'Afterlife' seems insufficiently defined to answer this.
Of course there's an afterlife. If I die, my biological matter is quickly rearranged into worms and such, which is life after my death.
"OK, but that's not 'you'" one might reply, but then we need a solid definition of what causally connects a given identity from one moment to the next. What if you (the person who replies to my post here) is a totally different person than the one that posted the OP. How would one go about proving conclusively that they're both made by the same person and not just some clone who happens to be a mildly rearranged version of the matter that made up the first person.
The answer to that goes a long way to defining how you might define 'an afterlife'.

I am referring to a coherent continuation of a persons consciousness.

As when we wake up each day aware of being the same person.

For an afterlife My body dies but my consciousness is relocated whilst preserving my mental identity.

It hinges on the nature of consciousness. It could be that consciousness goes to another realm or enters another body or entity as with reincarnation.

My question is if you knew that some scenario like this happened how would it impact you?

It hinges on the nature of consciousness. It could be that consciousness goes to another realm or enters another body or entity as with reincarnation. — Andrew4Handel

As far as I can tell, some of the great philosophical questions (afterlife, idealism, reincarnation, god..) would not make a difference to how I live. I would still live as I do now, doing the best I can, with what I have, with an eye towards continual improvement, where possible.

I am referring to a coherent continuation of a persons consciousness.

As when we wake up each day aware of being the same person.

[ ... ].

My question is if you knew that some scenario like this happened how would it impact you? — Andrew4Handel

I might try even harder to never die. I prefer to exist in a finitely intelligible universe than in some "realm" we probably cannot understand.

My own conjecture / scenario, I think, is about as good as metacognitive-self-continuity-surviving-brain-death gets:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/548675 (+ link to further elaboration) :nerd:

My question is if you knew that some scenario like this happened how would it impact you? — Andrew4Handel

Obviously, it would impact me for very much longer than my has. But I know nothing about this afterlife - not its characteristics, requirements, rules, form, expectations - nothing. Some kind of disembodied consciousness continues after biological. Is that the good news or the bad news? Is it mandatory or optional? Do I get a choice of manifestations? Do I get judged, rewarded and punished?

How would you feel or respond if it was proven conclusively that there is an afterlife? — Andrew4Handel

Disappointed.

I am referring to a coherent continuation of a persons consciousness. — Andrew4Handel

That would seem to be a continuation of life, not an afterlife, a word which implies the conscious thing is no longer alive, a contradiction as far as I can see.

As when we wake up each day aware of being the same person.

I can actually think of no empirical test for this, so any such awareness is actually just an assumption. A manufactured copy of me would have the same awareness yet would arguably not be the same person.

For an afterlife My body dies but my consciousness is relocated whilst preserving my mental identity.

Sort of like a candle flame being snuffed but the combustion still going on somewhere where it gets located despite a lack of combustibles there.

Sorry, I'm the wrong person to ask since I don't know how to envision my consciousness as an object.

:lol:

As usually, top notch post!

List of people who need to be put in main bunker in case of nuclear Armageddon

1. 180 Proof
2. Myself :grin: Just kiddin'
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Back to topic.

There is reincarnation, Buddhism says so. It's a religion that's 2.5k years old and I can't imagine how something that old could be false. Someone would've seen the butler exit the dining room at 8:30 AM, oui?

Nonsense. Many, maybe most, religions are two or more millennia old and they cannot all be correct though they all could be – probably are – wrong.

Reincarnation

1. Explains
2. There's evidence albeit flimsy

Reincarnation — Agent Smith

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/529561

A 5 star post!

There's this feeling everybody has: The world is not enough! I love James Bond movies by the way.

Sean Connery was the only 007 (1962-71) for me. :wink:

Sean Connery was the only 007 (1962-71) for me. — 180 Proof

Thatsh right! He wash the besht! :cool: :grin:

:lol: :up:

:smile:

I would hope I never entered it and just dissipated - that is if it entailed ‘eternity’. No thank you!

An end is meaningful eternity is nothing.

I am not sure how long I could stomach ‘living’ (afterliving or otherwise). 200 years? 500? Maybe I could stretch to 1000 but I doubt I would tolerate it that far into the future … hard to say without knowing what state I will be in or the world around me.

When I went under general anesthetic it was sunny one moment then I woke up in what seemed like an instant and it was dark outside.

If death is like complete unconsciousness then we can have know concerns about the present or future.

Yet we live our life based on concerns for the present and the future.

Making plans for the future is hence irrational because you are planning for a future you won't exist in and won't know anything about. You can create children but have no idea what the future holds for them and any descendants. I doubt Hitler or Stalins ancestors predicted them.

We have to speculate about the future to live.

The rationality of these speculations depends on how they are framed.

Pascal's wager says you have nothing to lose by believing in God but everything to lose by not believing. Is there anything to lose by believing in an afterlife? Not believing in it could be an inaccurate and hence irrational stance. We always make plans for the future without any way to be certain.

We have no idea how consciousness works to know whether or not it survives bodily death. We don't see consciousness in brains and it is a private subjective state only accessible to ourselves.

With this complete lack of knowledge about how consciousness is instantiated it is faith position not to believe in the afterlife.

I have no reason to tell someone who is bereaved that they will never see a relative or friend etc again bus I don't know that likewise I cannot say they will see them again. but I would not take away hope based on my lack of knowledge about what happens to consciousness.

Even if you don't take a Pascal style wager you don't have the knowledge to tell someone one way or the other on this issue. But not knowing means we can speculate not that we should be silent. Science operates on speculating before facts emerge or knowledge is created.

There is an afterlife, i.e., that we as conscious beings do survive the death of the body. For me, it's beyond dispute, as I argued in the following thread.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1980/evidence-of-consciousness-surviving-the-body

Sean Connery was the only 007 (1962-71) for me. :wink: — 180 Proof

Yeppers!

:eyes:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/727848

That would seem to be a continuation of life, not an afterlife, a word which implies the conscious thing is no longer alive, a contradiction as far as I can see. — noAxioms

If someone's body is dead how is the continuation of their consciousness the continuation of life?

If a radio breaks down the radio programme still exists it just ceases to interact with the radio.

Consciousness is not identical with anything in the brain. It is its own thing and the thing we value (i.e. experience)

I can actually think of no empirical test — noAxioms

Why do you need to test whether or not I am the same person?

In what sense would I be a different person? If I dye my hair blue I am still the same person. If I move to America likewise etc.

What is the same is my consciousness associated with my memories.

There is no plausible reason to assume I become a different person between time 1 and 2 unless you are arbitrarily defining me as every atom currently in my body

As Descartes said "I think therefore I am" the only think we can't doubt is our conscious self. Indeed everything else could illusory.

Disappointed. — javi2541997

Because you dislike life?

Because you dislike life? — Andrew4Handel

No, because I don't have any hope in future.

If someone's body is dead how is the continuation of their consciousness the continuation of life? — Andrew4Handel

Similar to my treatment of fingernail clippings. I don't define my life in terms of the state of some optional parts that I've lost. If I'm conscious, then what matters is still there, no? Even if I'm not conscious (anesthesia say), I still seem to be alive, so the consciousness part is also not critical. What is then?

If a radio breaks down the radio programme still exists it just ceases to interact with the radio. — Andrew4Handel

Exactly, so the radio program does cease to be just because somebody shuts one radio off.

Consciousness is not identical with anything in the brain. — Andrew4Handel

Can you demonstrate this, or is it just a wishful assertion?
You also call it experience, but sans a body, there's nothing to experience. Sensory deprivation pretty much violates any definition of 'experience'.

Why do you need to test whether or not I am the same person? — Andrew4Handel

To justify a claim of such, as you claimed being aware of being the same person each morning.
I mean, what if you suddenly woke up as a different person tomorrow morning. What would that be like? Would you notice? There's not a right answer to that since different views answer it different ways, so it just serves to clarify your position.

There is no plausible reason to assume I become a different person between time 1 and 2 unless you are arbitrarily defining me as every atom currently in my body — Andrew4Handel

But there is a plausible reason, at least if you know your physics. No, I don't consider me to be the sum of my atoms, a sort of Ship-of-Theseus argument. I (the pragmatic part of me) assumes this because such an assumption makes me fit. The fact that it doesn't stand up to logic doesn't bother that part of me since it isn't the rational part. It has a different job to do.

I don't define my life in terms of the state of some optional parts that I've lost — noAxioms

Consciousness is unnecessary for life to exist. I don't assume plants are conscious. Whether or not consciousness is dependent on the biological notion of life is a question (but somewhat irrelevant here).

Consciousness is not identical with anything in the brain.
— Andrew4Handel
Can you demonstrate this, or is it just a wishful assertion? — noAxioms

Can you demonstrate that any conscious states are identical to brain states? When I think or dream it doesn't tend to be about neurons or the structures of neurons or biochemicals. If you think brain states are identical to conscious states then you need to provide examples.

I mean, what if you suddenly woke up as a different person tomorrow morning. What would that be like? Would you notice? — noAxioms

You have to define "different person."

I would notice if my hair changed colour overnight or I changed sex in my sleep.

What is continuous is the coherence of my consciousness. A ship could be gradually altered over a few decades to become a different ship altogether but it wouldn't care because I assume it is not conscious.

If I woke up and found I had turned into a woman that scenario only makes sense if I had the same stream of consciousness as the night before. It is the severing of a stream of consciousness that would cause a loss of identity I assume.

Thought some of you might be interested.

There is a recent movie, "The Discovery," with Robert Redford that describes events after a scientist proves there is an afterlife. It is available on Netflix. Here's a link to the IMDB page:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5155780/

I watched a part of it but lost interest.