[Fozzie_DeBear]

Originally Posted by jammies

As an atheist, the problem of death becomes acute, as this life becomes all there is and all there will ever be. I used to fear death and hope that somehow science would advance and grant some form of immortality - anything to save me from the fate that every other person that has ever existed must face - however in the last few years, as I've grown older, the certainty that one day I will die has become less and less important.

After all, what separates my consciousness from all others and gives it value? It cannot be merely my thought and experience, as those, while certainly unique, are valuable only to me, and to exalt them as irreplaceable is merely an expression of selfishness. Rather it must be my ACTIONS, and how they affect those around me that are important. If I have a million years, and all I do with those years is indulge myself, then I might as well never have existed. On the other hand, if I live only the tiniest fraction of that but use my time to make the world a better place than if I had never existed, then I have defeated death because the important part of me - my actions - will have consequences far beyond the days measured out to my physical being.

Personally I don't think that belief in an 'afterlife'=a belief in 'god'.

A cycle of birth/death/rebirth may just be the way the natural world works no supernatural filler needed.