What do believers believe heaven or hell are like?

All I can say is this. People who make light of the belief that God is fake are as notorious as people who go around trumpeting the belief that He is real.The ideal would be someone who is quiet about either account. Not to say I'm that quiet about my belief, but i'm eventually leaning that direction. Wealthy people are not simply greedy. They amass great fortunes to preserve their families. Wars are indirectly caused because those who have everything won't give it up and allow the less fortunate to have a slice. Edited by AdminPD, : Warning

Notorious for what? Atheists only exist because theists do. As soon as religious nutters get their lobster ass claws out of everyone else's business, the atheist movement will quiet down, if only because we won't NEED to be as vocal. Human rights needs us because you lot sure don't care much for personal freedom.Now, what's this to do with the topic? Ideal for who? Why? That's not a very convincing argument for saying that wars are for "protecting the interests of children". Edited by AdminPD, : Warning

This was rather interesting. I realize that Christian TV is often commercialized, but this guy seems convinced of the experience he was selling/telling.

Strangely, Revered Howard Storm admits that there is no evidence that he actually died - he was simply unconscious on a hospital bed.
Can I consider all my dreams to be near death experiences?Because if I can, there is some major crazy shit in the after-life...

Must everything be linked to evidence? Cant some experiences be real to us even if they were imagined?

I never mentioned evidence.
I was simply pointing out that a near-death experience that is not actually 'near' death is not a near-death experience.Imaginary things can seem real - see Hooah's most recent thread.
But the things we experience when simply unconscious are called dreams.Wear a nicotine patch and go to sleep.
Then come and talk to me.

Yup, by his logic Aliens, Predators and zombies are real cause I dream about them (mostly, zombies, mostly).What a bunch of crap.

Being real to us and being real to everyone else is very different.

Have you ever experienced a hypnopompic hallucination combined with sleep paralysis?If you haven't, then you have no idea how real some of these experiences can be.I had one in whcih I was waking up in my apartment, but I couldn't move. I could open my eyes, but all I could see was the corner of the ceiling above me. In my mind, I was in my bed back at my parents' house, and since most ceiling corners look the same, there was nothing to disabuse me of that hallucination.The wall against which my headboard rested, in my parents' house, was between me and the stairs heading downstairs. I could hear a growling beastie, and I "knew" it was a large, demon-dog thing on the stairs. I was very scared, but the wrost part was that I could swear I heard my mom start walking up the stairs. I wanted, no, needed, to call out to her and get her to stop coming up, that the demon-dog would eat her. I was in a panic, but I couldn't move, couldn't make a sound.Through sheer force of will, or perhaps because I was beginning to come out of this hypnopompic state, I was able to move my leg, and that sort of snapped it. I sat up quickly, saw my apartment bedroom, and it completely broke the spell.I have to tell you, it was one of the most intense experiences I've ever had, and I can easily see how, had the dream been slightly different, I could have attributed it to aliens or a religious experience. Luckily, I had known about this phenomenon before, and could explain it to myself as soon as it was over.So, dreams and other "misfirings" in the brain can cause very profound experiences that someone could easily believe had actually happened.

There's BIG Money in being able to "Testify, Brother" on the Christian Money Train Circuit.

Of course they can.The characters of many fiction novels are far more "real" to me than many historical figures who actually existed. Fictional stories have had a significant real effect on my moral opinions, for example. The names we use for days and months originally stemmed from the names of utterly fictional deities, for another.Even Jesus had a significant real impact on me, and continues to do so, because Christianity impacts me on an almost daily basis even though I no longer believe it to be factually accurate.But there's a significant difference between that sort of reality and believing that fantasy characters actually existed in real life. Some of Jesus teachings can still be perfectly valid and useful in real life even if Jesus (as depicted in the Bible) never actually existed. "Thou shalt not commit murder" is a pretty good rule even though Yahweh is an imaginary character.

Of course. But those "experiences"? They're worthless to anyone other than yourself. If you keep them to yourself, except maybe to tell a story, that's fine. But when you try and use these "experiences" to dictate ANYTHING to anyone else, you're wrong. Flat out wrong.{abe}
Whoops. Sorry phat. I didn't realize the forum we were in. I really should stay out of the F&B section as it is anyways..... Feel free to disregard this message because I've no intention on discussing the matter if we can not lend credence to evidence.Edited by hooah212002, : No reason given.

This topic is about the afterlife, especially what heaven or hell will be like along with the accompanying rationale for believing it to be that way.It is also in the Faith and Belief forum where there is less demand to supply scientific evidence to support a position, and where philosophical or theological answers are acceptable.I suggest all participants take the time to look at the OP (Message 1) to see if their post is really something that addresses the topic.