but it also allows us to experiance the joys of new beginnings as well.  

[Jin-Universal-Guardian-]

Ok, a few words are only needed. Eternal life is when your body can never rest. Death isn't that bad because you can rest in peace.