Of all the big questions, one of the biggest is, of course, is there any kind of life after death? Is there perhaps a heaven or a hell? Or maybe a life after death is like having an existence solely as a kind of spirit or ghost. The afterlife is similar to exobiology (also known as astrobiology) in one sense: they are both ‘sciences’ looking for their subjects!
Actually, apart from the fact that all major religions preach the existence of a future life, there are quite a few ‘religions’ in which the death of an individual is celebrated (in songs and dances, etc.) because they strongly believe that this is the person has now gone from ‘rags to riches’, the ‘riches’ part is the afterlife where everything is peaches and cream and you get three meals a day (including seconds!).
Now there is a kind of continuous perception of the Universe after it is considered medically dead (a future life), or there is not.
If it does not exist, then death is similar to the existence it had before its conception! You do not remember or perceive the Universe before your conception: it was peaceful; a stress-free, tax-free, memory-free, perception-free existence, if I could call it an ‘existence’. Translated, without a future life, post-death is similar to pre-life Jenseitskontakte. It is a wonderful state of nothing.
Of course, if there is no other life, if you just get a little bite out of the cherry, or grab the carousel rings, because of the Universe’s existence (assuming the Universe also has a finite lifespan), you weren’t an event. [Of course, for most people, the big mess, even while you’re alive, is practically not an event in the grand cosmic scheme of things!]
Even if you have a future life, and assuming there are no animals like reincarnation, 13.7 billion years of history have passed you by. You were a universal non-event from the Big Bang (and before, if there was an event before the Big Bang) until the date of your conception. It is still a long time to have no consequences for the cosmos!
Questions come up, questions, lots and lots of questions. Is it logical to have a finite start but an infinitely long end (beyond)? And what happens to you if there is a life after death but the Universe hits a Big Crunch? If there is a Big Crunch, the reverse of the Big Bang, even his life after death is presumably kaput!
If, on the other hand, the Universe expands forever and forever (infinitely), and an eventual Death of heat ‘dies’, although it still exists as cold (as close to absolute zero as possible) dark (without energy, without light) elementary particles, atoms, molecules and larger bodies, such as white dwarfs, neutron stars, etc., then your infinite future life will be quite boring: spend eternity contemplating for all practical purposes a universe in constant expansion that tends towards a state of purity, empty!
Then there’s also the theory that the relatively recently discovered ‘dark energy’ content of the cosmos increases in strength over time, ultimately not only accelerating the rate of expansion of the Universe, but ultimately tearing apart clusters of galaxies, galaxies , stars and solar systems, molecules, atoms, even the most fundamental particles: it is called ‘The Big Rip’. Presumably, the realm of the afterlife is still a part of the Universe, so if there is a Big Rip, the afterlife will also tear you apart!
Perhaps it is better to go out with a Big Crunch bang than with an eternal cold and dark moan or to be smashed! Or, maybe there is another dimension or plane or universe / parallel / alternative existence where you will spend an eternal eternal life (complete with harp and wings and halo) where there is no Big Crunch or Heat Death or Big Rip, but I wouldn’t count you can count with that!
I must emphasize that it is the destiny of the Universe that is important here with regard to ‘living’ a future life. The disappearance of planet Earth has no consequences. If an afterlife is somehow on a different plane or in a different dimension, then what happens to Earth, which exists on another plane or dimension, is irrelevant. However, I suppose that the Universe, which contains everything there is, contains its plane or dimension of beyond and, therefore, its destiny is its destiny. So when the entire cosmos fades (in either direction: Heat Death or Big Crunch), they’re curtains for you, too!
