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Fuzzy
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27 Jan 2010, 11:15 am

How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


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phil777
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27 Jan 2010, 11:16 am

From a strictly spiritual point of view, i would say that it depends on his attachment to the real world ^.- . Or other "things". (...And yes i do read Bleach >< Sue me)



musicboxforever
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27 Jan 2010, 11:53 am

Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


Do you have to have a spirit to be a spiritual person?



Magnus
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27 Jan 2010, 12:29 pm

I have no idea. My guess is that there are different dimensions and spirits come through the mind via the brain. So, a person who knows a deceased person can make contact with the departed person through the universal mind. That is my own private belief.


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leejosepho
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27 Jan 2010, 12:46 pm

Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


I do not know, but I still seem to be doing well enough at the moment ...!

More seriously: Death is sleep, and any spirits wandering around were never human.


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DW_a_mom
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27 Jan 2010, 1:02 pm

Interesting question. I am not aware that Christian theology addresses this point. Based on common mythologies, I would say that most common belief is that it depends on the level of unresolved ties to the earth at the point of brain death. That makes sense to me.


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mgran
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27 Jan 2010, 1:02 pm

I don't know. When you're dead, you're dead. I was with my husband when he died, and it was as quick as shelling a pea... he just popped out between one second and the next. He was utterly gone, and he's never coming back.

Which isn't to say that I don't believe he's somewhere else. Just, I know for a fact, that he's not here.



Fuzzy
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27 Jan 2010, 9:04 pm

leejosepho wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


I do not know, but I still seem to be doing well enough at the moment ...!


Haha. Well said.

Quote:
More seriously: Death is sleep, and any spirits wandering around were never human.


I perhaps should have more correctly said the soul.

(this isnt just aimed at you leejosepho) What of, say, a headless body? Perhaps a mostly crushed brain, or a non functional nervous system?


I'm thinking specifically of someones body(or a portion thereof) which has far outlived expectation(the reasonable lifespan), long after the person portion(be it personalty, soul, whatever), has, to borrow a colloquialism, left the building.


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leejosepho
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27 Jan 2010, 9:15 pm

Fuzzy wrote:
I'm thinking specifically of someones body(or a portion thereof) which has far outlived expectation(the reasonable lifespan), long after the person portion(be it personalty, soul, whatever), has, to borrow a colloquialism, left the building.


Ah ...

Do you mean something like "walking dead" in the sense of "cognition gone" or "just a shell of a man" still breathing only because breathing is automatic?


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iamnotaparakeet
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27 Jan 2010, 9:41 pm

Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


How many definitions are needed to answer this properly?



leejosepho
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27 Jan 2010, 9:46 pm

iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


How many definitions are needed to answer this properly?


Enough to zero-in on this:

Fuzzy wrote:
... perhaps should have more correctly said the soul ... a headless body ... a mostly crushed brain ... a non functional nervous system ... long after the person portion ... has left the building.


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Fuzzy
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27 Jan 2010, 11:27 pm

leejosepho wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


How many definitions are needed to answer this properly?


Enough to zero-in on this:

Fuzzy wrote:
... perhaps should have more correctly said the soul ... a headless body ... a mostly crushed brain ... a non functional nervous system ... long after the person portion ... has left the building.


Is that enough? Its a hard subject to articulate.

There was once the debate over the retention of a soul in a person who was revived(after a heart attack, drowning, etc). I dont think anyone these days would suggest that such a person would be soulless after experiencing that sort of trauma.

The purpose of the original post was to discuss the social/spiritual aspects of the changing definition of death. Unfortunately I posted it on far too little sleep.

There is an immortal human... i dont want to say human being. Probably more than one such.. entity. Its a strange thing coming from me, because I dont believe in the supernatural, but in this case it is a scientific fact, and this once person achieved a sort of human immortality over 50 years ago.

If she were alive she would be about Sands age, or my grand mothers. This lady was born in 1920.

Before she died, a portion of her body was taken as a sample, and those cells were provided with nutrition and a favorable environment and they have persisted ever since. In fact they have been made to grow and divide. In the 50 years since, what has developed from that sample is probably a not insignificant mass in proportion to her original body.

So.. not really a zombie, and not really a person either. The cells dont depend on a nervous or digestive system. But shes dead... and shes not.

Her name was Henrietta Lacks. And humanity owes her a great deal of gratitude for the good that her remains have done.


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Magnus
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27 Jan 2010, 11:55 pm

Fuzzy wrote:
leejosepho wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


How many definitions are needed to answer this properly?


Enough to zero-in on this:

Fuzzy wrote:
... perhaps should have more correctly said the soul ... a headless body ... a mostly crushed brain ... a non functional nervous system ... long after the person portion ... has left the building.


Is that enough? Its a hard subject to articulate.

There was once the debate over the retention of a soul in a person who was revived(after a heart attack, drowning, etc). I dont think anyone these days would suggest that such a person would be soulless after experiencing that sort of trauma.

The purpose of the original post was to discuss the social/spiritual aspects of the changing definition of death. Unfortunately I posted it on far too little sleep.

There is an immortal human... i dont want to say human being. Probably more than one such.. entity. Its a strange thing coming from me, because I dont believe in the supernatural, but in this case it is a scientific fact, and this once person achieved a sort of human immortality over 50 years ago.

If she were alive she would be about Sands age, or my grand mothers. This lady was born in 1920.

Before she died, a portion of her body was taken as a sample, and those cells were provided with nutrition and a favorable environment and they have persisted ever since. In fact they have been made to grow and divide. In the 50 years since, what has developed from that sample is probably a not insignificant mass in proportion to her original body.

So.. not really a zombie, and not really a person either. The cells dont depend on a nervous or digestive system. But shes dead... and shes not.

Her name was Henrietta Lacks. And humanity owes her a great deal of gratitude for the good that her remains have done.


Cells have memories. I don't know where a soul would reside, and I also don't think that a soul is a continuous spirit of the personality. Personalities change throughout a lifetime, so it seems as though they would change in the afterlife as well.


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28 Jan 2010, 1:15 am

Magnus wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
leejosepho wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Fuzzy wrote:
How long does a persons spirit hang around after their mind is gone?


How many definitions are needed to answer this properly?


Enough to zero-in on this:

Fuzzy wrote:
... perhaps should have more correctly said the soul ... a headless body ... a mostly crushed brain ... a non functional nervous system ... long after the person portion ... has left the building.


Is that enough? Its a hard subject to articulate.

There was once the debate over the retention of a soul in a person who was revived(after a heart attack, drowning, etc). I dont think anyone these days would suggest that such a person would be soulless after experiencing that sort of trauma.

The purpose of the original post was to discuss the social/spiritual aspects of the changing definition of death. Unfortunately I posted it on far too little sleep.

There is an immortal human... i dont want to say human being. Probably more than one such.. entity. Its a strange thing coming from me, because I dont believe in the supernatural, but in this case it is a scientific fact, and this once person achieved a sort of human immortality over 50 years ago.

If she were alive she would be about Sands age, or my grand mothers. This lady was born in 1920.

Before she died, a portion of her body was taken as a sample, and those cells were provided with nutrition and a favorable environment and they have persisted ever since. In fact they have been made to grow and divide. In the 50 years since, what has developed from that sample is probably a not insignificant mass in proportion to her original body.

So.. not really a zombie, and not really a person either. The cells dont depend on a nervous or digestive system. But shes dead... and shes not.

Her name was Henrietta Lacks. And humanity owes her a great deal of gratitude for the good that her remains have done.


Cells have memories. I don't know where a soul would reside, and I also don't think that a soul is a continuous spirit of the personality. Personalities change throughout a lifetime, so it seems as though they would change in the afterlife as well.



It's about the equivalent to saying there is a spare tire and a carburetor still hanging around from a model T Ford and therefor one can still consider the car existing.



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28 Jan 2010, 6:04 am

I think I understand this topic now. I don't believe I have a soul, but there is obviously something that keeps me alive and I guess this energy could be called "spirit". I find life fascinating. I planted a hebe once and it died and that got me wondering about the nature of life. I have life and this little plant had life. After it died, that life was gone. But, yes, if you take cells from someone and keep them alive, is that still part of that person's life force? Or has it become something in it's own right.

But then is this similar to heart transplant patients who seem to have acquired some of the personality of their donor. Was that donor's spirit/energy/life force still in the heart and is this the same with all transplants?

This is a pretty deep subject. A good one though.



leejosepho
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28 Jan 2010, 6:37 am

Fuzzy wrote:
Before she died, a portion of her body was taken as a sample, and those cells were provided with nutrition and a favorable environment and they have persisted ever since. In fact they have been made to grow and divide. In the 50 years since, what has developed from that sample is probably a not insignificant mass in proportion to her original body.


That is no different than an old photo laying around and even being "reproduced":

She does not breath -- she is dead.


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