Topic: "Average Man" dealing with death

[Desert Fox]

I am curious, people try to argue that it is not the case but one of the main reasons for our major Monotheism is death and the promise of an afterlife.
Can the "Average Man" be weaned  from that?

[ting-bu-dong]

I think the pressing desire for an afterlife is something created by religion itself, much like the desire for an objective morality. It's a really effective tactic of making up a problem and then being the only one with a readymade answer. If you go to very secular places where actual theism is a rarity, like much of Europe, people don't endlessly agonise of where they will go after death, same thing with objective morality. I think it's just a matter of many people taking their particular brand of Christianity as the common sense default and judging all other positions relative to that. If that's accurate, then mere persistent exposure to other views, whether they are other religions or naturalism, will weaken that over time on its own.

[Soldier of FORTRAN]

Absent religion, I think people learn to deal with death directly.  If I learned to cope with stress by eating, then how well will I handle stress absent ho-hos?  If I was raised to believe that this was baseline, it would natural to believe that it was intrinsic to all, including detractors.

I'm sharply atheistic, have lost family, and have neither had abnormal difficulty in taking it nor any impulse toward delusions of immortality for my loved ones.

[daemonowner]

I think the pressing desire for an afterlife is something created by religion itself, much like the desire for an objective morality. It's a really effective tactic of making up a problem and then being the only one with a readymade answer. If you go to very secular places where actual theism is a rarity, like much of Europe, people don't endlessly agonise of where they will go after death, same thing with objective morality. I think it's just a matter of many people taking their particular brand of Christianity as the common sense default and judging all other positions relative to that. If that's accurate, then mere persistent exposure to other views, whether they are other religions or naturalism, will weaken that over time on its own.

Not really. In Europe, like everywhere else, people grieve at the loss of a loved one. People in Europe (and various other secular places for what its worth. Thinking of Japan, Australia, New Zealand...) have just gotten over denying that we will eventually die. But the underlying problem which religion has learned to prey upon is still there. We don't want to die, we don't like our relatives and people close to us dying, it all really sucks.

[Ah.hell]

I think the pressing desire for an afterlife is something created by religion itself, much like the desire for an objective morality. It's a really effective tactic of making up a problem and then being the only one with a readymade answer. If you go to very secular places where actual theism is a rarity, like much of Europe, people don't endlessly agonise of where they will go after death, same thing with objective morality. I think it's just a matter of many people taking their particular brand of Christianity as the common sense default and judging all other positions relative to that. If that's accurate, then mere persistent exposure to other views, whether they are other religions or naturalism, will weaken that over time on its own.

I don't know, I'm an atheist and I don't want to die.  Religions often take advantage of peoples desire not do die by creating a fictional after life or cycle of rebirth but I don't see any evidence that fear of death has been created by religion.  I'd say the same thing about objective morality.  It would be nice if there was one, it would make deciding what was good and bad much easier.

[ting-bu-dong]

Of course people everywhere fear their own death and grieve the loss of loved ones. It would be silly to say they didn't. What this discussion was about was whether the average person can come to terms with mortality and the loss that comes with it, and places like secular Europe and many others demonstrate that this is the case. What I was saying was that the pressing, existential need for an afterlife which makes naturalism a nonstarter for many who are raised in religion is a result of the religious beliefs, not something that is innate to people.