Is reincarnation real?

[SirJosephPorter]

So what you are saying is that your son isn't free at all. The path of his life was either dictated by biochemistry or pure randomness...

Might as well say there is no such thing as free will.

As I have said in the other thread (the one started by you), we don’t know the answer to that. If we had our science developed sufficiently enough so that we could analyze each and every phenomena in the world, we can analyze everything that goes on in the world, every leaf that falls, every movement of every creature etc., if we had a computer big enough and fast enough to analyze that, we may know the answer.

We may then know if we can predict the action of each and every individual, then we can predict how anybody would behave in any given circumstance. By comparing how individuals actually behave, we may then be able to answer the question as to whether the free will exists or not.

But short of that (and I don’t see that ever happening), it is purely a matter of conjecture.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

SJP: It is quite possibly a fraud. Wife said that the only way she could tell for sure would be to interview the kid herself. If it is a fraud whoever set it up knows what is supposed to happen. I'm not convinced about all of it yet partly because it requires believing in souls which is something that is hard to prove and has something to do with Karma too. The fact that it was on Fox makes me suspicious.
This is somewhat of an explanation of why some people are so fixated in the past and want to protect anything old. It quite possibly is the period of one of their last lives and they need to finnish something from that era. Again like religion it requires a certain leap of faith.

I quite agree, taxslave.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Everything is fraudulent to a non believer. There are many things that happen to people that cannot be explained by science. It doesn't make them any less real to the person experiencing them. Just because it doesn't fit within one's personal realm of possibility doesn't mean it isn't possible.

Cliffy, I agree with everything you say here. The experience is certainly very real to the person involved. However, these phenomena (reincarnation, afterlife, telepathy etc.) are not recognized by science. Any explanation of the phenomena has to fall outside science. If that is the case, then fraud, hallucination, hypnosis etc. is as good an explanation as any other.

Is it possible? We don’t know, science has nothing to say about it. As I said before, if somebody develops a scientific hypothesis, makes predictions that can be verified (or debunked) by science, then it will become a scientific Endeavour.

Until then, it is one person’s word against another, mo more. Science does not say whether it can or cannot happen (science has nothing to say on the subject). So to me, it is on par with religion or superstition.

 

[Cannuck]

The experience is certainly very real to the person involved. However, these phenomena (reincarnation, afterlife, telepathy etc.) are not recognized by science.

Yet again, you are wrong.

Parapsychology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Parapsychology is a discipline that seeks to investigate the existence and causes of psychic abilities and life after death using the scientific method. Parapsychological experiments have included the use of random number generators to test for evidence of precognition and psychokinesis with both human and animal subjects, sensory-deprivation and Ganzfeld experimentshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parapsychology#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parapsychology#cite_note-1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parapsychology#cite_note-2 to test for extrasensory perception, and research trials conducted under contract to the United States government to investigate whether remote viewing would provide useful intelligence information.The results of such experiments are regarded by some parapsychologists as having demonstrated the existence of some forms of psychic abilities.

 

[Cliffy]

Yet again, you are wrong.

Parapsychology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Parapsychology is a discipline that seeks to investigate the existence and causes of psychic abilities and life after death using the scientific method. Parapsychological experiments have included the use of random number generators to test for evidence of precognition and psychokinesis with both human and animal subjects, sensory-deprivation and Ganzfeld experiments to test for extrasensory perception, and research trials conducted under contract to the United States government to investigate whether remote viewing would provide useful intelligence information.The results of such experiments are regarded by some parapsychologists as having demonstrated the existence of some forms of psychic abilities.

Bingo! Thanks Cannuck. I was too lazy to look it up as I read about all this stuff twenty odd years ago. They have even done extensive research on plants and there ability to know what is happening to fellow plants in remote areas or sealed rooms. It was all recorded in the Secret Life of Plants back in the seventies.

 

[Ron in Regina]

Bingo! Thanks Cannuck. I was too lazy to look it up as I read about all this stuff twenty odd years ago. They have even done extensive research on plants and there ability to know what is happening to fellow plants in remote areas or sealed rooms. It was all recorded in the Secret Life of Plants back in the seventies.

I remember reading a similar article (years ago) on Yogurt cultures and their
ability to respond (communicate?) with each other.

 

[Cliffy]

I remember reading a similar article (years ago) on Yogurt cultures and their
ability to respond (communicate?) with each other.

I have met a few humans that would qualify as vegetables and they could communicate.:lol:

 

[AnnaG]

Sure there is free will, it is caused precisely by the reactions in the brain (I think that is ultimately what the thinking process is, chemical reactions in the brain). As to their being random, sometimes they are, sometimes they are directed by the brain.

But that is all free will is, biochemical reactions in the brain.

lmao

 

[AnnaG]

As I have said in the other thread (the one started by you), we don’t know the answer to that. If we had our science developed sufficiently enough so that we could analyze each and every phenomena in the world, we can analyze everything that goes on in the world, every leaf that falls, every movement of every creature etc., if we had a computer big enough and fast enough to analyze that, we may know the answer.

We may then know if we can predict the action of each and every individual, then we can predict how anybody would behave in any given circumstance. By comparing how individuals actually behave, we may then be able to answer the question as to whether the free will exists or not.

But short of that (and I don’t see that ever happening), it is purely a matter of conjecture.

lmao Are you the head of the Department of Redundancy Department?

 

[AnnaG]

I have met a few humans that would qualify as vegetables and they could communicate.:lol:

Me, too. lol I would think they would be like peas, though...... entirely unpalatable, IMO.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

I remember reading a similar article (years ago) on Yogurt cultures and their
ability to respond (communicate?) with each other.

I also remember reading about ‘culture wars’ between different flavoured yogurts.

 

[AnnaG]

Anyway, I'm not willing to make a decision whether reincarnation is real or not; just that it's unknown. And in any case I've ever heard of or read, there remains reasonable doubt.

 

[JLM]

I have met a few humans that would qualify as vegetables and they could communicate.:lol:

There's quite a few in Victoria and Ottawa, and they communicate well, if you consider lying communicating.

 

[Cliffy]

Our relatively short life span does not allow us to experience all the possibilities which life has to offer. It does not allow us to experience a different historical time frame, to know what it is like to be a member of the opposite sex (sex change operations not withstanding) or of a different race. It doesn’t make sense that one trip through third-dimensional reality would prepare us for the next spiritual evolutionary step. Besides, if sheer numbers have anything to do with it, what is to be made of the fact that far more people believe in reincarnation than don’t?

Although, in our culture and religion little is said or taught about reincarnation, there are references to it in the Bible. In the Old Testament in Malachi 4:14 the return of Elijah is prophesied. In Matthew 11:11 - 15 and 17: 10 - 13 Jesus reveals to his disciples that Elijah has returned in the person of John the Baptist. In John 9:1 - 9 we read:
“As Jesus passed by he saw a man who was blind from birth, and his disciples asked him saying ‘Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’ and Jesus answered ‘neither hath this man sinned nor has his parents but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.’”

Reincarnation was a common belief two thousand years ago, which would explain why they asked if the man had sinned. How else could he be blind from birth unless he had sinned in a previous life? In John 3:13 Jesus said, “no man hath ascended to heaven but he came down from heaven”, clearly stating the existence of life before physical birth.
Many of the early Christian scholars wrote about reincarnation. About AD 553 the Emperor Justinian repressed reincarnation for purely political reasons. Today a few references remain, like Jeremiah 1:5, Proverbs 8:22 - 31, Wisdom 8:19 - 20 (in the catholic version only), Ephesians 1:4 and John 17:5.

The nature of reincarnation remains vague in spite of recent interest. The popularity of past life regression among some circles of society has reopened a door once closed. The knowledge that was suppressed has yet to be fully regained or understood at this time.

 

[china]

The reincarnation is not real.

 

[Cliffy]

The reincarnation is not real.

Neither are we. What is real when you live in the Matrix. We are all just god/godess/the all that is/universe experimenting with possibilities. We are no more than a dream of the dreamer.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Reincarnation was a common belief two thousand years ago, which would explain why they asked if the man had sinned. How else could he be blind from birth unless he had sinned in a previous life?

Cliffy, religion has never been able to satisfactorily answer the question, why is there so much suffering, pain in the world, why do bad things happen to good people? Hinduism tries to answer it with reference to reincarnation. Hinduism says that people suffer in this life because they sinned in their previous life. By the same token, if the do good deeds in this life, they will enjoy the fruits of it in the next life (the ultimate fruit, reward, of course being Salvation).

Two thousand years ago, Hinduism was the dominant world religion, so it is natural that other religions take their cue from Hinduism and also talk of reincarnation.

 

[JLM]

Reincarnation was a common belief two thousand years ago, which would explain why they asked if the man had sinned. How else could he be blind from birth unless he had sinned in a previous life?

Cliffy, religion has never been able to satisfactorily answer the question, why is there so much suffering, pain in the world, why do bad things happen to good people? Hinduism tries to answer it with reference to reincarnation. Hinduism says that people suffer in this life because they sinned in their previous life. By the same token, if the do good deeds in this life, they will enjoy the fruits of it in the next life (the ultimate fruit, reward, of course being Salvation).

Two thousand years ago, Hinduism was the dominant world religion, so it is natural that other religions take their cue from Hinduism and also talk of reincarnation.

S.J.- BAd things happen to good and bad people- look at Saddam Hussein and sons and Adolf Eichman. What we consider as "tragedies" may not be actual tragedies in the great scheme of things. The Supreme Power in my opinion is more concerned with trends than individuals.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

S.J.- BAd things happen to good and bad people- look at Saddam Hussein and sons and Adolf Eichman. What we consider as "tragedies" may not be actual tragedies in the great scheme of things. The Supreme Power in my opinion is more concerned with trends than individuals.

JLM, that is certainly a more sensible view than the Fundamentalist view (that God looks after you, pray to him and your prayers will be answered) or the Catholic view (Priest is a direct conduit to God, confess your sins to him and they will be washed away).

If at all a God existed, he will be along the lines you suggest (which is also the Buddhist concept of God). He may be interested in trends in general, but not in individual lives of people.

 

[taxslave]

If, as my wife claims that reincarnation is real and Karma is involved then Hitler will come back as a fly in a Jewish outhouse for about ten million lifetimes. And all antiabortionists will become pregnant at 13 by their fathers in the next life. So it is not a bad theory.