Why I believe in reincarnation.
#1. Life is too short to test everything and think about everything for myself. Therefore, the important thing is to find reputable sources of information and listen to them. Rather than travelling to the moon to investigate the properties of gravity, I listen to the people who've already done that. Rather than running DNA tests on my parents, I read my birth certificate. Rather than figuring out for myself how to dance, I go to dance lessons. Similarly, rather than working out the whole of metaphysics for myself, I listen to people whose metaphysics have, to date, been useful, clear, and compatible with my other sources of knowledge such as the scientific community. In other words, I listen to Buddhists.
#2. Death is certain. There are essentially three possibilities for what happens after death. One is nothingness. One is moving to a world where death is absent (ie, "heaven" or "hell"). One is moving to a world where death is present, possibly this world (ie, "reincarnation"). I can only obtain evidence of which of these is correct by dieing, which I'm not in a hurry to do. Given the choice between a number of models, each of which is equally capable of explaining, we have to make choices based on other reasons. Of the various models, reincarnation provides the most aesthetically pleasing behaviour, allows for simple and quick reasoning, and does not complicate my model of the world.
You may now explain why I'm irrational and/or clinically insane.
As the views of the World (and even this Forum) will not alter the facts of what lies beyond death, your choice of one that brings your peace is excellent. As you say, no one can prove to you any different.
Oh ... caveat. The views of the World may not change the 'afterlife' experience ... but members of the Forum may want you put in a padded room under sedation as you don't totally agree with their view of the Universe and hence you MUST be insane.
I think the idea of reincarnation is flawed... someone, (and I can't remember who) told me that when we die, our soul is reborn into someone else?
Now, the worlds population has grown and grown, so if that were true, where do all the extra souls come from
MODERATOR AT YOUR SERVICE
"If you're going to do something tonight, that you know you'll be sorry for in the morning, plan a lie in." Lorraine
Most come from Motown concerts ??
See here
The Magic of Motown - Touring Concert Shows - Entertainers
I like the idea of reincarnation but I can't really say I believe it in.
Perhaps reincarnation has no restrictions on time so you could be born in the middle ages after you were born in the "modern" world. Also you make the assumption there is only one planet worth of life.
MODERATOR AT YOUR SERVICE
"If you're going to do something tonight, that you know you'll be sorry for in the morning, plan a lie in." Lorraine
Well ... the fact that the living having control over what happens in the afterlife is fairly fundamental to most religions ... like mine. What I was trying to say is that no matter what the Forum may believe it won't actually change which of MH's three scenarios is true. Fair comment?
Motown. They got plenty.
Actually, as with all such religious matters, I turn to the Holy Texts of Adams for comfort and guidance. And there I read the parable of Agrajag and the Statue, which successfully explains one fundamental silliness of reincarnation, namely:
If any living thing can be reincarnated as any other living thing, then the chances of a human being being reincarnated as another human being are vanishingly small. Even if we restrict the process to multi-cellular life to ignore bacteria (how?), your chances of being human again are infinitesimal (your chances of being a mayfly or midge or such like are pretty good though). And if we restrict it to human life (are we counting Neanderthals? Do we start at Homo erectus, or a later hominid?), where are all the extra souls coming from?
There's also issues of framing. I'd give credence to reincarnation if any recalled information shed a new light on human behaviour of the time (e.g., someone recalling their life as a Viking, explaining now-unknown details about their navigation techniques). However the "memories" are typically framed by the recaller's knowledge of the period. For instance, I'm sure I've read of people recalling a past life as a slave labourer on the Pyramids, even though the consensus academic view nowadays is that the Pyramids weren't built using slave labour (it's still probably the "popular" view, though).
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