“Evolving life must experience a vast range of possibilities, based on environmental histories so unpredictable that no realized route - the pathway to consciousness in the form of Homo sapiens or Little Green Men, for example - can be construed as a highway to heaven, but must be viewed as a tortuous track rutted with uncountable obstacles and festooned with innumerable alternative branches. Any reasonably precise repetition of our earthly route on another planet therefore becomes wildly improbable even in a trillion cases.” MenLittlesFormHeavenConsciousnessCasesExamplePossibilityPlanetsGreenEnvironmentalTrackObstaclesAlternativesEvolveRangeBranchesRoutesPreciseRepetitionUnpredictableHighwaysPathwaysHomo SapiensImprobableEnvironmental History Author:Stephen Jay Gould
“In memorizing the prayer, it may be helpful to remind yourself that you are not addressing some extraterrestrial being outside you. The kingdom of heaven is within us, and the Lord is enshrined in the depths of our own consciousness. In this prayer we are calling deep into ourselves, appealing to the spark of the divine that is our real nature.” MayRealHeavenPrayerConsciousnessLordDivineCallingDepthKingdomsHelpfulSparksKingdom Of HeavenExtraterrestrialMemorizing Book:The Undiscovered Country: Exploring the Promise of Death Source: The Undiscovered Country: Exploring the Promise of Death
“Talking to a peasant one day, I suggested to him the hypothesis that there might indeed be a God who governs heaven and earth, a Consciousness or Conscience of the Universe, but that even so it would not be sufficient reason to assume that the soul of every man was immortal in the traditional and concrete sense. And he replied, "Then what good is God?” MenSoulReasonMightEarthUniverseHeavenConsciousnessTalkingOne DayConscienceAssumingEvery ManTraditionalImmortalitySufficientImmortalConcreteHypothesisPeasantsHeaven And Earth Book:The Tragic Sense of Life in Men and Nations Source: The Tragic Sense of Life in Men and Nations
“And when, in the evening of life, the golden clouds rest sweetly and invitingly upon the golden mountains, and the light of heaven streams down through the gathering mists of death, I wish you a peaceful and abundant entrance into that world of blessedness, where the great riddle of life will be unfolded to you in the quick consciousness of a soul redeemed and purified.” WorldSoulLightDeathHeavenWishConsciousnessMountainCloudsGoldenPeacefulEveningStreamsGatheringMistWish YouRiddleEntrancesRedeemedBlessedness Author:J. G. Holland
“We fear death so profoundly, not because it means the end of our body, but because it means the end of our consciousness - better to be a spirit in Heaven than a zombie on Earth.” MeanEndsBodyEarthSpiritHeavenConsciousnessZombieFear Of Death Author:Alison Gopnik