Do you believe in Reincarnation?

[Mole]

There is no evidence for reincarnation.

In fact the blind belief in reincarnation leads to fatalism, and fatalism leads to social and personal decay.

 

[lunalum]

I'd at least hope that my consciousness is resurrected in about another few hundred billion years, after all the cool ones have already come up. Bonus points if the universe lets us keep at least a vague recollection of a past life when we are all recycled.

 

[Redbone]

Yes.

 

[21%]

Nope. I want to go and be gone.

 

[Typh0n]

I have no reason to believe in reincarnation, but I dont exclude it as a possibility either. I just have no evidence it exists.

 

[Siúil a Rúin]

I'll believe in whatever there is an accumulation of evidence.

So far, we only have rare anecdotal stories that suggest any sort of truth to the notion of Westernized (not buddhist) reincarnation... so I'd have to say not.

Besides, how come no one's former self was ever a nobody?

Do you have an opinion, yenom? For this being in the Philosophy section, there wasn't much meat on it. Have you studied any of the prominent cases?



EDIT: I want to come back as Fluffywolf.

That is the funny part, isn't it? I don't believe in reincarnation, but I do have an active imagination and feel a strange kinship towards certain images. I have a feeling like I was a harpist in the early part of the 20th century, a little person in a traveling carnival before that, a dog with a close canine friend, a few other various critters, and then for most of the time a tree. Oh, and also an ant for quite a while.

 

[WALMART]

I believe all matter is perpetuated indefinitely.

Perhaps we all share essences of past lives with each other.

 

[Infinite Bubble]

I do not believe it in the more traditional sense.

But, I do think it could be possible for matter to hold a sort of "memory" within it, in which case, segments of previous energy states and patterns might be re-used at some points. The universe is a cyclical system as it is anyway.

Although extremely (extremely) improbable, if this was true, then the complex pattern that made up a consciousness, with integrated traits and thought processes could be stored temporarily, in a sort of universal binary code. It could then be picked up by another being. In fact, this process could be a way to implant the mind of a human inside a cats brain (or vice-versa), or some other animal. That was a random tangent, but whatever.

From a purely physical standpoint, the atoms in ones body might well have been used in a previous one, although that is not nearly as exciting a prospect as the traditional idea of reincarnation.

But to sum up, no I do not believe in it really.

 

[whitelion]

I do not believe it in the more traditional sense.

But, I do think it could be possible for matter to hold a sort of "memory" within it, in which case, segments of previous energy states and patterns might be re-used at some points. The universe is a cyclical system as it is anyway.

Although extremely (extremely) improbable, if this was true, then the complex pattern that made up a consciousness, with integrated traits and thought processes could be stored temporarily, in a sort of universal binary code. It could then be picked up by another being. In fact, this process could be a way to implant the mind of a human inside a cats brain (or vice-versa), or some other animal. That was a random tangent, but whatever.

From a purely physical standpoint, the atoms in ones body might well have been used in a previous one, although that is not nearly as exciting a prospect as the traditional idea of reincarnation.

But to sum up, no I do not believe in it really.

that's exactly what I think, too

 

[Lexicon]

I don't believe in reincarnation, but I thought this was a cool documentary, nonetheless. Revolves around a case of supposed reincarnation. You can observe the dynamics, direct and indirect, that may have contributed to the situation, as well as how some of the medical community views such things.

Perhaps a bit of what [MENTION=15886]superunknown[/MENTION] expresses is illustrated here, as well.

related link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_B._Tucker#Reincarnation_research

 

[ndovjtjcaqidthi]

I believe all matter is perpetuated indefinitely.

Perhaps we all share essences of past lives with each other.

I truly, totally believe this too.

 

[Alea_iacta_est]

In a manner, yes, though it is through reintegration via a paradox created with the unattainable state of non-existence (excepting in a first-person, existing, frame of reference, i.e. conceptual non-existence) rather than any spiritual connection or ideology.

Essentially, assuming that an Atheistic worldview is true, we arose out of the not-existing non-existence into a corporeal, existing form as consciousness, meaning that if we return to this state of non-existence, we would inevitably reintegrate back into existence due to the fact that it is impossible to maintain a state of non-existence for it contradicts its very nature.

 

[WALMART]

I truly, totally believe this too.

Brain-Buddies.

 

[ndovjtjcaqidthi]

Brain-Buddies.

 

[Opal]

In a manner, yes, though it is through reintegration via a paradox created with the unattainable state of non-existence (excepting in a first-person, existing, frame of reference, i.e. conceptual non-existence) rather than any spiritual connection or ideology.

Essentially, assuming that an Atheistic worldview is true, we arose out of the not-existing non-existence into a corporeal, existing form as consciousness, meaning that if we return to this state of non-existence, we would inevitably reintegrate back into existence due to the fact that it is impossible to maintain a state of non-existence for it contradicts its very nature.

"We" would lose our form, though, no? We build neuronal empires, and the memories of those may impact others and resurface in that way, but do you think the precise pattern of our circuitry would reappear? If so, genetics are the only reasonable way of preservation I can imagine, unless you consider our essence something immaterial (souls) that trickles from our physical containers on an unobservable plane. I see no reason to believe that though.

(mostly rhetorical clarification for my sake, since I failed to find your reintegration thread)

 

[á´…eparted]

Nope. There is not a lick of evidence to even tenuously support the idea of it, and any "evidence" that has claimed to me is quickly discredited.

It's sad though, reincarnation would make my "purpose" in living a lot more meaningful, at least with respect to my drive to do stuff.

 

[Alea_iacta_est]

"We" would lose our form, though, no? We build neuronal empires, and the memories of those may impact others and resurface in that way, but do you think the precise pattern of our circuitry would reappear? If so, genetics are the only reasonable way of preservation I can imagine, unless you consider our essence something immaterial (souls) that trickles from our physical containers on an unobservable plane. I see no reason to believe that though.

Spontaneous reintegration. When we die, we (our consciousnesses) cease to function and exist. Therefore, we would enter the plane of non-existence, but that's impossible due to the fact that non-existence can't exist due to the infinite potential of non-existence to exist, so, when we die, we would simply become non-existent for no amount of time (no amount of time due to the fact that there is no such thing as time in non-existence due to the fact that non-existence is separate from existence but at the same time also non-existent itself) and then be randomly reintegrated back into existence as anything at any point in time or space or any other dimensional axes due to the fact that non-existence would be unfettered by the laws of existence due to its absence.

Essentially it's just a loophole in the system (a paradox).

Reintegration threads (a huge chunk of it is in my members' blog "Scribbles of a Madman" and I don't think your post count is high enough to get there; I also realized I coined reintegration in my blog, so that's why it isn't specifically mentioned in these threads):
1
2

 

[Tellenbach]

Yes. There are some fascinating accounts of children's past life experiences in Carol Bowman's book "Return From Heaven". There is also an online forum that lets parents of such children share their experiences. I accept anecdotal evidence if there is enough of it and there are thousands of such accounts, many of them collected by Ian Stevenson.

"Stevenson helped to found the Society for Scientific Exploration in 1982, and was the author of around three hundred papers and fourteen books on reincarnation, including Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation (1966) and European Cases of the Reincarnation Type (2003). His major work was the 2,268-page, two-volume Reincarnation and Biology: A Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects (1997). This reported two hundred cases of birth-marks that, he believed, corresponded with a wound on the deceased person whose life the child purported to recall."

 

[OptoGypsy]

I don't remember my existence before I was who I am so why the fuck would I care, if I'm not going to know how it's going to be in another life form or in darkness?

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

In the sense that

energy isn't destroyed, so our energy is redirected upon death

and

ultimately our physical matter will return to the cosmic dust; until that time, it is recycled into the circle of life a la cutesy Disney musicals.

But, is there a cosmic waiting room where our souls wait in line until assignment to a new body? I doubt it. I find certain Tibetan Buddhist ideas and concepts regarding reincarnation very fascinating, but I remain skeptical.

Perhaps our memories and thoughts are somehow cycled around, potentially explaining how a five year old in an american suburb might have vivid and detailed memories of the inner workings of a WWII Bomber Plane and how the hell I was speaking German in my sleep (according to an exchange student I roomed with in college) when I had not taken a single course in german.