UK finds new fuel source to undercut Russian stranglehold on Europe

[Bereta_Eder]

Why should the respect for the remains of a beloved person be associated with something metaphysical and not psychological?
We are animals as well as satient beings and psychology plays a huge part in our behavior. Logical thinking is only a part that makes us human.
If by psychological means the remains hold importance, shouldn't that be respected? Even though it has no metaphysical (religious) connotations?
Can you tell someone to stop being angry when they are angry? Or to stop crying?
Why should you tell them not to respect the remains?
Simply because they don't believe in God?

(as to why, psychologically they retain importance, that's another discussion, much easier I think)

[Imran Siddiqui]

Why should the respect for the remains of a beloved person be associated with something metaphysical and not psychological?
We are animals as well as satient beings and psychology plays a huge part in our behavior. Logical thinking is only a part that makes us human.
If by psychological means the remains hold importance, shouldn't that be respected? Even though it has no metaphysical (religious) connotations?
Can you tell someone to stop being angry when they are angry? Or to stop crying?
Why should you tell them not to respect the remains?
Simply because they don't believe in God?

(as to why, psychologically they retain importance, that's another discussion, much easier I think)

This explanation may make the most sense to me. Funeral rites are done in such way for the helping of easing the trauma and grief of the family. However, you final question is correct - why psychologically does the remains hold such power absent religious notions of afterlife? Why don't we all just do natural burials and let the body return to the Earth and become food. And why would it matter to take half or more of the remains, as long as some still remain for a funeral service, in order to power things if they can be used for that?

[Bereta_Eder]

I think they retain such an importance because it is the projection of the love we hold for that person. As we took care of him/her during life we take care of him during death. It's a projection of love.

[Serb]

One of the difference between us and machines - we bury our dead!

[Sava]

One of the difference between us and machines - we bury our dead!

yeah... after you make them dead

[Imran Siddiqui]

I think they retain such an importance because it is the projection of the love we hold for that person. As we took care of him/her during life we take care of him during death. It's a projection of love.

Hmmm... Ok. I think I can buy that. A last time to show love towards the person? So, the respect is not necessarily FOR the dead person, its for the living people to show what they thought about that person while s/he lived?

[Serb]

yeah... after you make them dead

Irrelevant. Machines still don't bury their dead, humans do.

[notyoueither]

This would be an example of you aren't actually giving me any non-religious motivations. You hold the position that human remains should be treated differently. Ok, WHY?

And is it resulting from a different foundation than Judeo-Christian ideals (at least in the West from where your societal morality develops from) on why dead remains are sacred? This would be one of the reasons that even Richard Dawkins calls himself a "cultural Anglican" - because he believes in the moral underpinnings of English Christianity while wanting to toss away God. He doesn't want to do what Nietzsche wanted to do, which was to toss out the entire Western moral edifice, which was built on the foundation of Christianity (German Christianity in his case) and start over (the point of ubermench wasn't "Nazis!!1!" but morality creators that a society which has cast aside God would need).

My thinking is that funerals are for the living. We want to be soothed when our loved ones pass on. We also might imagine ourselves being treated the way we see others being treated. Do you want your remains flushed down the garbage disposal?

As for where that idea comes from, was Confusious a "cultural Anglican?" "Never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself."

Plato and Socrates? "...it has been shown that to injure anyone is never just anywhere."

I'm not a Christian, BTW, and I didn't grow up in a Christian household.

[Sava]

Irrelevant. Machines still don't bury their dead, humans do.

Disagree. There's lots of old computer equipment buried in American landfills.

And unlike Russia, we actually have machines to bury. We aren't stuck in the 19th century... like SOME PEOPLE

[Imran Siddiqui]

We also might imagine ourselves being treated the way we see others being treated. Do you want your remains flushed down the garbage disposal?

That's my entire point - why would YOU care what they did to your body after you died? When I was an atheist I could give two ****s what they did. I'd want my organs for transplants, but then give me a natural funeral so I could return to the Earth (garbage disposal would do the same thing I figure). If they wanted to use me for heating, fine.

[Sava]

When I was an atheist

just another extremist flipping sides

[notyoueither]

Why would you feel attached to the remains of a person if you believed that there is nothing else afterwards for them? It's just a body husk, is it not? A meat bag? Why assign a higher reason to something when you don't believe in a higher purpose for it? Why respect the dead when you don't believe the dead are around anymore? If human existence only exists in consciousness, once that consciousness is extinguished, the body had no special significance.

And why do you think ancient burials based on emotional ties did not have an element of spirituality?

Spiritual /= religious.

Basically, yes. I simply cannot wrap my head around why atheists would consider a respect for dead bodies to be important, aside from cultural conventions that arose due to a religious foundation - which is fine, if you want to say that you like the Christian foundation of funeral rites, but don't believe in God that's one thing, but claiming that there is an atheistic reason for respecting dead bodies makes no rational sense at all.

I would say rather that it is religions adapting the practices of people since the concept of reciprocity is found in just about every religion and philosophy.

[Sava]

"spiritual"

[notyoueither]

Hmmm... Ok. I think I can buy that. A last time to show love towards the person? So, the respect is not necessarily FOR the dead person, its for the living people to show what they thought about that person while s/he lived?

Yes, partly.

There's also what miltaries will do for the dead of the other side. They still get buried, because if the enemy held the field we would want them to do the same for us. Or strangers finding bodies of homeless and drifters after a catastrophe, etc.

[Imran Siddiqui]

The concept of "spiritual but not religious" is BS to me. Of course spiritual is religious. There is a reason people use the term "organized" religion - it implies that religion doesn't have to be in an organized group or setting.