Analysis Of The Philosophy Of Immortality

In the readings of William L. Rowe’s, “Philosophy of Religion”, he talks about life after death in chapter nine. The author breaks down some arguments made by past and present philosophers to whether or not we as humans are immortal after our physical bodies dies. In the paper I will be summarizing the varieties of immortality, the meaningfulness of immortality, the case against immortality, and the case for immortality. I will also discuss whether or not I agree or disagree with the philosophy of these individuals along with my personal experience, interactions, and thoughts.

Varieties of Immortality

There are two ideas of life after death. The Homeric and the Platonic. The Homeric belief is that only immortality is given to Gods. The Platonic belief is that human beings are immortal in some way. Human bodies perish at death but the human soul is not with the body, but that it is a spirit which can remember or imagine thoughts. In the platonic belief the spirit is living its life on earth and is thought to be prison to the human being body. It is only after the death of a physical human body when the spirit is released from the physical body and gets to live true life. Rowe quotes that Socrates said, “He is not his body but a soul in his body” (Rowe, 2007). I agree with the Platonic idea because the Homeric view died along with the Greek Gods and their myths. These two Greek conceptions are considered individual immortality. There are also Non-individual immortality forms that believe in immortality. For example Rowe states that “In India they consider immortality undesirable”. The Indian religion also explains that when someone dies, the soul travels to another body. Another non-individual form is that they believe in the idea of resurrection. This goes against the Platonic view but instead this soul lives on, even after the destruction of the physical body. Another belief is on from Christianity about resurrection. It talks about Judgment Day and how all the souls of people living on earth will be reunited with their bodies. Rowe then questions on what that resurrected body would look like. In my opinion I would have to say that we are living in a future that has proven historical thinkers wrong and that I am on board with the platonic view of thinking so far. The Homeric belief that a shadow of a mind and a soul roams the earth seems incorrect. The shadow of a mind cannot function and be able to contact mediums and I have read countless articles, stories, and seen for myself that there are paranormal forces out there which can open and close doors along with contacting us.

The Meaningfulness of Immortality

In the meaningfulness of immortality, philosophers have asked some questions regarding immortality. The first is what it is for something to be a person? The second is, what it is for something to be the same person? The looked at a list of features to determine in their opinion what it is to be a person. One example that they give is that “A soul does not have a certain color or height which rules out the physical characteristics” (Rowe, 2007). Philosophers argue that if you do not possess any of these certain features then the idea of a human without its body does not make sense at all. If this is true then the Platonic idea would be false. I disagree with this. Who is to say this is true if they haven’t experienced it for themselves? What if when we die we can feel, have emotions, or have a shape but we are in a spiritual world. Maybe we can just see other spirits and interact with them. Another idea is people claim that they see ghosts or claim that ghosts have touch them who is to say that the same thing doesn’t happen to dead people when they become spirits?

The Case for Immortality

Three main arguments that support the view that human persons survive bodily death. T he first is the Philosophical argument that agrees with the platonic view that the soul is immaterial and a pure substance. There have been argument from philosophers over the years because they state that a soul cannot be destroyed because you cannot separate its parts. Rowe does Bring up a point and uses Immanuel Kant argument that “a soul and if its degree of consciousness diminishes to zero it can be destroyed” (Rowe, 2007). I tend to agree with Kant’s argument because it is logical. Modern thinkers today say that the mind is nothing but a series of mental events or experiences. The second is the scientific argument gives a short story about Edgar Vandy but more importantly talks about the Super Extrasensory Perception hypothesis which is that, “all the relevant information conveyed at the sittings, by mediums, came from the minds of people still living”. The third is the Theological Argument which believes the theistic God exists. According to theism, God has created finite persons to exist in fellowship with himself. If a theistic God exists then it is reasonable to believe in life after death. This I agree with because how else could other things around the earth be created? Why do we just know how to think and do simple daily tasks? You hear about stories of people who have had encounters with their lost love ones and also video and photographic proof of spirits. More of this explanation will be discussed later in the paper.

The Case against Immortality

The case against immortality argues that our mental life is dependent on certain processes associated with the brain. We all know that when we get brain damage that it can result in memory loss and our thought process. In order for our brain to function properly we must have a steady state of consciousness. This explains that when we die the brain does not function anymore. This is true but who really knows what happens after you die and if that consciousness cannot be transferred to another body or stay with you spiritually? The argument against immortality depends on our view in relation to the body and mind.

Let us recap what was just discussed. Rowe starts off addressing the Greek myths of life after death. He then starts to explain about the two early ideas of death which are Homeric and Platonic. Homeric believes that only Gods are immortal and Platonic believed that humans possessed some sort of immortality. There is also the conceptual question about immortality and if it is meaningful to believe in life after death. Rowe then talks about the case for immortality through three different arguments. The first argument, philosophical argument on immortality, supports the Platonic view that the soul is immaterial and purely a spiritual substance. The second, the scientific argument, talks about the Super Extrasensory Perception Hypothesis. The third argument, the Theological argument, believes that a theistic God exists. Lastly in the case against immortality the strongest argument rests on the Theological argument and that unless we have a good reason to accept theism, then we do not have a good reason to believe in life after death.

My Opinion and Experiences

The idea of having a medium and being able to contact the other side when reading the story about Edgar Vandy was pretty remarkable. Back then you didn’t have smart phones or technology to help assist you with looking up people’s information. In my opinion it would be hard to fake something like that when you have multiple mediums telling the story of how this person died along with the secret document he was working on. This just shows you that there is a greater power in the world and the possibility of life after death. People who base their career on find out if there is life after death does not see irrational after reading William L. Rowe’s article. Some might think that they are crazy to go ghost hunting or tell stories about crazy encounters but the facts are out there and there is something greater than we know. It is all about believing and having faith in our religion. Another idea that

I do have some experiences with spirits, well at least my son did. It was when I lived in El Paso, Texas at my house in government housing. It started one morning at 0230 when I woke up from my bedroom door slamming. I didn’t think too much of it because when the central air would turn on it would create pressure that would close doors if they were not open. I usually kept my bedroom door open because my son was 8 months old and if he woke up I could hear him in his bedroom which was about 15 feet away. The same noise woke me up the very next night and at the same time. Instead of it being my door it was my son’s door. I got up out of the bed and walked towards his room and then his door opened and slammed shut. It startled me a little and I woke up their mother saying that there might be someone in the house because our son cannot reach the door handle. After explaining what had just happened to her we both walked towards his room and the door did the same thing, opened and closed. Well I ran over there and opened up the door only to have my son come hopping out of his room and into the hallway. We ended up checking all of the windows and doors and they were all locked. There is no way anyone could get into the house. I also had my son try to reach the door handle and he could not. So my question is what just happened? My opinion is that there was a spirit or something paranormal doing that. This made me a believer in spirits and after reading this journal I agree with the possibility of life after death.

This material made me think more about the afterlife. It caused me to look up and read about some people’s real life interactions with spirits or how they died and came back to life to tell about it. It also opened my eyes about all of the other religions that had their own beliefs about life after death and it all comes down to theism. Some believe in resurrection, reincarnation, and some believe that you will have another life in heaven. It really depends on where you look. We all want to know what life after death is and that is one of the biggest questions the world wants answered. Maybe we will never know what the answer is and still come up with assumptions. One thing I do know is that something is watching over us and if you give us the answer to the biggest question on Earth then all beliefs will become irrelevant.