No matter how much time it would take, reincarnation is inevitable is it not? Even if it can't naturally occur and even if it takes a super-advanced race to reincarnate our consciousness individually.. Would it not inevitably occur - in a Universe in which could be never-ending?

The most intriguing part of all of this is that if someone died, they'd be reborn again seemingly instantly at the point they become non-conscious. But in actuality, many many years may have gone by.

Amongst all of this, one then has to wonder.. What if this has happened before? And what if we are only able to be reincarnated when the exact same situation of our original existence arises again - perhaps from the Universe collapsing and expanding.

Could we be in an eternal loop of existence?

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Genetics is fate. Change our genes, achieve free will.

Our molecules may have rearranged themselves back into our old bodies (unlikely) but the chances that the mind/soul/whatever survives the trip is nil.

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Educators destroy your brain,
but you don't know, so why care?
Fagotto

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The mind does not have matter and as such can be created and destroyed.

Our molecules may have rearranged themselves back into our old bodies (unlikely) but the chances that the mind/soul/whatever survives the trip is nil.

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That's only if you consider the mind to be a non-physical entity - something that doesn't fit in with modern-day science anyway.

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Genetics is fate. Change our genes, achieve free will.

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Well, certainly the mind can be explained due to particular chemical balances in the brain, and whatnot... but as far as I knew, once your brain shuts off, everything gets wiped clean.

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Either way you'd never know.

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Who dares wins. - Special Air Service

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I don't follow your logic...Matter can't be destroyed, so we are reincarnated? Um no, it's called decomposing.

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Decomposition is simply a way of returning the atoms from your body back to nature. There, those same atoms can be used to construct anything.

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Genetics is fate. Change our genes, achieve free will.

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Quote: from hithere at 4:19 am on Aug. 25, 2008

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I don't follow your logic...Matter can't be destroyed, so we are reincarnated? Um no, it's called decomposing.

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Decomposition is simply a way of returning the atoms from your body back to nature. There, those same atoms can be used to construct anything.

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Quote: from Bacon at 8:34 pm on Aug. 24, 2008

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Quote: from hithere at 4:19 am on Aug. 25, 2008

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I don't follow your logic...Matter can't be destroyed, so we are reincarnated? Um no, it's called decomposing.

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 Decomposition is simply a way of returning the atoms from your body back to nature. There, those same atoms can be used to construct anything.

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Well, yes, I don't see how anybody might not think that that is inevitable.

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Exactly..

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Genetics is fate. Change our genes, achieve free will.

My gut says that there's a huge number of possible states, and if I had to ballpark it, I'd put the number in the hundreds of trillions, if not higher.  Consciousness is a very complex thing, so complex that we aren't even close to being able to understand the amount of and types of things that go into creating a consciousness from scratch.  

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And your cyclic idea of everything happening the same way after every Big Bang is quite interesting, but it is contradicted by our current understanding of quantam physics in which effect happens without cause. Take Uranium for instance, which is a radioactive material and therefore has deteriorating atoms. We can predict how quickly it will deteriorate, but there is no way of knowing when atom A and when atom B are going to go poof. They seemingly break without cause. So if nature is capable of such true spontanuity (sp?) that would mean that things would never happen the same way, even if set up the same way. In fact, it would always be very drastically different, as when everything is as dense as we believe it was before the Big Bang, quantum mechanics and the movement of particles have cosmic significance.

Post edited at 9:21 pm on Aug. 25, 2008 by InsaneBlue

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Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm schizophrenic, and so am I.

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It is remotely remotely remotely remotely possible for all the atoms of one persons brain to be recycled into an identical brain. But for these atoms to be arranged the same way, the two individuals sharing these brain particles would need to be genetically identical (never mind how you're going to construct the new brain from all the particles of the old). Then you would need nature to treat it the exact same way. This is the only way to have a brain be identical to one before.

And your cyclic idea of everything happening the same way after every Big Bang is quite interesting, but it is contradicted by our current understanding of quantam physics in which effect happens without cause. Take Uranium for instance, which is a radioactive material and therefore has deteriorating atoms. We can predict how quickly it will deteriorate, but there is no way of knowing when atom A and when atom B are going to go poof. They seemingly break without cause. So if nature is capable of such true spontanuity (sp?) that would mean that things would never happen the same way, even if set up the same way. In fact, it would always be very drastically different, as when everything is as dense as we believe it was before the Big Bang, quantum mechanics and the movement of particles have cosmic significance.

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I understand there may only be an infinitesimal chance of those atoms making up another consciously equipped brain after death, and yet.. Perhaps in a Universe of which potentially will never truly "end", those atoms will have to make up such a brain simply as there is only a finite amount of atoms in this Universe.

That spontaneity apparent in nature may be a result of the specific variables defined by the big bang. And if that same big bang occurred again, is it not possible for the same events of spontaneity to occur?

I guess this is all coming down to one's belief of fate. A predetermined Universe means that anything seemingly 'spontaneous' is merely a result of our ignorance.

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Genetics is fate. Change our genes, achieve free will.