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LIFE AFTER DEATH I
The Idea of Life after Death
The idea that human life does not end with death; that there is a hereafter is an important tenets of theistic religions. In Islam, for example, that the transitory worldly life is designed with a specific purpose inasmuch it is directed to the life after death is frequently underlined in the Qur’an.
Likewise, the immortality of the soul, the possibility of an afterlife seems to have been a perennial interest in the history philosophy.
The possibility of the life after death, as a problem of philosophy of religion,
is also intimately related to important isssues in metaphysics, ethics and
philosophy of mind.
Mind and Body
The possibility of the life after death is closely related to the traditional philosophical debate of mind and body.
Are we identical with our minds or bodies? Or both?
An answer to this question is also significant for our understanding of what makes a person the same person.
The question of personal identity is therefore crucial for our
understanding the possibility and nature the life after death.
On the issue of mind-body, generally speaking, there have been two types of theories.
(1) Dualist theories which attribute mental states to an immatterial substance which is ontologically independent of bodily properties. This substance is called the ‘mind’ or the ‘soul’.
(2) Physicalist theories which identify mental states one way or another with
bodily properties such as brain states or that they can be explained in
reductionist way (without an immatterial substance).
The Question of Personal Identity
What makes a person the same person? There have been different views on the issue of personal identity. Basically, they are:
(1)
Bodily Criterion: According to physicalism, since a person is identical to his/her body, the criterion of personal identity consists in the sameness of the body. The same body = the same person.
(2)
Psychological Criterion: On this view, personal identity is a matter of
psychological continuity which is turn explained in terms of the continuity of memory. (as famously defended by J. Locke).
(3)
