Life After Death : The Nature of Disembodied Existence

1. Life After Death: The Nature of Disembodied Existence March 10th, 2014.

2. What does Disembodied Mean? • Disembodied Existence refers to life after death without a physical form. Where Reincarnation and Resurrection involve living in a “new” body, Disembodied Existence alludes to survival after death without bodies. • A disembodied existence shows a separation between the soul and the body, treating them as two different things. • Simply put, Disembodied Existence means living without physical form.

3. Are Disembodied Existences Coherent? • Richard Swinburne:We can imagine a situation where we could exist without a body, and if we can imagine it, then it is a coherent concept. • We have an intuitive sense of being not the same as our bodies • We say that we have bodies, as opposed to we are bodies • This suggests that we feel ourselves to be separate and distinct from the purely physical • Because there is a distinction between the consciousness and the body, we can have mental processes and events which are not translated into anything physical at all • We might be thinking all kinds of things without any evidence of them appearing on our face or in our body language

4. Continued • To some, it seems as if the consciousness and the body, although linked, are distinct from one another • Therefore, it could make sense to suggest that the consciousness might be able to exist on its own, without the body, once the body has died. • Note: Careful when using Reincarnation as an example of Disembodied existence. Technically, Reincarnation means that you are reborn into a new body. It wouldn’t typically count for an example or support to a disembodied existence.

5. Examples of Disembodied Existence Theories • Plato (Tripartite Theory, Soul exists before & after death) • Descartes (Mind/Body Problem) • Richard Swinburne (Uniqueness & Evolution of the Soul) • Keith Ward (The Soul as a form of Morality and Spirit) • Immanuel Kant • Although he does not deny that the soul can exist apart from the body, in 1755 Kant insists that disembodied souls cannot have human cognition. • Our souls cannot operate effectively if they do not interact with healthy, well-trained bodies. Whatever existence our souls have after the death of our body, they cannot have knowledge or experience of the sort we possess in our lifetimes • H.H Price (Dream World) • Raymond Moody (Near Death Experiences)

6. Examples of Embodied Existence theories • “Embodied Existence” refers to the soul/mind and body being one. If the body dies, the soul dies with it, but there is still potential for Life after death in physical form. • Aristotle (The Wax Tablet with a Stamp) • Richard Dawkins (Humans = vehicles of genes, survival machines) • Hindus (Rebirth/Reincarnation; Body is a vehicle for the atman) • Buddhist (Reincarnation; Soullessness, no God, no essential individual self) • Judaism (Resurrection; bodies rising from the dead) • Islam (Resurrection; earthly life is a test for LAD) • Christianity (Resurrection; day of judgement)

7. Where does John Hick & Replica Theory fit here? • Hick believes that the body and soul are inseparable. • Therefore, if there is LAD for the soul, the body has to be resurrected. • Feels that it is logically possible for people to exist in different worlds with the same identity • They could be “replicated” on to the new world by God • The world of the resurrected is not spatially related to our world, but objects within it are spatially related to each other • Traditionally, John Hick’s view could be classified as a resurrection. However, when you argue that the “replica” is not the same person, this can be classified as a reincarnation, as the essence of the person is placed into another body. • Still, his view is an embodied existence.