Aug 5, 2022 01:01PM threetree wrote:

I don't consider myself an atheist, but probably somewhere between agnostic and believer. Over the course of my life I've pondered the "enduring question" about whether God exists, etc. over and over. I came to the conclusion for myself that if there is a God, it/he/she probably transcends any general concept that any of us have, and that whatever God is might actually have more to do with the forces of the universe; forces out there for good and bad (good and evil), forces that create, and forces that destroy. I am no scientist by any means, but this idea came to make the most sense to me over time, with my non-scientific brain.

It was fabulous to read the transcription in the link that li77 sent above. I had never before heard of anyone putting this sort of idea "out there" - thought it was just some wacky thing in my brain that I would be careful who I mentioned it to. The content of the transcription completely jives though, with the kind of stuff I've been thinking about when it comes to God, life (and "eternal" life), and death. I think that organized religion can have some comforting ways to frame all of this, and that it can be a true help to many people, and I think that conventional religion actually uses a lot of analogies that would fit with what this physicist has described, but I can't help but think that in the final analysis, our actual living and dying is more specifically/truly explained by this "physicist argument".

Interesting, my brother who has Asperger's or Autism of some kind told me when his cat died, that he was comforted in part by the fact that "her molecules were inside" him and would remain there for the rest of his life. Weird as this will sound to most, he even told me that he waited to take her to the vet for cremation and kept her in his apartment for a day after she died, just so that "more of her molecules would be in me".

Maybe those who are on a little different plane than the rest of us really do have some true and beneficial insights into the world - insights that most of us are just never able to see or understand.

Thank you for your post li77.

Aug 5, 2022 02:47PM serenitystat wrote:

Threetree- I've written elsewhere that I was born atheist into a devout Catholic family. I mostly went to parochial schools. Yet the whole time I found it difficult to accept what I was taught. I had lots of religion but no faith.

When a history teacher said that mythology started as a way to explain phenomena before scientists could, I extended that to religion. It's a way to control the masses. It's a way to comfort people about what happens after death or to answer the meaning of life. I like the physicist's explanation of death. Your brother isn't far off.

While we're not Buddhists, my husband and I like their idea of easing suffering. Moth did that in spades. I wrote to her that in doing so she has left an imprint on all the lives she touched in person and virtually. That goes beyond the physics of dying.

Divine - I confess since cancer I haven't read much on how people handle cancer or death except how to manage side effects of treatments. I used to think of death a lot before. 🙃 There's an old movie with Emma Thompson called Wit. She plays someone dying of cancer. I did enjoy watching it before cancer, but I don't think I could now. I prefer getting lost in cancer-free works.

Aug 5, 2022 07:57PM elderberry wrote:

traveltext: I find it hard to believe in a God/Goddess, Hairy Thunderer or Cosmic Muffin. But I do believe that in nature everything is comprised of molecules and energy (whatever "energy" actually is) and that the energy gets dispersed, Like the light coming from a long dead star. We aren't gone, but our energy has gone somewhere out into the ether, the cosmos.

serenitystat: I don't think you have to believe in anything, just being a decent human being, cleaning up after yourself, offering a helping hand. Currently, the worst offenders are folks on the Far Right in the USA claiming to be Christians. I don't think Jesus' gospel included gratuitous cruelty.

Aug 5, 2022 09:46PM traveltext wrote:

You can read Moth's sad BCO posts here:

https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/163/topics/856706?page=2793#post_5762360

Aug 6, 2022 06:29AM alicebastable wrote:

This was posted 8 hours ago on Mel's, so about 9:15 Friday night. Damn, but it's good she's with her family.