" Being born is like waking up without falling asleep, and dying is like falling asleep without every waking up."
I just watched a TED talk from 2007, one of the original talks that first day-viewed on the TED website. It was an Oxford Christian Preacher, that was baffled by the Tsunami that hit South East Asia in 2004. The question was, " How can God allow this to happen?" And the preacher struggled to come up with a "logical" answer according to Christian theology. So in the end, still within in the confides of Christianity, he had to make an allusion to a Hindu/Buddhist non-dualist type of God that does not control, but is one with the universe. I think this compatibilist conclusion that he comes to avoids the confides in which he's thinking. He must resort to a non-Christian theology/philosophy to explain a Christian God. His commitment to a Christian God, or a divinely intelligent being named " God”, doesn't allow to him to dispense with the entire theology and narrative of Christianity.
I myself have gone through phases trying to have a metaphysical explanation of existence involving a divine being, presence, or force. Most lately, I have been exploring pantheism and non-duelist schools of Hinduism and Buddhism, like Adia Vedanta. And they speak of the idea of "Brahman" being one and the same all matter and existence.
But after watching this talk, and trying to understand existence, I have come to the conclusion that there is no divine being or force. The idea that something had to cause a beginning and an end to existence is moot. It is the wrong thinking and the wrong question. Lawrence Krauss wrote the book " A Universe from Nothing" and supports the premise within some of the latest findings from quantum mechanics. And this gives an explanation for how an universe could have emerged from "space".
The fundamental problem with finding an origin to existence or even a creator, is that there is an infinite regression. The compatibilist will have to say that a divine being is the "alpha and the omega”, " unmoved mover", "causeless causer." An infinite regression of questioning, plows right through the idea of a first agent. The need for a first agent is necessary for the religious to affirm their religious doctrine.
Can a singularity in a big bang, a black hole, or the existence of nuclei really be understood or have meaning in a visceral way? Why would such phenomena in existence even require a creator?
Living things, human beings, or consciousness, matter, or anything else that is existence doesn't need an initial explanation or prime mover to exist.
They just do.
And what is human " you-ness”, human consciousness? It is like everything else that exists right now. It does not exist at one point, and exists the next.
Before we are conscious, what are we? After we die, what is our consciousness? These things pass in and out of existence. And so too, can all of existence.
All in all, there wasn't, and now there is.
And everything is, and are manifestations of what is. lol
In Buddhism there is a desire to break free from the cycle of reincarnation, achieve transcendence or in Sanskrit, Moksha. This could be understood in number of ways.
It can also have the understanding of a soul that seeks the end of death and rebirth. It could also be understood as removing all attachments to mental structures, meanings, differentiations. In truth, the idea of a soul or a creator are totally irrelevant in the Buddha's teaching.
In conclusion, there is an existence and a non-existence. There can be no explanation and no creator.
Things just occur. A series of events caused a Tsunami, but there was no reason or plan.
Living things try to live and in the process evolve because molecules arranged.
These things have physical laws and patterns, but those " behaviors" have no reason or design.
There is no presupposition, motive, or reason or end to existence.
It exists. It does not exist.
But, even with this "truth" life is not diminished in anyway, as life will always continue. An ice cream still tastes good. Compassion and empathy continue to exist, ect. No need for Nihilism.