If there's no God, and we don't "go" anywhere after we die, then I'm forced to conclude that grieving patterns (like those for recently deceased Czech leader Havel, found here) exist for other reasons.
Here are some possibilities, ranging from the personal to the political.
1. Obvious personal need to feel better after the loss of another human.
2. Signal to other humans the association you or I had with the deceased
3. Signal to other humans feeling of loss and pain
4. Show that deceased had the right amount of empathy and stature--i.e. that he/she was acted in an idyllic model fashion
Here's where it gets weird:
4. Show respect to an idea, or collection of historical events. This would be the arena of Havel. This isn't so strange when the idea or collection of historical events increases the capacity for people to obtain happiness, and this is recognized through a grieving process. I suppose death is a good opportunity to reflect.
The weird part is the collective conscious part. Whatever it is that Havel did is enshrined in a number of different minds. Not all of the minds that existed, that played a role in Havel and the fall of communism, even exist anymore, though. So, the minds that pay homage are also minds that don't always have direct knowledge.
Query whether direct knowledge is necessary.
Query whether specific details are needed to back up general claims about levels of human happiness (and how to get it)? If yes (that you can back up such claims) though, the question can be refined; you or I might need x amount of data to confirm or deny a general proposition (e.g. the fall of communism increased aggregate happiness in then post-soviet countries).
The weird part is that a different person lines up their requirements for the same general belief and comes up with a list that looks very much like our list, but is different in a few small areas, and yet, we still agree at the general level.
And weirder still is that, while we can probably boil our list down to essential elements and others can do the same, at times there can be two people who agree but have lists that don't look the same at all.
"If there's no God, and we don't "go" anywhere after we die, then I'm forced to conclude that grieving patterns exist for other reasons."
ReplyDeleteWhat's the reason grieving patterns exist assuming there is a God and we do go somewhere after we die?
If there's a God, then religious practices around death have some foothold (assumption is that religions, if a God exists, have some relevance to that God). If there's a God, then our grieving may in some way connect to that God (though I'm in uncharted waters as to how).
ReplyDeleteRight, but initially you were talking about grieving, not just religious practices (at least that's how I understood it). At any rate, I guess what I'm asking is what you think that foothold is, specifically.
ReplyDelete