Observatio

On the same subject, and in light of my ongoing conversation with a lifelong friend about faith and atheism, I sometimes wonder if the truth of the matter is that whatever we believe the afterlife to be is what it will appear to be to us as we die. I’ve always thought that those near-death experiences some people have border on autosuggestion, i.e., they expected, subconsciously, to encounter a tunnel, a light, and dead loved ones, and that’s exactly what they saw when their hearts weren’t beating and their brains were flat-lining.

If you’ve ever seen David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive, you must have considered the possibility that illusion could be a huge part of the experience of dying. The entire movie takes place in the moment Naomi Watts’ character is dying. I can imagine that a person of deep faith, like my friend, would drift into a dream of everlasting life in the presence of Jesus simply because that is sewn into his very identity. I, on the other hand, will more than likely fade to black, since that’s what I expect the afterlife to be. A lot of nothing.

Religious ideas -- which are really all about immortality -- could well be a kind of archetypal message from our ancestors telling us that we are in control of our own afterlife. Peter Pan style, all we have to do is believe. Who wouldn’t want to train themselves to live forever?

But that introduces a very tricky dilemma. How can you brainwash yourself to believe in eternal life at the hem of Jesus when science and philosophy -- if you’re paying any attention -- point instead to a definitive end? Is living a lie the smoothest way to dying in peace? Can it even be accomplished, given our tendency to doubt? What if you are burdened with doubt at the very end -- does your fond vision of heaven evaporate with that small, badly timed chink in your faith?

I’m not the kind who would be able to hedge my bets by signing up with the outfit that has the nicest eternity plan. This is not like buying a car or getting a time-share. No, I’m afraid that even if I knew my dying thoughts would dictate my afterlife, I’d wind up devoted instead to the truth as I see it at the time.

Maybe if they come up with a drug -- some kind of Pearly Gates opiate that guides you along to your ideal eternity. Maybe I’d give that a try.

Observatio

I’ve been working out in my layman’s way these thoughts about mortality brought on by my dad’s death. Nothing makes sense -- either way you care to read that phrase.

I keep coming back to the religious idea that we might exist after this life in some eternal, nonphysical state, since that’s the default belief. But, like I said before, eternity is the absence of time by definition, so to “exist” is not really a correct way to refer to such a state. Existence is tied to space and time.

Only a state of nothingness can ever be thought of -- given the limits of our imagination -- as eternal, yet our physical lives are proof that nothingness is not eternal. It was perking right along in all its non-existential glory until we were born, or at least till our self-awareness kicked in, at which time nothingness ended. Therefore, we can say that nothingness isn’t eternal because it came to an end when we came into existence. If even nothingness isn’t eternal, then there’s no other kind of state that can have that characteristic because all other conceivable states depend on the presence of the “self” or a subject, an I (eye), or change of some kind (like the transformation of dead dinosaurs into oil), and that implies time. Since eternity is the absence of time, no state that requires those kinds of things can be eternal.

But if nothingness ended when we came to be, it’s not eternal and must have a beginning too, since anything that ends has been in existence for some period of time -- an unfathomably long time, but some estimable length -- implying that it also had a beginning. Anything with a beginning and an end can’t be said to be eternal, so nothingness can’t be said to be eternal.

Now that that’s settled...

If we accept that no consciousness-based afterlife can be truly eternal, and nothingness is not eternal, then what are the possibilities for the state of our “selves” after death?

Well, we might imagine existing in a non-physical state after death, but not eternally. In other words, if our identities are somehow preserved after death, then we still exist in time (if not literal space) because we’ll still be subjects and observers of (and in) the universe. This kind of existence is hard to imagine because we can’t quite grasp what it is to have a mind but no body. Are our bodies just suits of clothes during life, prisons of our true spirits? Or are mind and body really one neurobiological system, with the mind dependent on the physical body for its own existence? If it’s the latter, as science seems to be concluding, then any afterlife will have to be tied to some other system we don’t yet know about that provides a platform for the mind to retain its integrity. That means it will be “physical” in some sense, or at least anchored to time and space.

Another possibility is that we cease to exist altogether, entering the same nothingness we must have inhabited (in the form of a potential being) before birth. This state, though, isn’t eternal either, according to the rules of the game, so it might well be interrupted again, by other periods of consciousness, other lives, or other states of awareness of space and time, whether via the mind we’re used to or a new one, and presumably with some kind of body. (By the way, Seneca touches on just these points in Letter LXXXVIII, way back in the first century A.D.)

And still another possibility is that this life will be the only interruption of nothingness that we will ever experience and our state after death will be as if eternal. After all, eons passed before we were born, and we weren’t aware of ourselves in any way. It’s easy to imagine that eons will pass after we’re dead too, with no interruptions to make this nothingness anything but a de facto state of eternity, even if it’s constantly interrupted by other people’s momentary awareness.

But there’s one big difference between the prior state of nothingness and the one that’s ahead for each of us. We will have existed. We will have possessed a consciousness, a viewpoint, and that consciousness is something that did not exist in the prior state of nothingness.

We deduce that the universe existed during that state, though. We accept that the stars and planets existed, that life on Earth existed, that all of it wasn’t created out of nothing when we were born just to give us a context. So something existed in the midst and in spite of our personal nothingness. And something existed before there were any subjects or observers to notice it.

I’m not sure where this leads. Heavy drinking, probably. What I do know is that life certainly gives us plenty to chew on during the brief time we’re wading through it.

Observatio

I’ve just read a short column about what happens to us when we die, theoretically. It seems a pretty good time to contemplate such meaty stuff, since my father died three weeks ago. Where he is, how he experiences his being, if at all, and whether his consciousness has survived intact are all on my mind. If there is an overriding justice in the universe, though, he has probably returned as a little black baby in Detroit.

The column -- I forget where I saw it -- tied the idea of consciousness to Einstein’s theory of relativity, which makes sense in a way. If time and space depend upon an observer, then the absence of the observer implies the obliteration of time and space. The writer said that time “reboots” at our death, though I’m not quite sure what he means by that. Sounds like a nod toward reincarnation, because if time reboots it means there must be a new subjective observer. In that sense, time begins when we’re born, or when we start to perceive the world as a subjective observer, and ends when we die. It is easy to imagine, along with a million other possibilities, that “I” will inhabit another consciousness after this one fades away -- a new one, or maybe even an older one embedded in another time. Who knows? All I know for sure is that it’s impossible to experience nothingness, so either my ability to experience at all comes to an end when I die, or “consciousness” is somehow renewed. It will be interesting to find out, though I’m happy to wait as long as possible for the news.

On the other hand, I’m pretty sure I had no consciousness prior to this life. Nothing comes right to mind. Maybe this life is my first appearance, or maybe, if time does reboot, the observer’s script is erased and there is nothing to be remembered of earlier struttings on the stage.

I’m willing to give Einstein the benefit of the doubt. He thought that the time-space bullpen we find ourselves waiting in -- the present -- is an illusion. That seems as realistic as anything I’ve heard on the subject.