Hi there LDSdude. I was wondering if those responses were of any use to you. I think the clearest illustration of what atheists imagine was given by that rather foxy biomechanical lady off Star Trek - i.e. that the experience of being dead will feel pretty much how it felt to be not yet concieved. I don't know if that's what I'm EXPECTING exactly, but it seems fairly reasonable.
Can you imagine what it would feel like to believe that you only had a few decades (if you are lucky) in which to be? Its certainly a scary thought, though if you're as lazy as me it might not motivate you to do a stitch more than you would do if you believed in eternal life. But it certainly does impress on you the specialness of existing. Think of all the millions of sperm who could have made it when you were concieved, and thus blotted out your existence. Weird, isn't it? Anyway.
I think the point that you make - I guess it could be called an argument from incredulity? - namely, that its pretty hard to imagine not imagining, is totally sound. It is hard. But I don't think that this difficulty is evidence for the existence of any post death consciousness shenanigans.
We are in a pretty special position: intelligent beings who devised pine-tree shaped air fresheners and who sometimes wear wedding rings. No other animal is tormented by existential confusiongasms of the complexity we enjoy on an everyday basis. My personal view is that when a being smart enough to use language witnesses the death of a loved one, its pretty inevitable that we're going to come up with some pretty rationalisations and explanations of where they have gone, because inescapably we are going too. But that's just my opinion.
Now a barely related personal rant, prompted by a couple of responses to this question. I'm not trying to rattle anyone's cage here, and the idea of legacy is quite cool and all, but you can bang on about it too much. Its a bit of a tired cliche. I personally draw pretty scant comfort from the notion that I will leave a legacy in the memories of others - firstly because these people will die pretty soon anyway. Secondly, its all a bit like genes. People say that its really great to pass them on, as if they were handing on something that they actually had a hand in making themselves or something. But they just got issued with them, and the genes don't really "belong" to them in a meaningful way. The same with deeds and legacy: if I do nice stuff and pass it on, I can't really say that the nice stuff I did was MY nice stuff, because if I did it, I just learned it off someone else. Maybe I just say that because I have trouble with free-will, so I don't think people really choose to hand stuff on anyway. Okay, I'll shut up about that.
But one more thing: the same goes for when people go all misty eyed about being made from stars. That really leaves me cold. At some point some of my atoms were probably a part of some medieval murderer of something, but I'm not going to get excited about it. Okay, rant over.
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