Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk30 December 2007
We all die atheists
In our last instant of life, I have a hunch that we all have a moment of revelation. And I think it is this: it’s all over, there’s nothing else.
Even those people who might have been screaming for a priest a minute before, who might have seen the white light approaching (a common phenomenon with near-death experiences and therefore almost certainly some neurological effect), who have even uttered the name of their favourite deity or prophet - yes, even these people must know as the final few cells shut down that it is all over. No heaven. No hell. No harps or virgins. No coming face to face with Jesus.
Provided the brain retains some basic level of conscious function, I believe that the fantasy of faith must fade. As our faculties close down, we must surely cling to those most crucial to survival. Mankind has an advantage over other animals - the sophistication of our consciousness that has resulted in the most powerful of our tools: rationality. It’s what allows us to understand the world, to survive in it with such facility that we have the freedom to indulge in additional, inessential activities - such as belief in unseen, supernatural entities.
With the mind closing down, however, I doubt that we would waste our few remaining mental capabilities on such worthless luxuries. And that’s why I believe that our final impression - not even a thought as such, but a sudden, brief and irrevocable knowing, a revelation indeed - is that oblivion is upon us. And if we still have the capacity for emotion, I think that realisation must be profoundly comforting. For, at that moment, we know that there is nothing left to do, no tasks or responsibilities remaining, no more fear, no more fruitless searches for mystical fallacies. Everything is done, complete.
There are many religions that do not offer an afterlife. Even those, including most forms of Buddhism, that propose the idea of reincarnation, strive for extinction as the ultimate goal. When you reach nirvana, you stop being reincarnated and simply cease to exist. But that seems like a long route to the same end.
There’s nothing scientific about this. It is based on no empirical evidence. What evidence could there be? So I admit that this is nothing but a leap of faith. Isn’t that rather like religion? Well, no. There’s a crucial difference.
I ask no-one else to believe what I believe. I claim no higher authority. I freely confess there is no foundation to this belief. It does not have the status of fact or truth. I will not infringe others’ rights, impede their actions or affect their lives in any way if they choose not to share my belief. And should there arise some method of testing my hypothesis, and if the results of such a test contradict my hypothesis, I will gladly abandon it.
In the meantime, I will continue to believe that the actual moment of death (regardless of what preceded it) is one of peace and acceptance. And as there is no reason to fear death, who needs religion?
