So what the f# happens after death?
This is the question you want to ask, isn't it?
Of course this is the question you want to ask. Isn’t it?
You are stored in the fabric of reality (quantum fields or something underneath and beyond quantum fields). The fabric of reality is alive and aware in some sense. Or better, super-alive and super-aware.
So you go on as a small part of Mind at Large. You can call Mind at Large - if you want - Brahman, God, or God by any other name.
In a nice metaphor, you are a water droplet that enjoys a short independent life and then goes back to the stream whence it came. In an equivalent metaphor, droplet/you is an elementary particle and stream/Mind is a quantum field.
But I guess you don’t want to hear nice metaphors. You want to know what happens to YOU as yourself, and what happens to your loved ones as themselves, after death.
Some possibilities:
You go on as a disembodied but relatively autonomous and self-aware part of Mind at Large (afterlife in a spiritual Heaven). Mind at Large is not impersonal and unconscious, but super-conscious and super-personal. Sure there’s room enough for little you and everyone else. Life as a quantum field (or weirder) will be fun!
You go on as a particular new person in this world, without memories of this you (reincarnation).
You go on as another version of you in one of the parallel worlds of a multiverse (Everett worlds, inflationary multiverse, brane worlds…), with no memories of this you (another equivalent concept of reincarnation).
Same as above but some weird kind of tunneling allows some of your memories to pass through.
You are brought back to life by Mind at Large in this or another world, with all memories of this you (resurrection).
You are brought back to life by ultra-advanced technology developed by our descendants (or benevolent aliens) in this or another world, with all memories of this you (technological resurrection).
All these possibilities are consistent with “you go on as a small part of Mind at Large.” There are other conceivable possibilities and combinations.
OK. So which one?
Personally I prefer the last because it is a project for our future. We want to do this, we are confident that we can do it, and we’ll do our f# best to do it.
But why only one? Why not all?
I like to think that all these versions of me are equally real and I experience all of them in parallel. Perhaps they combine to form a super-me (of course super-me is another larger part of Mind at Large). In my interpretation of this picture, super-me casts multiple shadows and experiences multiple versions of me.
Hmm. I would prefer the first. But I think the last point is the most plausible (personally). Also it gives hope and guides action. It is something we can work towards already now :)
The many worlds theory is also very interesting. In a way won't there be endless exact copies of us, and endless variations too? So in a way we are already infinite and endless. I think I read some variation of this theory were your consciousness would swap place. So if you "die" your conscious stream would just find itself in a new world where you're still alive. So personally you would just experience more and more awkward events keeping you alive, as conscious death is "impossible"
Guilio, in my opinion you reached a highpoint with your June 4th 2019 essay on Andrew Strominger's gauge theory of gravity interacting with IR photons to form a memory storage unit, and an akashic record. It seems like the physics is sound, although who knows if Strominger agrees?
https://turingchurch.net/the-infrared-memory-of-the-universe-hints-at-future-akashic-physics-3f9a072f0ca6
I mentally combine this sort of cosmological database with Alexey Turchin's speculation about using a Dyson sphere to achieve your "Data Recovery project."
https://turingchurch.net/the-infrared-memory-of-the-universe-hints-at-future-akashic-physics-3f9a072f0ca6