Of heaven, hell and legacy
It is often argued that atheists and those who have a religion which does not offer an afterlife have little to look forward to, and no reason to be concerned about more than their personal experiences and deeds while alive. But I suggest that is not true.
Atheists are subject to influences very much like the punishment and reward system of Christianity, and also have available a form of afterlife, albeit not for eternity, and not in a way that they typically think of it. Those influences operate on everyone, whether we are aware of it or not. But it seems helpful if we could make them explicit in discussions with Christians who believe atheists to have neither Heaven nor Hell.
Although it wasn’t his intention (he was concerned with different issues), cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter offers us a way. Let me start with his observation about the remembrances we have of the people closest to us:
“What is really going on when you dream or think more than fleetingly about someone you love (whether that person died many years ago or is right now on the other end of a phone conversation with you)? In the terminology of this book, there is no ambiguity in what is going on. The symbol for that person has been activated inside your skull, lurched out of dormancy, as surely as if it had an icon that someone had double-clicked . And the moment this happens, much as with a game that has opened up on your screen, your mind starts acting differently than how it acts in a “normal” context. You have allowed yourself to be invaded by an “alien universal being,” and to some extent the alien takes charge within your skull, starts pushing things around in its own fashion, making words, ideas, memories, and associations bubble up inside your brain that ordinarily would not do so. The activation of the symbol for the loved person swivels into action whole sets of coordinated tendencies that represent that person’s cherished style, their idiosyncratic way of being embedded in the world and looking out at it. . . .
“[Y]our brain is inhabited to various extents by other I’s, other souls, the extent of each one depending on the degree that you faithfully represent, and resonate with, the individual in question.”
— Douglas Hofstadter, I Am a Strange Loop, Basic Books, 2007, pp. 247–248.
Lest he be misunderstood, let me make clear that Hofstadter is not referring either to anything supernatural, or to the inhabitants of UFOs. Rather, he is observing the way we think about others, and the effects they have on our lives. What he means takes place entirely within our own minds as we become familiar with people, or with what we learn about them, and form complex “templates” to describe them. Just as with other templates, we become emotionally involved with the template itself; invoking it can cause considerable emotional effect.
And that effect persists after we die. We “live on” in the memories of our loved ones and to a lesser degree those who know us, who were influenced by us, or who hear of us. It is a form of temporary immortality, declining over time, but having the most influence on the people most important to us: those closest to us.
Hofstadter does not use the terms “Heaven” or “Hell” to refer to this — and might object if he were to consider it from this perspective. But this powerful force — the opinions of us, memories of us, in people closest to us — can create something very similar to Heaven and Hell for everyone, Christian or not.
Nearly everyone — secular and Christian alike — tends to do things for their spouse and children, and to want their loved ones to respect them, love them, think well of them. Presidents, in their last terms of office, have a tendency to (finally) act to enhance “their legacy” — which is much the same thing. Children also moderate their behavior to seek the approval of their parents or other reference group (church, peers . . .). There is nothing Christian about that; no God, Hell or Heaven required. We recognize the transcendent importance of the templates held by others, and act to keep them as we want them to be. With their love and approval we are in Heaven; without it we are in a Hell of our own making.
People who are outside the observation of their loved ones or reference group act very differently than they do when at home. That is true of atheists as well as Christians — in fact, more so for strong Christians, as anyone who has attended Spring Break can attest. The power of God to guide us — even, perhaps especially, for strong believers — has a way of yielding to other kinds of forces in a different local culture and outside the view of those we care about.
Secular people and Christians alike, it seems to me, have both a Heaven and a Hell. It’s just that the secular are more likely to recognize that it is one we create for ourselves, and are less concerned about that legacy being “everlasting.”
