'Hey Bill Nye, Do You Think about Your Mortality?'
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- Опубликовано: 15 сен 2024
- 'Hey Bill Nye, Do You Think about Your Mortality?' #TuesdaysWithBill
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The days may seem long, but life itself is rather short. As Bill Nye the Science Guy explains, an average human life will span about 30,000 days. That may seem long, but consider that the typical professional football stadium holds twice as many seats. If you sat in a new seat each day of your
life, you would not visit even half of the seats in the sport stadium. In order to make the most of our lives, we would do well to meditate on our own mortality as a way to understand just how precious and limited our existence is.
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BILL NYE:
Bill Nye, scientist, engineer, comedian, author, and inventor, is a man with a mission: to help foster a scientifically literate society, to help people everywhere understand and appreciate the science that makes our world work. Making science entertaining and accessible is something Bill has been doing most of his life.
In Seattle Nye began to combine his love of science with his flair for comedy, when he won the Steve Martin look-alike contest and developed dual careers as an engineer by day and a stand-up comic by night. Nye then quit his day engineering day job and made the transition to a night job as a comedy writer and performer on Seattle’s home-grown ensemble comedy show “Almost Live.” This is where “Bill Nye the Science Guy®” was born. The show appeared before Saturday Night Live and later on Comedy Central, originating at KING-TV, Seattle’s NBC affiliate.
While working on the Science Guy show, Nye won seven national Emmy Awards for writing, performing, and producing. The show won 18 Emmys in five years. In between creating the shows, he wrote five children’s books about science, including his latest title, “Bill Nye’s Great Big Book of Tiny Germs.”
Nye is the host of three currently-running television series. “The 100 Greatest Discoveries” airs on the Science Channel. “The Eyes of Nye” airs on PBS stations across the country.
Bill’s latest project is hosting a show on Planet Green called “Stuff Happens.” It’s about environmentally responsible choices that consumers can make as they go about their day and their shopping. Also, you’ll see Nye in his good-natured rivalry with his neighbor Ed Begley. They compete to see who can save the most energy and produce the smallest carbon footprint. Nye has 4,000 watts of solar power and a solar-boosted hot water system. There’s also the low water use garden and underground watering system. It’s fun for him; he’s an engineer with an energy conservation hobby.
Nye is currently the Executive Director of The Planetary Society, the world’s largest space interest organization.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Josh: Hey Bill. Do you ever think about your mortality? Does it ever bother you to think that one day you just won't exist? I know you're not religious but do you think anything happens when we die or is it just over, no thoughts, nothing like that? And if given the choice to live longer in an artificial body would you take that or not? Thanks. Bye.
Bill Nye: What a question. That was Josh? Josh, fabulous question. Yes I think about mortality continually man. I won't say constantly but everyday. So I'd like to just give you something to think about. If you lived to be 82 and seven weeks, depends on leap years as to the exact number of weeks, you get 30,000 days on earth, 30,000. When you're in kindergarten 30,000 sounds like a lot, almost an unimaginably big number. When you are my age, I'm 61, you start to see that 30,000 really isn't that many. And to show you it's not that many I encourage you to imagine a National Football League stadium. They typically hold way more than 70,000 people, certainly way more than 60,000 people. So imagine sitting in a different seat every day of your life and watching your life take place down on the field, imagine this. Sit in a different seat everyday. Day-to-day it looks about the same right? But with 30,000 you don't get halfway around, halfway around and you're dead. It sucks man. So it's why it's important to do your best to live your life as best as you can every day. This doesn't mean you become a hedonist and just have a joyride everyday, you're working too big goals but no one appreciate that everybody is going to die. I have never met anyone who is not going to die. I've never met anyone who's of a certain age who is not already dead. It sucks.
Now here's the evidence for why I don't believe i...
For the full transcript, check out bigthink.com/v...
How I feel about it is like the quote that's attributed to Mark Twain - “I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.”
Man, you just cured me from 27 years of fear of death. How can I thank you ?
Seriously man, you wouldn't believe it. I've suffered from years of obsessing about death, and you just relieved me from all that. I couldn't express enough gratitude for what you just did to me.
Ok.
the difference being that you have now experienced life where before you had not.
Andrew Sutton you contemplate the subjective nothingness of death while you're alive, but not after that.
Man, his "I'm 61" came out with such pain I felt bad for Bill
Don't feel bad, you'll be 61 yourself very soon
Victor Bastos I though he was in his 80s
@JamesO19991 What's the beef?
But awesome to see what 60+ people look today... can you imagine that Keanu Youknowwho is almost his age???
Feel bad for us all. Everyone has more or less the same end.
What do you think about mortality bill?
IT SUCKS MAAAANNEEE!!!
puff puff pass
Dat FancyIan Bill be smokin tokin lol! Probably when he was younger lol!
@@HardKore5250 haha nah he still does trust me
Tenzin Who why should we trust you
His answer was sad, but I expect it to be the same for All who don't know they're an eternal Spirit.
The irony of the intellectual not knowing Who and What They are!
Not all his fault tho, We're All fed BS to keep Us distracted from that very truth, not even the religions really tell Us in any empowering way where We don't end up giving Our power away to something or Someone outside of Ourselves.
I'm reminded of the advice of the ancient Scholars;
"... first know Thyself"
🧘♂️💚🧘♀️
The eternal Self is discovered in thoughtless-awareness-mediation.
🧘♀️💚🧘♂️
Bill is impressed by every question posed on the show, he's like the opposite of a grumpy grandpa, it's great! lol
Richie Godsil Probably because he chooses the good questions he thinks are good out of the myriad of questions he receives.
Spindoctor experience adds
@@tgwaste Wild guessing on your part. Can you support your position?
i too think about death almost every day. some days it scares the absolute shit out of me, some days im alright with it (not really). but for some reason, the scariest part is that i'll just be gone forever and ever. this universe will keep expanding to the point where no stars can be seen anymore. the stars will blow out like candles and everything will be cold and dark forever more.
it would console me to know what or how this all came to be.
Jenson there is no “one” universe. Everything ever made as we know is in our universe shaped as a sphere in the 4th dimension. This sphere according to a 4th dimensional creature looks like a flat piece of paper. That if you bend into the 4th dimension and fold it in half can create a “wormhole ” where am I going with this? Well in order to escape the heat death any race must leave the third dimension, then somehow survive the 4th with completely different laws of physics and entropy and find another life sustaining universe in 3D and enter it but who knows if you can see other universes as a whole to join and who knows if leaving the 3rd dimension and everything AND our laws of physics then surviving unknown ones then finding a universe that we may not be able to see and completely living THERE. (IF) we can do that for every universes’ death, than the human race will live forever’
Yeah, I just can't wrap my mind around non-existence, and it scares the shit out of me. That whole quote about non-existence before I was born doesn't even give me comfort, since now that I do exist and can contemplate stuff I don't want to go back to the state before I was born lol.
@@AnifreakGedsparrow RIGHTTT??!??!?! LIKE THAT QUOTE BRINGS NO COMFORT AT ALL BRO
@@AnifreakGedsparrow if you watch many videos on some sites of people getting killed you will see just how passing and simple life and death are. A guy walks down the street and a truck runs over him exploding his guts on the pavement - it happened and it's done and done, next day that spot has been power washed and he doesn't exist anymore, no big deal really, just 1 in 8 billion who will all die as well in various ways and 100 billion already lived and died humans. Done and done
DEATH IS LIFE
I dont necessarily believe in an afterlife, but its comforting to think about it. Just being gone forever is kinda frightening
That’s what religion was for, if you learn enough about Catholicism, you will know that you will definitely rather be up there then down in hell forever that’s for sure
@@greensingleton1854 honestly i wouldn't care where i go, i just wanna capacity to think the next day
you're not going to experience eternity after you die, so why be afraid? You didn't exist for an eternity before the universe began, and for billions of years after it did. Were you inconvenienced?
But what could be frightening if there wasn't anyone there to experience fear?
I don't think that's what frightens you. It's the transition from existence to non-existence. The last fight. When that's over and done (like it will be for all of us some day), there's nothing left to be afraid of. I hope..
When we're dead, we have no concept of time, so to me the most logical conclusion is we either stay dead forever or immediately move to a different form of consciousness if at all possible
We can always hope this is what happens.
I certainly do, because my brain can barely grasp its own lack of existence and when it comes close its filled with a primal fear of the truly unknown.
You always fear what you don't understand
@AzeriBeasT /// Who knows? All one can do is speculate.
@AzeriBeasT /// Like I said, pure speculation.
Yeshua is lord
I find mortality discouraging. A lot of people say the certainty of death drives us to accomplish more today, but for me personally, it seems to have the opposite effect. I find myself saying things like "I'm too old to start a new career," or "saving up for a house will take too long."
There's ups and downs to it all.
The net effect should be that you're happy with the time you had.
Sometimes re-evaluating goals and what really matters can be liberating. For me it's hobbies and time with family.
It's okay because nature only expects you to procreate. If you don't, well there's plenty other of our species. Beyond that, any expectations we have about life are self imposed. We've succeeded just by being alive in nature's eyes. That's all it takes. If I get down on myself for not living up to my own expectations, I try to remember that and it helps. Everyone essentially is just going through life the best they can with the best they have. There are choices within that and principles to be guided by but that's what it boils down to.
That's the exact effect that death has on me. Like, why bother with anything because I'll die anyway and it'll all be for nothing.
Tally Shardz yeah it sucks and we just have to live with it. And sometimes I wonder if I want to bring a kid into the world that’s gonna have the same questions about death and feeling worthless just as I have
Through college I've taken away this- that its unlikely there will be an after life. But dear god, I hope there is. A place in which everything is perfect and there is no more pain. Just pleasure and happiness.
It’s confusing man. Imo there’s significant evidence to prove both sides so it’s really hard to say.
I personally believe that we become part of the universe if that makes sense. We are part of the universe allready but I mean in a more as in energy and not a materialistic form. I think we will transcend in a form in which we don’t need to survive and we don’t need feelings to survive anymore. I also can’t imagine an afterlife in which we are the optimal best form of ourselves, wouldn’t make sense really. However given the fact how complex everything is and the chances of us actually being in this moment as it is in this universe is so complex and way out of our understanding that it wouldn’t even surprise me if we were all to be flying unicorns in the afterlife :p
I think life is a leap of faith, think of it this way, your an atheist, you think there’s nothing after death, but when you die and you find out it’s all true, and you lived your life thinking it wasn’t, what will you gain from that? If it’s not true, yea your right, great and enjoy losing your consciousness forever, it’s always going to be a lose lose situation for atheists
@@nicholasonciul5770 zero evidence to prove an afterlife exists and all the evidence to prove that our and the universe's existence is natural
@@bobbyfrank1237 zero evidence to prove something doesn’t happen after death either
I am an atheist, but we have to remember we have no evidence either way. We don't know how life got started, and why that happened, and we don't know how life seems to dissipates or die out.
there may be am afterlife, if there is, I don't think it's going to parellel closely to any religous ideas of the afterlife.
I both disagree & agree.
If there's an afterlife, why isn't there something pre-life?
You weren't sentient prior to birth, so why would you assume there's something after death?
***** I am not assuming anything. I just said that I have no idea.
I just think that assuming life dissipates into nothingness is more likely then an after life is vacuous.
This is especially backed up since we don't have much on the tangebilty of the Genisis of life, or the end of life for that matter.
***** ugh. I am not refuseing to accept it. To me, it's a possibility that nothingness is what happens when we die.
What you're assuming is that there is no afterlife, without any proof.
Also: So far we only know that life started, and how it evolved. We don't know what instigated it.
Joey Bear we have pretty good evidence that consciousness is tied to the brain and that the brain rots away after you die, so afterlife existing is highly unlikely
Xeirus, how about if this life is pre-life? And What we call afterlife is actually “life”?
I cried to my pillow semi-regularly when I came to terms with my mortality when I was 7 or 8.
Haven't felt any need to think about it with grief since.
yea for me it was like, holy shit im gonna die someday, and a little time later, holy shit summer vacation starts in a few days,
its like there is no reason to keep thinking about when there is nothing to do about it
Bustanut
Well, then its a good thing to know you won't notice anything anymore when you dead. So you can stop worrying about dieing some time..
manners
You flushed it all out haha
Anston, Musician me too!!!!! Very hopeless time. I think I was younger than you when I went through that. I’m now dealing/worrying about health, separation issues, depression and anxiety.
I thank you Bill for being a positive part of my life as a child, right through to now as an adult.
This video was surprisingly depressing. I have so much respect for Bill Nye and you can hear it in his voice that the thought of his own death weights heavily on him.
Atheists are like that, they sometimes realize that they are finite, in their own mind. And that is a sad state to be in, very sad.
Thank you Bill, for being you, and always standing up for truth. I'm an American (57) living for the past 11 years in central Thailand, teaching high school science. A good deal of my classes are spent showing Bill Nye The Science Guy episodes, which the students seem to like and learn English from. It must be rewarding to know you have taught so many millions during your career. I wish you well in your twilight years. Peace to you.
My reason for disbelief of the after life is thinking about before I was born. It was nothingness and blackness and no awareness from me. Death is exactly the same.
You didn't meet god
+nadoeloiskat I am happy for you. I am jealous of those with strong faith, it sure makes death easier to stare in the face. I am agnostic and drifting closer to being an atheist. Despite this I pray occasionally to God to show me a sign or do something to inspire my faith. I have been doing this for 20 years and no one has called back yet.
Michael O download a free audio Bible and listen to the New Testament Jesus teachings.
Romans 10:17 So faith comes from hearing the message, and the message that is heard is what Christ spoke.
Michael O I think the whole "God" concept is just fear of the fact that it's more probable that when we die it's game over. Now sure people believe in God due to "faith" but that's all they have and I believe they use that term "faith" to escape the idea that there is no afterlife because no one knows.
I'll tell you a good one...
I'm completely Atheist (not that it's really relevant) however I thought, Ignoring all Religion and pretending that there never was religion, what evidence have I got for life after death thinking I would probably come to the answer that there wasn't any.
But then I heard people saying Death is like before Birth that's why you shouldn't be afraid cause you didn't mind then so why should you now. (A terrible argument for not being afraid in my opinion) but then I realised that if you go back to the state you were before you were alive then aren't you at the state which is pre birth?
One could argue that when the universe ends there will be absolute cold yet before everything there was absolute cold (cold being nothing (nothing being the absence of anything)).
Therefore even though the odds are astronomical for you being alive now the fact you are is evidence enough for you coming back.
The only thing that that leads to is maybe we have infinite cycles of being alive and dying. This is without taking any religion into consideration just what we have experienced up to now.
So it's either 0 or infinity. That probably didn't help cause both are scary but at the same time it to me gives a glimmer of hope that it might not be 0
Sorry for the essay
anyone else notice bill's eyes watering and getting all choked up? broke my heart realizing he's closer to death than we realised, and i think he realised it as well.
Yeah
Jeez, he got really choked up at the end it looked like he was doing everything he possibly could to not just break down into tears.
Yeah
Man's gotten old heaven is a pleasure to believe in but some people can't force themselves to that belief so death is quite painful to think about
@@CopeandSeethe80085 another way to look at it is that death is so scary humans make up things about the afterlife to comfort themselves
Bill: I've never met anyone who's not gonna die
Kids born in 2020: actually I'm gonna upload my consciousness onto a computer when I'm 80 years old
I wonder how that's gonna work. Uploading consciousness, that is. Till date, we don't even know 'what' we're gonna upload much less 'where' we're gonna find it and 'how' its gonna be done. Hope humanity figures it out.
@@hyperion3704 '
Once your consciousness gets uploaded your true self dies. Or at least will still die. The upload isn’t you. It’s a copy of you.
@@Stierenkloot Yeah
Shit I bet they will have it figured out before the next generation passes. We’re that far from going to Mars.
Religion aside when he said, “Live your life the best you can.” That’s what I take from this vid
I love you Bill and I don't want you to die 😢
We are all going to. All of the awoken are awoken together. We all will die together and build the window of time we call the past. We are all the past. :/
@@@eDreamsinc & Cindy Lou, death is not the end. nanu nanu!
So if there is an afterlife, do I get to see my grandpa who died with dementia and didn't know who I was? Or do I get to see him as a 23 year old in top condition who didn't know who I was? Either one sounds great. He was a real prick.
lmao wtf
XD
Nordkiinach you're way to smart. go out and party for once you deserve it fuck studying lmao
Idk friend no one does. But I can say is let the ones you live know you love them and how much. Maybe show them some how instead of just saying it. My older brother is of like 10 yrs ago a hardcore Pentecostal and since he became that way. He never txt me never checks in on our mom but he is always at church. Hell his family use to got 4 or 6 days a week. We aren’t mad at each other but we don’t talk at all and we didn before all his church going. I just hate that some believe have this belief they will see there loved ones again and get to reminese. I am currently very confused one what I believe and have always had a hard time with having faith in the unknown. I don’t see my self forgiving my brother for not coming to see my mother she she does pass away. He lives 10 miles away by the way. I guess my point is just let the ones you love know that you do cause once they’re gone they’re gone. ✌️out
I'd like to live 1000, maybe 10,000 years. But forever? No way!
The life is the difference.
@@rosellecarmen2224 so your saying suicide is ok?
@@dizzychineseman7445 who's saying suicide is okay? The OP wants to die after 10000 years.
@@rosellecarmen2224 because it potrays the same idea as im gonna be dead in 100 years so why not kill myself now
@@dizzychineseman7445 my question was what's the difference between dying now and 10000 years from now. You can read my original unedited post and there isn't any suggestion for anyone to kill themselves. So what's your point?
BILL BILL BILL
A Languager Bill bill bill biill bill nye the science guy!!
SCIENCE RULes!!!
BILL! BILL! BILL! BILL NYE THE SCIENCE GUY! SCIENCE RULES! INERTIA IS A PROPERTY OF MATTER!
Bill nye, your mom’s a guy
inertia is a property of matter
THANK YOU BIG THINK AND BILL!! THIS IS ON MY FAVE TOP 5 VIDEO SERIES ON THE ENTIRE INTERNET!!!
im 22 and this is bothering me so fucking much. I just want to stop and live my life. I guess it ties into my clinical depeession and panic disorder. fuck they say ignorance is bliss and I have to agree the morw aware i became to more miserable ive become. Fuck i wish everyone ultimate peace and happiness. 😩😤
Hope you eventually find peace too, I would never ever wish this sort of pain on anyone
"Do you wanna be stuck in an Apple product the rest of your life?"
No, I'll take Microsoft thanks. I know where the "advanced options" are.
That being said, I've always been a fan of "Ghost in the Shell."
Well said.
this man spoke at a college in my town and I missed it. I really missed out on seeing a great mind in person.
fucking love you bill
It’s not the idea of suffering that scares me, it’s the idea of disappearing. Forever, for infinity. The thought keeps me up at night and I feel cold and hot and I feel like throwing up. I don’t normally think about this sort of thing but when I do it hits my core like a truck. I really do hope I can come to terms with it someday. Logically, and not with some overused quote or religion or any sort of cheap coping mechanism that looks away from our mortality
Hi my name is Daniel .thank you bill this gives me a new perspective on life i’m still very much afraid of death and it’s something that I haven’t been able to get over since I was a child when I learned about it .I’m 17 now and sometimes when I stay up thinking about it too long I have fear twitches I know that one day I will die but facing the music is just very frightening to me
Bill. You have raised me intellectually since I was a child. There is nobody I would aspire to be more than you. You have a beautiful mind, and I consider it an honor to live during a portion of your life, and be able to see everything you've done, and caused. :) Thank you.
ArmeniAren ! And?
Oh my god... thinking about being stuck in an Apple product sends chills down my spine...
iluvatar003 haha, I’m an apple fanboy, so as long as it (whatever product I am) is from the Steve Jobs era I’m fine
God no. I'd rather be stuck in Linux truth be told...
Bill Nye da Science Guy!
He was an important figure in my childhood. Kind of like a Mr Rogers for science geeks. Respect for having answered that one. Actually made me cry listening to his voice get heavier. Then after sniffing, I saw the tears in his eyes. I wanted to give the guy a hug. 😢
My grandpa of 93 wanted to take every lunch we had together to talk about dying. What he needs to pass on before he can't anymore. Establish his will. Talk about giving me the ring on his finger. For 2 years, it just created this awkward sadness. His body was giving up. Only his will kept him going. Sight, Bladder, Memory... All stayed strong for so long, but fell so fast in the end. He was an inspiration to me.
So to Bill, I want to say this... You got some good time ahead of you. But it's all relative. The short time you can give adds to the richness of the years that others have. We love you man. 😊
I can feel the sadness in his voice. I'm sorry such a tough question came up Bill.
Same
is it just me or did it seem like Bill Nye got emotional there towards the end or was he just chuckling
Nah, he was just laughing at his thoughts, like a true nerd.
Gotta love em.
+Josh T lol yeah I can see that now
Ikr
To me it DID sounded like he was going to cry
Everyone has experienced consciousness (being awake) and unconsciousness (being asleep). Let's assume we're dead and that death is like an eternal sleep. We are unconscious. Because we're unconscious, we don't know that we're unconscious. We can't perceive space or TIME. Let's assume the only alternative to unconsciousness is consciousness. Perhaps at some point we will 'wake up' into consciousness. Not necessarily within our old bodies, but in a completely new lifeform in the future, completely separate from our previous life. Even if we didn't 'wake up', we wouldn't know anyway because we can't perceive time in such a state. So the only known alternative is to 'wake up'! Right?
Time to go take some ayahuasca...
OnePercentBetter I think we turn into potatos
Can you dream when you're dead ?
Kyrlics lmaoo
and that doens't disturbe you?
Tnu1138 year old thread mate, he's probably not gonna respond
why would it be disturbing though? how could the notion of not feeling anything whatsoever feel disturbing?
life is much too important ever to be taken seriously- Oscar Wilde
Whenever I talk to my boyfriend about this, he always says ‘you just like to believe in an afterlife because it’s comforting’, when it reality it’s primarily based on interesting discussion and curiosity. I’ve always been intrigued by philosophy and our state of consciousness. If there is nothing after death, no afterlife, there will be no “me” to experience it, so there is no need for me to worry about that.
If you guys are curious about the afterlife, watch Alan Watts video on reincarnation. He makes some really logical points.
*“What has happened once can very well happen again. If it happened once it’s extraordinary, and it’s not really very much more extraordinary if it happened all over again.”*
This thought of me not going to experience it anyways consciously and hopefully all going to end with something like going to sleep in bed is my solitary comfort in this subject.
I was pretty terrified of death at some points in my life so far, but I don't care as much now (I'm in my 20's). All I want is to do the things I care about and have the experiences I look forward to before I die, so I guess for me it's more about not dying too early. There's a paradox where I want to grow old so I have more time to do my things, but I don't to get all kinds of diseases and outlive many of my friends and family. In a weird way it helps that life has a lot of horrible things too, so death can not just be and end to good things, but also a relief when you have experienced a lot of pain and misery. Nowadays I don't really think about my mortality that often. It makes me feel anxious, and I enjoy my life more when I think about interesting ideas and deeper goals I want to accomplish. This doesn't mean that people should completely avoid negative emotions and thoughts. Quite the opposite: I would recommend taking a walk or meditating or keep a diary or whatever, to get your thoughts organized and let your emotions pass through your mind without resisting too much, so you can observe them and not continually have to supress them. I didn't know what I was going to write in advance so this ended up as a lot of rambling.
The idea of continuing consiousness after death doesn't have to be religious nor a naiv conception that you can just migrate to a better place. It can indeed be rationalized. I at least look at myself as a rational person who carefully considers what's true independent of what I would like to be true. But I do believe that you in a sense will be conscious after death. I acknowledge that anything more than that I don't find any basis to believe. Just consciousness. Why? Because the only thing in the world we can be 100% certain is not an illusion is consciousness. So why do we experience it? My hypothesis is that we have to, simply because you can't be conscious of being uncionscious and that's why we immidiately experienced consciousness wherever it may have appeared. We didn't have to wait for infinity to wake up, nor the 13 billion years since the Big Bang of this universe. At least we didn't feel that infinity. The fact that I in the end actually happened to experience consciousness I think confirms my point in a lot of ways. If I can exist now, why not later? Is my consciousness depleted after getting here in a one shot lucky event, that would have to be infinitely lucky, given that the universe had to occur the exact way it did for this exact body that I am to exist? All this among other things leads me to believe in sort of a law, that says that my conscious experience will always exist. In what way or form I cannot know.
I do not see any religion or mysticism in the Bible
Would be nice but no, I don't think so.
Thank you for that input. I am not convinced about that but it is a very comforting thought.
Nye is the shit. He's such a nice guy no matter which side of the argument you're on its tough not to like him. I could listen to this guy all day.
It is interesting how prominent scientific minds are often great at discussing philosophy. Thanks so much Bill. You are making a difference with your allotment of days.
I feel like this view of the afterlife is based on just the most commonly believed view. I've always thought if there is an afterlife, you wouldn't take any sort of physical form.
I've been wanting to ask this question for the past two years. I keep hoping I can find solace about mortality somewhere.
It comes with time/age. Be patient.
(it doesn't. You just gaslight yourself into thinking you're fine with it because you know you can't do anything about it.)
@@kagakai7729 I mean, it does. From a TOC in Afghanistan to the hospital where my wife works, I know plenty of people with a perfect acceptance of their mortality.
Even before I watched videos about death awareness, I often asked myself "would I regret saying no if I was on my death bed?" on offers that I felt unsure about. And there were a surprising amount of things I considered saying no to, but said yes to due to this reasoning, that ended up being very worthwhile experiences. Had a great vacation in Vietnam, some of the friends I have now I got to know due to a party far away, and I've got to spent plenty of time with my grandparents/great aunts & uncles before they passed away, even if it was uncomfortable due to their decline.
My hair looks ridiculous.
Josh T
Mines pretty sexy .
Psh, lies.
Chubby? lmao.
Might be the way I'm sitting, I'm def not chubby :P
Looked like you were in an earthquake, but good question! I think about mortality and discuss with my son all the time. Have you seen Ghost in the Shell?
Question everything. Haha, I was balancing the phone on my leg. I think I did pretty well :P
I've only seen one episode like 10 years ago :/
Greetings Bill my name is Igor I'm from Russia I am 32 years old I've been living in several countries all around the world for many years and I've studied science and spirituality close hand close up and personal. Sorry for my English I am trying. I really enjoy and love a whole your material every video everything you do and I appreciate the effort and believe me when I'm saying that there is life after this life and up to the point where you started saying that jumping out of Cliff to hurry up your to get you this optimal conditions you were absolutely on the right idea and after that moment you start losing it so let me correct you please just just listen for one second that's why there are certain laws that we have the ability to know of that rain that universe and the spiritual world and because there are these laws we cannot commit like suicide or other fastening techniques to to make this passage that's why we must have the natural passage with the time we planned to spend on this earth in this information in this body but that's a subject for another time. Love you have a great life. Please keep up with the good for the humanity
This is the Bill Nye video I've been waiting to see.
He did a great job answering a question that is very sensitive it looks like towards the end he's about to cry and tries so hard to keep it together. I can tell he was thinking about his grandma and his life. Mortality can be a scary thing and what I also respected about him is he's also open minded to an afterlife because the thing is we really don't know. Bill nye thank you for answering such a tough question and not sugar coating it. I have many fond memories of watching his show when I was elementary school.
“I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions
and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the
slightest inconvenience from it.”
-Mark Twain
That quote doesn't make sense. You can only be dead if you had a life beforehand.
It does make sense. What the quote is saying is that you werent born or existed during those billions of years. So basically your dead and dying in this life is like returning to that state of non existence. Except this time you won't get second chances, this time we will all spend the rest of our eons as if we never existed during those billions of before
If I could save any celebrity it would be bill. He made me want to learn when I was a child and I'm still learning from him now. He is a very witty man!
what a thought! you just have to "fit in"! the better you fit in, the more evolutionarily fit you are! hahaha what a thought for me
Greatest video on youtube. Thanks for posting and most thanks to Bill Nye for answering what most people would avoid. Such a great person
"Watching ourselves die is overwhelming evidence that there is no life after death"
That's evidence? I can respect that he doesn't believe in life after death, but a better reason would be, "Because we have zero tangible proof". That would make more sense. I personally believe in life after death, and that's only because I choose to have faith in that. I've watched loved ones pass away and that didn't stop me from believing that there is an afterlife. I just don't see the correlation. Simply saying there is no evidence of an afterlife is a good enough reason in my opinion.
I think you missed his point. We can see the degradation of our bodies before our selves. Why should we believe things get better after our hearts stop beating?
For all of y'all regurgitating that Mark Twain quote, "Well you didn't care before you were born." The difference is that before you were born, you were *always* there, awaiting the time when you would be born. You were always on the timeline, it just wasn't your time yet. But when you die, that's it, you will remain dead and never be on the timeline again, for eternity, for literally all of time, until the end of time itself, and even after that. Let that sink in.
Perhaps once the universe collapses, it will restart with a big bang, and suddenly, wow would you look at that! There's your timeline again, and there you are, waiting your turn, just like the last time. Who knows.
But either way, man. When you die, you will be dead for longer than time even exists. Your death will last longer than the universe itself. And that certainly wasn't the case before you were born. So don't sweep your own death under the rug. It's the worst thing that could happen to anyone, ever. And it will happen. So live while you can.
this was a great question and a great answer i love bill nye ever since i was kid . It sucks not having an afterlife though because i worked hard at becoming who i am and i still have more to discover . its hard for me to believe that my state of consciousness is not a living being of its own design and that i cant progress beyond the body it which it is in. also the fact that our body shares a symbiotic relationship with many bacteria and we understand and acknowledge that fact . so its just hard for me to comprehend my existence just poof gone
That's exactly the feeling that lead me to submit the question.
Energy can’t be created or destroyed. Our thoughts, emotions, memories... they’re all types of energy. That’s our soul. When we die it changes form since that’s the only thing energy can do.
"It sucks!"
The most likely result of death leading to an afterlife, in my opinion, are one of these two options (or a duality of the two):
1-Absolute oblivion; our consciousness is nothing more than a complicated self-preservation algorithm.
2-Dreams; viewed recursively. First, think of a movie. Does the movie start at the beginning of the universe? No, it starts sometime billions of years later with an assumed history that can be guessed at. Is every living being the protagonist in said movie? No, the movie is told from the perspective of one or a few individuals. Why watch a movie if it's not real? Why live a life if it's not real? We do it because we wish to experience something, to feel something, to be effected and affected. I mean just think of the concept of scope. Take a lengthy detailed novel or other IP that got converted into a movie. Is everything included? No, the scope is narrowed. Stuff is left out. I can think of no more glaring an example of scope reduction than the Drake equation. To the best of our understanding, there should be hundreds to millions of advanced species out in the cosmos of our galaxy alone. Sure the solution might be hidden in the uncertainties that still exist, as is always the case, but I'll be damned if that doesn't look like a clean snip to the film reel. Then, in the other direction, you deal with Planck lengths and subatomic stochastics. Not as obvious a snip, but many point to them as being evidence for this all being a mere simulation.
So in conclusion, either (or both) we are nothing more than a blob of self-aware star-stuff, or we are experiencing the comedy, romance, thriller, tragedy, slice of life - created by a consciousness; be it ours or another - who's complexity of dream is not limited to a room and a few individuals like in our dreams, but can solidly maintain the personalities of billions of humans, quadrillions of species, all the physical laws, and all the stars and rocks in the universe.
I love you bill and I'm so grateful to be alive in the same timeline as you. Same goes for Neil degrasse Tyson and stephon hawking
I can kind of see his argument that people slowly die before death, and that that’s evidence of no afterlife. But, at the same time, I think that people who believe in a soul would argue that the body is just an instrument by which the soul observes the world and communicates, and just because, a person’s body, including their brain, stops functioning as well, later in to life, doesn’t mean that their soul isn’t just as much their. The best evidence against afterlife, imo, would be the evidence for evolution, by natural selection, and the fact that all known parts, of a person, can be explained by this process, yet, a soul obviously couldn’t be. Plus, it’s just plain improbable that a thinking thing could last forever and still be the same thing, in any meaningful sense, for eternity.
Damn Bill! That was depressing! You are in my top 3 mentors, "heros" if you will. I love to listen to your lectures, and to learn from your cast life experience. But that stadium speech was a bummer!
I like Bill cuz he doesn’t sugar coat his answers. So genuine.
Shrooms say there is a possibility of something after this existence 😁
I had an alarming trip with LSD, about one year ago. I went to Hell for a long time then finally I managed to get to Heaven. My consciousnesses was extracted and shot through a black hole when entering heaven. I thought I was dying, I thought I was dead. At the time it made me an instant agnostic, with time though I think this only happened because my brain was so active during the whole process. I think when the lights go out for real, they go out - no brain activity means no thoughts. Im sure though that even non religious people have these exact same thoughts when dying for real because we all deep down do not want it to be over and this is of course the basis for all religion. Safe travels!
i've noticed this also after years of meditation and psychedelics. HAD a major depression and realised everything we know or think about afterlife and dreams are false information. We are animals like rest of the species around us.Lesson of life is to survive or die. Not saying i am right or anything but that is what i believe currently..
I never thought anything happened after you died until I tried DMT. After that, I feel certain that your soul or some form of consciousness continues on after your physical body deceases. I felt like I died but got hugged by the entire world in some weird way. After hearing that your brain produces DMT when you die, I still keep this belief.
Runos9999
You take a complete scientific approach, that's one way to look at it.
You noticed I said "possibility, which means I don't claim to know one way or the other, just like you.
*****
I think, thought created the material world in which we live in.
I know, I don't know.
Gosh this is so refreshing to hear. Part of what makes life great is that there are no expectations other than the ones we impose on ourselves. Just as Bill said, we are here to pass on our genes and that's about it. Evolution couldn't give a rats ass about you after that. I don't think I will have kids but it is interesting how nature just kind of is a thing and that we exist individually for a brief part of it in time and then we pop out of it. We will never know when it ends, if it ends, or what will happen beyond our death, even what has happened presumably before the big bang (if there is such a thing as before B.B.). It's fascinatingly pointless but at the same time it is everything that matters. We might be in a simulation but we'd never know. It's pretty amazing that we can experience life as conscious beings, aware of our own existence.
Apparently Bill Nye has never tried DMT
WOW IT'S GOD. I SEE GOD! IT'S ALL OVER ME, IN ME! IT TICKLES!
So respectful of religions and delivers his answers in such a cool way. Love this man
Bill nye was about to cry :( i dont like seeing old people like bill nye cry
When old people cry, it's because shit's bad
It's just as natural to leave this earth as it was to enter it. I believe in the afterlife. I don't believe that we are just an accident. I believe that we were designed by a maker. I believe that our maker gave us free will, that man is responsible for good and bad. Someday we will stand before our maker and give an account for our choices. I know that not everyone believes this, but I do with every fiber of my being.
He never fails to brighten my Tuesdays
Regarding immortality, consider this: "Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon." -Susan Ertz
I wish you elaborated more on the final part of the question. You kind of just laughed it off.
RedSquirrelHunter That means that he's involved in cybernetic bodies. Shhhh...
RedSquirrelHunter The technology and understanding to move our consciousness into a digital place is too far off for Bill, probably too far off for anyone alive right now, so although it's an interesting subject, it only seems to be interesting to those willing to entertain future tech. I think Bill prefers to contemplate present day or near future developments as an engineer. However, Sam Harris is the guy you want to listen to on those sort of subjects. As a neuroscientist, it's right up his alley, and his conversations in the matter are enthusiastic and rather stimulating.
you can move our conciousnes into a digital realm , that doesnt mean you will enjoy awareness forever, since the real you will die, only your digital version will go on for a long time, so it is basically making a digital clone of yourself.
Ariel .Rodriguez Very good point. However, we don't have any way of knowing just yet if that concern, though natural, is really valid or not. Is it a simple obstacle to overcome in our methods, or perhaps a non issue altogether? There's obviously still more that we don't know about consciousness than what we do know about it. What experts seem to agree upon is that the consciousness you experience, the feeling of 'I' in your head - is the real you. And all it's made up of is electrical signals interpreted by the hardware of your brain. So if this process was fully understood in the future, so that the full exact process of electrical signals that makes up 'you'. your consciousness, your sense of experience, memory, inner thoughts, all of it .. if it were perfectly understood as to be replicated, emulated, or transferred from electrical signals on the brain to electrical signals on another storage medium - then it will be for all intents and purposes 'the real you' - the body isn't the real you, the consciousness is. The body is simply the container, the vessel. In so far as the concern that the consciousness, though 100% identical (and so still you), would only be a copy or duplicate, and not the orginal, well there's nothing too scary about that it turns out. Our cells get replaced after a few years with new ones anyways. So nothing is original, and that's never been an issue for our continued sense of self before. Vsauce has a cool video on that if you're interested. However, we're not talking about a slow gradual move/replace. We're talking about a more abrupt and jarring procedure for sure so it would be natural to have concerns and doubts. It's all theoretical anyways. The important thing is to retain the continuity of presence, when transferring your consciousness, so you won't feel as though you must die and be reborn, but instead that you simply woke up to find yourself in a digital body, or whatever the container is - with ALL your memories in tact, your sense of self, your personailty, everything is still right where you left it in that place behind our eyes we call 'I', our self, our consciousness - you still feel like you. And is there a necessity to avoid interruption in order to affirm that it's really you? And not simply a copy of you and the real you is missing out? Well that's something nobody knows, and it's a big one. Another big issue is will we even know if the new container has true consciousness, or does it only appear to? If the transferred consciousness was a collection of electrical signals that operates like you, but without the all important consciousness, then it would have been a failure. In that sense you would be right, it wouldn't be you at all, but merely a general intelligence without consciousness, or with a new form of consciousness we don't understand. Perhaps that consciousness, though not you, would still be a valuable and obviously immortal variant. You could think of it as offspring, or passing on your essence to an immortal artificial being that lives forever in this universe representing you. It would still be the closest thing to an afterlife we could have. If nothing else, it would be a superior version of you since it still functions and thinks as you do but without the corruption of aging, or the limitation of time when it comes to what that version could accomplish. But that's assuming you lose the continuity. However, there are those who think the continuity of presence can be maintained during transfer.
This is all hypothetical of course, but the concepts are all we have to go on at the moment. Of course, I'm no expert on any of this, far from it. But I have read about these issues from those who study in this particular field. The neuroscientist Sam Harris discusses these issues in great detail in his book 'Waking Up' It covers, among other things, consciousness, what it is and isn't, what we know so far, what we can expect, what we still need to grasp, etc. It's a very interesting book. I recommend it if you're interested in that kind of stuff. Sorry for rambling on. Have a good one buddy.
Derek Moore funny thing im a fan of Sam Harris, ill check the book out, thanks.
It'd be great if there was an afterlife but there's no way to be certain. As we get older like Bill said, we'll lose our faculties and start perceiving the world and ourselves differently. Having these thoughts about mortality is a privilege of not dying of old age yet.
I'm not religious I don't believe in the Christian version of God but I believe that there are endless possibilities out there in the universe for all we know were stuck in the Matrix. Scientist can entertain the idea of multiple dimensions/Universes/time travel but I always feel like they're really dismissive of things that are considered "spiritual".
RUclips Commentator Rick the universe is a hologram
Think of your body as a vessel that you precieve life through, before you were born there was a probability/chance greater than 0% that you would be created with your particular brain & consciousness & When you die that same probability to be given life that you had before you were born will remain. Anything faced with infinity will always repeat itself otherwise none of us would be here today. Think about that before you fear death. All we know is life, that speaks for itself we are all blessed to be destined in this universe we occupy.
what if when we die we wake up?
My thoughts.
Everything in the universe, is. It changes form, it changes location but it does not become removed from the space it takes up. Electrical impulses are controlled by the brain to function a specific part of the body, but what controls the brain? The self... but what is the self and where did it come from?
It came from somewhere in space to take up another space... the brain.
I am not religious but I don't believe that once we die that the self cease to be. The body ceases but the self will always be in space.
There’s a new theory that consciousness isn’t actually produced by the brain, so that could potentially be what the “soul” is
I'm surprised how many people are scared of death.
More scared of the finality of it.
Better be scared of not living.
Without that fear, we probably wouldn't have the religions we have now.
+Josh T - The finality is the best part! You wont even know youre dead, so there will be nothing to fear... Ever again. Its beautiful in a way. A sweet release.
MrOuchiez Well yes and no.
I enjoy experiences, my kids, my wife, travel, etc.
The thought of it being gone, permanently, is the depressing part. I'm not concerned with the pain and such.
I don't fear death, it's dying that scares me. just like i don't have a fear of heights, i have a fear of falling from heights.
Something tells me that Bill will have or has some hard beef with Ray Kurzweil.
“You expire” damn that hit hard
The more I contemplate death, the' more I feel having no afterlife to be the perfect ending to existence.
After all, the idea of life permanently ending is only potentially frightening from a living perspective; once you're dead, you don't know you're dead. It's perfect.
I could listen to Bill Nye's thoughts for hours and hours nonstop.
Life is short. We are all going to die. Many people dont want to think about it. It could happen to you at any time though. Strange thought ! There is a book called the denial of death by ernest becker thats good and deals with this topic
justmadeit2 I think we don't think about it a lot for a variety of reasons. Religion is one but even if your not religious it doesn't do much good thinking about it. Thinking about it constantly just makes you lose time that you could have been using to do other things.
DManCAWMaster
True
I'll give it a read ,thanks for share.
Not a great Christian,but try to be a good human
Thanks Tish. On this topic, I also made a short low fi vi deo a couple of years ago, to see it, simply type in this........'Death the great taboo'
Bill has been a bright spot throughout my life in many capacities! He is my hero :D
Interesting, yet depressing. Looking forward to my last breath.
Grey Silverback Let it be a bong rip.
I see a lot of comments saying that death is just what happened right before we were born, so there's no reason to fear it. That analogy might work for some, but for most people it does nothing. A much better analogy is the opposite view.
Whereas with that one it pictures a timeline where we are in "eternal oblivion" forever and only alive for a few decades, however we can instead picture a more realistic timeline that starts at birth and ends with death. In that analogy, we have no reason to fear death, simply because we'll never experience it. In other words, we'll be living until "the day we die".
The reason we fear death is because we try to imagine being dead and conscious simultaneously, which is very conflicting and incorrect. It's not "you won't feel anything" or "you'll have no sense of time" or "you'll be used to it", because YOU will be long gone by then.
It's never made sense to me to title the nontheistic view of death as "eternal oblivion", since that title attempts to describe what it will be like after we die, even though the entire point of the theory is that there is no "after we die".
This analogy/viewpoint also allows for more worthwhile contemplations. Generally the people I know who look at death in this way experience less death anxiety, but MUCH more anxiety of the aging process, which sucks but is ultimately more productive.
mortality mmm why not but me neither don't believe that there's another life after death just face it we live once and no life after death
Whole Foods plant-based nutrition will help give you a few more days of living healthy so you can enjoy life to its fullest, after life cease to exist you don't exist no more.
But then you have to spend your 30000 days eating that crap for a couple extra days. Fuck that.
James Dreger I wish I had a few extra Twinkies or Snicker Bars said no one on their Deathbed
I doubt very much anyone bemoaned not eating enough spinach or brussel sprouts either, but I would be utterly astonished if someone were to be lay in bed dying, pissed off that they hadn't spend thier days with eating that over the top crap.
Much more likely I would have thought it would turn to not having enough sex, enjoying oneself enough or regretting not getting around to something important, possibly talking with a loved one.
An relatively balanced diet is of course recommended. But I doubt one needs go to such extremes. They way you seem to need to push it, kind of smacks of a little over exuberance, maybe?!
But yes, I agree, when we are done, we are indeed done. Or rather I have yet to see anything that would suggest the slightest possibility of "living on", and everything I have would suggest otherwise.
To be honest, I think it would be a horrendous prospect. Of course one would always like a little more, but the idea of a permanent infinite existence fills me with dread. If one actually thinks about it logically.
I'm happy to have my time and then move over for future generations.
I am not afraid of dying, I'm afraid of dying and finding out it was my fault.
Might make you feel better that the guy in the video (me) has been vegan for 3 years :)
Bill sounded like he was gonna cry at the end
On the last question, about putting my brain in an artificial body / machine I'd say yes if it was a la Ghost in the Shell, otherwise no.
It seems to me that life is a pure, unfathomable miracle, no matter what sparked the beginning. The fact that we not only exist and survive; but dream, love, believe, hope, contemplate and create tells me that we are more than just random flesh particles spun together by billions of years of chance. Scientifically speaking, the ability to open your mind to imagine various explanations of "how, what and why" puts you at an advantage. I believe what lies outside the realm of our understanding and imagination would leave us stunned and enthralled to say the least. That said, I can't imagine why it would be implausible to consider life after death; not to mention a spectacular being who first drove the whole infinite universe into motion with the Big Bang. Maybe that's just me though ;)
This didn't have to be religious... why not ponder some other type of existence after death... or even simulation theory?
I mean, I mentioned religion in my question, so he went from there.
He did elaborate on his rational on why he doesn't entertain the theory. It basically boils down to 3:21 - 3:42
I assume he didn't talk about the others because that wasn't my question and those aren't scenarios he believes in.
Afterlife could just be that final thought, or hyper-intense brain activity before death. It could be a slow build up or abstract energies produced by your mind that linger after your body dies. It could be it's own space, like it's own universe, a type of mind/unconsciousness-universe/multiverse since something non-physical can't exactly physically decay. I don't have all the evidence, but those are some fun maybes.
That could explain NDEs
Everything evolves into God in the future. We become one with him, and so we no longer exist as we once were, but we exist in a broader context. Time is an illusion. Information cannot be destroyed.
The thought of having a beloved engineer/science geek locked inside my Alexa bot doomed to forever answer my remedial questions sounds hilarious. 😅
Death doesn't exist. There is only experience. you can't have an experience of nothing xD. that's why I believe in reincarnation
Worst reasoning ever.
And the "xD" was fucking cringe.
Ross Monroe I don’t know about the whole “nothing” concept. Nothing doesn’t exist. It literally doesn’t exist in our universe. Not sure what that “nothing” will be like when we experience it.
Im Hindu so i also belive in rebirth but wtf was that argument? Lol
You're spirits who never die but you will go somewhere.
Haha, I think I would rather try my luck with Linux
JuanHans Yes! x)
Glad to know someone else thinks about this stuff daily
Life is overrated. Can't believe my nonexistence was disturbed for this nonsense.
Hahaha