This is in response to Dr. Jiten Roy's emails on the topic.
1. I don't understand why he thinks that atheists are materialistic. I think he has meant materialist, not materialistic.
2. The concepts like soul and afterlife are totally speculations. No scientific proposition is a speculation; it is the result of a process of scientific research and investigation.
3. I don't understand what he means when he says that consciousness, compassion, and spirit cannot be proved. These are abstract ideas and hence hard to quantify. But you can measure them although not precisely using the scales used by the psychologists. Attitudes are measured all the time.
4. Finally I will not mix up science (physical, social and psychological) with metaphysics or theology. This is a dangerous tendency and can halt although temporarily the progress is science.
Sent from my iPhone
On Oct 27, 2015, at 6:16 AM, ANISUR RAHMAN anisur.rahman1@btinternet.com [mukto-mona] <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
To me, after-life and soul are nothing but products of ignoramus minds. They have been invented by human beings of by-gone days (may call them Prophets, Sages, Rishis etc) to satisfy ignorant people of those days. Those self-proclaimed divinely-ordained but ignoramus people asked ordinary people to follow them, submit to them, obey them and, in return, the people would be rewarded by God in the after-life. This invention of after-life was necessary, because these proclaimed God-sent people could not possibly do anything to reward the people for their submission and obedience and hence a deferred reward in the after-life.Now once after-life had been invented, they had to invent something which could possibly go to that after-life. Human body perishes, it could not possibly go to after-life. Hey, presto, soul can! Body and soul are two distinct entities, they invented. After death, soul is taken to God by winged-horse; as monotheistic scriptures tell us. God creates a human body with mashed maize (because God started his apprenticeship in Mesopotamia where maize was abundant) and then blew the soul (something like a puff of air) into the body. This body and soul grow up together and when body dies, God takes the soul back (presumably to recycle it) by the winged-horse! (Nobody in those days asked the question, how could a puff of air enjoy 72 virgin women everyday, have gallons of vintage wine?)Modern day inquisitive people ask, how could we think, feel, sense without a soul within us, presumably in the brain? My gut feeling is that our consciousness, our thinking etc are all our experience. A child thinks differently to that of a teenager or the child's dad. Does that mean, God is constantly updating our souls (like Microsoft Windows update!)? Or does that mean our soul is nothing but our experience - events and senses that are stored in our neurons and correspondingly they alter the mode of chemical reactions culminating in electrical signals)? I guess this second option is more likely.If after-life is fantasy, so is soul as these two entities go hand-in-hand. One is a necessary byproduct of the other. We can say good bye to these mystical things of the bygone days.Science has not found a repository of souls of our ancestors anywhere in the universe. (Now you can say that our ancestors are having fun in the parallel universe!). If we, humans, have souls, what stops billions and trillions of insects, worms, birds, fishes, animals and so forth having souls? They have the feelings like us, they see, they move, they have compassion and fellow-feelings etc. Who can deny souls to them? How can we keep the proprietary rights of souls to human beings only?- AROn Tuesday, 27 October 2015, 1:20, "Jiten Roy jnrsr53@yahoo.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
I agree, the picture of afterlife, heaven or hell, given by religions are fantasy. But, the existence of parallel universe cannot be ruled out, because high probability for their existence is there. We can just look at the sky at night, and think about how much know about those universes.Atheist's view of life is purely materialistic. To them, existence of God can't be seen or proved, so God does not exist.The fact is - life is comprised of much more than just materialistic experiences. For example, presence of consciousness can be felt within us, but cannot be proved. Compassion and spirit can be felt, but cannot be proved. When science cannot prove a phenomenon, hypothesis is developed, and as long as it works, science will accept it as such.Existence of quantum levels or nuclear shells cannot be proved directly, but theoretical models are developed to understand them, and as long as those models work, science will accept them.If we think of life as just bunch of cells or atoms or molecules, we will not get the whole picture of life. Consciousness is reality, but where does it come from? Bain cells do not produce consciousness; brain just acts like a switch to activate it, just like electric switch, which does not produce light but controls it. If you think switch produce light, you will have wrong idea. Brain does not produce consciousness or compassion. Where do feelings or compassion come from? Neuro-biological sciences have no clue. That does not mean they do not exist.You can ask a builder to build two identical houses - one for you, and the other for your friend. After the house it built, you enter into your own home, you will have a different feeling than when you will enter into your friend's home. Do we know, here does these different feelings come from? As you can see – two exact homes produce two different feelings. These metaphysical experiences are beyond materialistic experiences.So, we can't just look for proof for validation of everything. Certain experiences we can never prove, but we accept them in life.These are natural feelings, and has nothing to do with religion. The lifelong quest for understanding of the spiritual world was the goal of the ancient Sages and Rishis of India.Jiten Roy
From: "ANISUR RAHMAN anisur.rahman1@btinternet.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com>
To: mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Monday, October 26, 2015 1:07 PM
Subject: Re: [mukto-mona] Metaphysical Concept of Life & Afterlife
After-life is nothing but a fantasy, a delusion or one can say a very neat way of bluffing people. Priests, Rabis, Moulabis all ask us to do this thing or that (as they fancy) or give money to them (for some concocted good cause) and we will be rewarded in the after-life!Why after-life, not in this life? The answer is quite simple - nobody can check the after-life (as it does not exist) and the fraudster will go scot free. This bluff could have been alright some two thousand or fourteen hundred years ago, but now people are more discerning, more inquisitive and more demanding. Hairy-fairy tales from quantum mechanics, parallel universe, going through the black hole and emerge into a new universe etc are all unproven and bluff.When one dies, that is the end of him or her. The atoms of his or her body will go back to earth and may form a minute part of a new life - a worm or fish or a cow or a tree and so forth - and that's it.On Monday, 26 October 2015, 2:36, "Shah Deeldar shahdeeldar@yahoo.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
"How do we know that such afterlife exists? I know, it can't be proved, but so is the most quantum mechanical events, which cannot be directly observed, but the existence of such event can be demonstrated through other processes. So, it's not necessary that we have to prove the existence of afterlife, but may be able to find indirect validation of it." JRI think the analogy with quantum mechanics is not right. At least, quantum mechanics has some mathematical reasoning while the existence of afterlife is simply beyond any reasoning whether it is mathematical or other kind of acceptable reasoning. People have tried and failed miserably to convince scientific community. Our souls are basically product of materia. With the death of our brain cells, it ceases to exist beyond the brain. If we assume it exists beyond our brain, it has to be transformed to another form? Does it have a material basis? If it is not materia (even weightless particles) based product beyond our brain, why would it require a good afterlife? How would it sense/differentiate from a good feeling from bad one? And for whom? A bunch of particles tethered to some core particle?On another issue, I am not sure whether seeing color is so important for a blind and non-blind person. Do color exist in the real world? Not, when you ask a physicist. A very similar argument was raised during the famous Tagore and Einstein conversation about the existence of beauty. The damn beauty does exist either. It is only a perceived feeling for us, mortals."Colors exist in very much the same way that art and love exist. They can be perceived, and other people will generally understand you if you talk about them, but they don't really exist in an "out in the world" kind of way. Although you can make up objective definitions that make things like "green", "art", and "love" more real, the definitions are pretty ad-hoc. "
On Saturday, October 24, 2015 2:25 PM, "Jiten Roy jnrsr53@yahoo.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Please red my article at the link below:Thanks.Jiten Roy
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