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No

Only Judeism

Only Islam

Yes to both Judeism and Islam

[Frumple]

... considering christian doctrine and response to the concept and questions surrounding the soul and afterlife has been referenced very, very sparingly, and the discussion spent nearly as much time talking about justification (with, again, little to no reference to the christian perspective on the subject) as it did on the soul and related concepts, no, it's pretty explicitly been a derail. Into a fairly closely related subject, but this last bit has been very much more metaphysics than theology or doctrine.

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

Well who wants to get back on topic
I've got a few ideas but 99% of them WILL cause a flame war

[freeformschooler]

I have two questions for two demographics in the thread -- to rerail it.

Christians/religious people, are you still afraid of death despite belief in the afterlife? If so, why?
Non-religious/atheist people, are you afraid of death? If not, how did you get over your fear?

(of course this makes the assumption that we are born afraid of death, but it's a common enough fear to safely make the assumption)

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

I'm not all that afraid of death itself, though I don't want to die
I know it's going to happen (and my friend getting hit and killed by a drugged up street racer) kinda helps me get over that fear
It's kinda like being afraid of something you can't stop no matter what so why fear it

In my beleif I will get to see my friend again
R.I.P
Donnie

[freeformschooler]

It's kinda like being afraid of something you can't stop no matter what so why fear it

Okay. Let's follow that explanation. I am trapped in a little prison cell. I was tortured yesterday. I know I am going to be tortured today. Why fear the torture? And yet wouldn't I fear it anyway?

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

It's kinda like being afraid of something you can't stop no matter what so why fear it

Okay. Let's follow that explanation. I am trapped in a little prison cell. I was tortured yesterday. I know I am going to be tortured today. Why fear the torture? And yet wouldn't I fear it anyway?

I wouldn't look forward to it
I don't look forward to death

I would try to stop it
As I would try to stop death

But all in all if I can't stop it no sense in fearing it
As I cannot stop death I should not fear and I do not fear it

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Well, you could actually do that if you were masterfully skilled at disassociation, but the difference is that there's a world out there without torture. So far, there's no world without death.

[Orange Wizard]

Fear doesn't necessarily mean that you want it to happen. In both cases (death, torture) I would look for a way to avoid it - but I wouldn't waste any time worrying about what would happen if I couldn't avoid it.

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

Fear doesn't necessarily mean that you want it to happen. In both cases (death, torture) I would look for a way to avoid it - but I wouldn't waste any time worrying about what would happen if I couldn't avoid it.

Exactly that

[Baffler]

I have two questions for two demographics in the thread -- to rerail it.

Christians/religious people, are you still afraid of death despite belief in the afterlife? If so, why?
Non-religious/atheist people, are you afraid of death? If not, how did you get over your fear?

(of course this makes the assumption that we are born afraid of death, but it's a common enough fear to safely make the assumption)

Really only by... association? I don't fear dying per se (not that I want it to happen, mind you.) What I fear is that when I die, I won't have lived a virtuous enough life, or a full enough life, or a worthwhile enough life. The prospect of an afterlife in eternal punishment is a frightening one though, and the conflict is real.

[freeformschooler]

I have two questions for two demographics in the thread -- to rerail it.

Christians/religious people, are you still afraid of death despite belief in the afterlife? If so, why?
Non-religious/atheist people, are you afraid of death? If not, how did you get over your fear?

(of course this makes the assumption that we are born afraid of death, but it's a common enough fear to safely make the assumption)

Really only by... association? I don't fear dying per se (not that I want it to happen, mind you.) What I fear is that when I die, I won't have lived a virtuous enough life, or a full enough life, or a worthwhile enough life. The prospect of an afterlife in eternal punishment is a frightening one though, and the conflict is real.

But that seems somehow worse because you're attempting to create a sort of horrifying secular teleology and overlaying it on your life like a video game GUI (in place of the old religious teleology). Instead of worrying about whether you're doing X or Y thing wrong, you now worry about whether you're doing X or Y thing fully, or fulfillingly, or authentically, and those are even harder to quantify than the already nebulous concept of wrong and right, and especially at the personal level.

I actually stood up and closed my computer and walked away when I read Paul Graham's essay that proposed that what "matters" in life, to you, should be roughly what will be on your obituary. Jesus, dude. I guess all those cavemen without gravestones didn't have things that really mattered in life. No wonder people nowadays feel like they have to videorecord everything: there is no God except Facebook for them to ask whether something really mattered.

[Arcvasti]

I have two questions for two demographics in the thread -- to rerail it.

Christians/religious people, are you still afraid of death despite belief in the afterlife? If so, why?

Yes, I think I am. Mostly because, especially right now, I have what I would call unfinished business. There are books to be read, experiences of life to be had and potentially relationships as well. And I REALLY want to see DF V1 come out. Actually, I'm mostly afraid of dying EARLY. As far as death in general goes... I'm mostly K with it. It is inevitable. I think I might have a different answer if I felt it to be more imminent, but I don't believe I am scared of death.

[Descan]

I don't fear dying so much as it pisses me off that we only get at best 120 years, and more likely 80 years. And that most of those years are with a likely-to-be bad body.

Hence my chosen profession.

[Orange Wizard]

At first I forgot you were an engineer, so my first two thoughts were "doctor" and "hitman".

[Cryxis, Prince of Doom]

I will say I don't want to die
I have a lot of things I want to do
But I came to terms with myself that I don't need to do those things to have a good life
(I hope I'm not beating a dead horse saying this.  A few months before Donnie died I had a nice conversation with him and another friend about what we want to do in life. He had some nice prospects. We shared a lot of prospects. And he never completed them, yet he lived a pretty great life. He never got married, had kids, finished college, got the job he wanted, or lived a long life, but he did live a meaningful one. Driving from the funeral to the grave site there was a good 3+ mile long line of cars, each car packed with his friends and family. So I think I'm ok with dieing even if I don't finish what I want to do)