(no subject)
Hi, okay, this has been bugging me for a really long time. I need your help!
While doing my IS research I read about different theories of the afterlife, as represented in different religions. What I can't figure out about reincarnation is:
If we have no recollection of our past live(s), and no prescient knowledge of our future live(s), how is it possible that we know it is the same person, Person X, who goes on into the next stage, and not a completely different person, Person Y? I mean, if a) our physical form changes, b) our mental and psychological characteristics change, and c) we cannot know anything that has or will occur outside of this life, then surely it is a totally different person? Granted, the karma generated within this life will affect our next, but the actions we do have an impact on both our and the next generation as well, so this causality is kinda ill-established?
Then again, we cannot remember our early years as well, and we have changed psychologically, mentally, and physically, but it would be ludicrous to say that we are entirely different entities than what we were 15 years ago.
HOWHOW? This is really killing me, I cannot think of anything else apart from this. I think the problem with the reincarnation theory is that it actually has a solid, tangible logic-idea behind it, whereas in other religions like Christianity there actually is a leap of logic, kinda resorting to deus ex machina in a sense to explain away the afterlife.
While doing my IS research I read about different theories of the afterlife, as represented in different religions. What I can't figure out about reincarnation is:
If we have no recollection of our past live(s), and no prescient knowledge of our future live(s), how is it possible that we know it is the same person, Person X, who goes on into the next stage, and not a completely different person, Person Y? I mean, if a) our physical form changes, b) our mental and psychological characteristics change, and c) we cannot know anything that has or will occur outside of this life, then surely it is a totally different person? Granted, the karma generated within this life will affect our next, but the actions we do have an impact on both our and the next generation as well, so this causality is kinda ill-established?
Then again, we cannot remember our early years as well, and we have changed psychologically, mentally, and physically, but it would be ludicrous to say that we are entirely different entities than what we were 15 years ago.
HOWHOW? This is really killing me, I cannot think of anything else apart from this. I think the problem with the reincarnation theory is that it actually has a solid, tangible logic-idea behind it, whereas in other religions like Christianity there actually is a leap of logic, kinda resorting to deus ex machina in a sense to explain away the afterlife.