Sign Up Now
Get instant access to over 1 million+ study documents
OR
Already registered? click here to login
By creating your account, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and student honor code.
Life After Death
Bertrand Russel presents a logical argument against the existence of a continuous human soul that would survive after the death of the body. Stating that "the continuity of a human body is a matter of appearance and behavior, not of substance," Russel argues that because our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are inextricably bound with the body, those very thoughts, feelings, and behaviors perish as the body does (89). Moreover, the sense that the "I" that exists now is the same as the "I" that existed yesterday is but an illusion, based on the fact that we possess certain memories and neural pathways that create the sense of a continuous self. Really, though, what we take to be the continuous "I" is nothing more than well-worn neural pathways, which Russel compares to a riverbed.
Because experimentation in this area of thought is impossible, Russel's argument does not amount to scientific, empirical truth. However, Russel's case is far more plausible than a standard Christian or religious one. According to Russel, "it is not rational arguments but emotions that cause belief in a future life," (90). People want to believe in life after death for several reasons: the desire to overcome the fear of death being foremost, but also an idealistic vision of the perfection of mankind fuels people's belief in an afterlife. A belief in a creator God influences the ways people view the soul and its potential fate following the death of a body. According to the author, these religious and philosophical beliefs cloud the truth. Just as the belief that the earth was the center of the universe clouded the truth about the nature of our solar system, so too does belief in life after death cloud what could be the absolute truth about the nature of the human mind.
Russel's argument is powerful and compelling, and although he argues against the existence of a soul, his thesis is not nihilistic. Rather, Russel is profoundly realistic. Certainly open to the possibility of their being a separate, continuous soul, Russel nevertheless concludes that with our current knowledge of the nature of the body and the mind, there is no proof that a continuous self exists.
His viewpoint is neither traditionally Christian and therefore subject to Church doctrine, nor strictly pagan and therefore subject to strict rationality. Hegel's working out of the thesis and antithesis of life and death, and the synthesis, which is love, is a kind of mystical interpretation of the Christian mysteries. What Hegel could not understand in light of objectivity destroyed, he attempts to explain in light of Love as the
This is perhaps most evident in the case of Mark Rothko. The romantics," wrote Rothko early in his career, were prompted to seek exotic subjects and to travel to far off places. They failed to realise that, though the transcendental must involve the strange and unfamiliar, not everything strange or unfamiliar is transcendental (Rothko 84). The key then, for Rothko, was to develop a form of "transcendentalism" involved locating the strange
Grieving over lost loved ones wouldn't be as intense, it would be more like saying good bye to a loved one that you know you'll be seeing each other soon, rather than the thought that you may never be able to see them again. Instead, with the uncertainty, each moment of life, for me, is precious. The self-inventory really brought this point home to me. This was especially true with
The feeling of being lost and lonely can be overwhelming. Those are the times I must work especially hard; those are the times that test my faith in God. I may come to feel psychologically strong by moving through difficult periods with grace and trust. Feeling at home in the Universe is a rare feeling, which may only come a few times in my life. However, I can prepare
However, the reasons why people commit crime are as different as the individuals themselves. Intentional murder comes in two different flavors. The first is the carefully plotted, well thought out, planned act. In this scenario, motivational theory takes over. The person must feel that they will gain some type of value from the action. It may be that they gain something, such as money, or they may feel that
Our prejudiced minds and clouded vision make us believe that all black men are criminals resulting in a twisted criminal justice system. Thomas Sancton (1991) reveals, "...blacks and Hispanics are proportionally far more likely to be sent to death chambers than whites; that poor defendants are condemned more often than rich ones; that the existence of the death penalty, despite widespread beliefs to the contrary, in fact has no