"Is there life after death, or is death the end of life?" Once meant to be a tongue twister to test our pronunciation of [ð] and [θ], it has now turned into something that I ponder about every now and then.
Being the typical cynic I am, I tend to believe that death is the end of life, though I'm sure that a vast majority of people will be glad to argue against me on this one. But on a semi-serious note, the concept of life and death has always been plaguing the human psyche for a long time. In particular, I find that most people tend to not want to believe that death is the end of life—just take a look at the myriad of explanations of the after-life.
Should an after-life exist, it will be hard for us to know it, as it requires either foreknowledge in the supernatural sense or based on direct experience, in which case it will become a rather circular argument. While I'm not about to say that an after-life doesn't exist (it might, but we have no way of proving/disproving it), I'm content to just take the bleakest of all beliefs, i.e. that such a concept only exists in our minds and not in reality. After all, if I believe that the after-life is hokey and I'm proven right, I'm not losing as much as someone who believes in its existence and is proven wrong.
So, why this sudden talk of life and death? Nothing much really; it's just one of those days that one sits down, and is supposed to be working on some paper, when one decides that thinking about the unfathomable is a more interesting enterprise than the daily grind that one has to do. In another life (there are many such lives hur hur hur), I could have been a philosopher or religious leader, contemplating about the void and thinking about things that science cannot resolve. Alas, I'm stuck with this life and have to be content with worrying about these things only from a distance.
One thing that I find rather odd about people in general is that they seem to not be able to understand how a single person can behave in so many different ways. And no, I'm not referring to that of schizophrenia or the more general "multiple personality syndrome"; I'm talking about the same person, but acting/reacting in a vastly different way given the differing circumstances. One way of looking at this could be that the vast majority of people have very little regard to that of others—anyone who doesn't fit the "standard model" is "odd", "weird" and at worst "sociopathic". Time and time again, I have proven empirically that people cannot seem to accept the fact that I am multi-facetted, that I'm not just a computer geek who dabbles in the art of computer programming, but also a decent musician, writer and poet. On the one hand, we keep complaining about having stereotypes forced upon people and how that is not such a good deal, yet on the other hand we find this phenomenon where people force others into stereotypes in order to react to them more "favourably".
Get a grip man, the world is a vast place, and not everyone is just about one thing. That dude you see on the corner selling hotdogs, he could be a leader at a martial arts dojo, and have high standing. The crazy haired person who cannot even remember where he lives; he could be an eminent physicist who has created some really ground-shattering theories. And that introverted computer geek in your class who smiles at you shyly each time you look at him; he could be a badass guitarist already recording demo tapes to pass around music producers to break into the industry.
My point is simple: stereotyped people are boring as hell. The most interesting folks are those with an eclectic mix of styles and characters that make them stand out from the crowd. And yes, I am insinuating that I am an interesting character myself, as is my current girlfriend.
There's so much more of the world to learn about rather than just books, data and methodology. A true thinker is one who places emphasis on the journey and understanding of all that is occurring, instead of just burrowing deeper and deeper into the abyss of "knowledge". Where do you think ground-breaking theories come from?
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