Sunday, September 09, 2007

The after after life

For this blog post let's assume there is an after life. Then I wonder if people, souls, whatever, in the after life believe in an after after life and feel that they have to live their after life in a certain way to be rewarded in the after after life.

It might seem silly to think there would be an after after life since the after life lasts for eternity so what is this after after life to worry about. I'm thinking something along the lines that the number of seconds spent in the after life equals the number of integers (aleph_0), but the number of seconds in the after after life equals the number of real numbers (aleph_1). So you better be good during the after life because the after after life is infinitely longer.

Now you might argue that if the after life lasts an infinite amount of time how could there be something after it. Logically it doesn't work. Well, first of all, an after life doesn't work logically either (I can just hear someone saying "you can't prove there's nothing after eternity" and someone else groaning in frustration). Remember I'm only asking if people in the after life believe in an after after life, not if an after after life exists. Plus if there was an after life all of the believers would have really shown up the skeptics so people would probably be willing to believe just about anything. Every argument would be ended by "you said the same thing about the after life." Can you imagine hearing that line an infinite number of times?

Of course the logical extension is to ask about an after after after life, although that would require a lot of discussion of Godel and your choice of axioms (although people in the after after life who are into faith would love it because you truly could not prove it either way...). I figure I've got a while before I have to worry about the after after after life, so I'll stop here for now.

2 comments:

The Owl Archimedes said...

WOW, I totally get it- that is the best analogy ever! Well, you know what they say about analogies,...but still!

The Owl Archimedes said...

do you think they have wikipedia in the after^n life? What are we supposed to link to if not?!