Some people have had a new fear revealed to them that they would never have believed possible, which is always a nice way to spend your weekend, isn’t it?
The subject of life and death is a difficult one for lots of people. We don’t want to admit that we’re almost definitely going to have to die, and it’s really difficult to parse the concept that we won’t live forever.
However, would you really want to, given the opportunity?
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It might not be the best thing ever, depending on whether you’re going to continue aging and deteriorating in health, or whether you’ll have to live to see the end of the world.
It’s stuff like that which has people thinking about topics such as quantum immortality.
In ordinary terms, it means that people never die, but in truth it’s a lot more complicated than that.
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The theory suggests that people’s consciousness never actually dies, but it means that we might have lived through countless multiple apocalypses and extinction events.
It’s enough to fuel your existential dread for months, so – with that in mind – let’s learn a bit more about it, shall we?
The theory has been explained by many people, but we’re going to focus on TikTok user @joli.artist, as she discussed the idea of quantum immortality, as well as American physicist Hugh Everett’s ‘many worlds’ theory.
He suggested that there are countless other worlds and other realities, and when we die we simply transfer to another one of those.
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In her TikTok video, Joli suggested that there’s a chance we ‘never really die’ and could have experienced the world ending on numerous occasions before.
"Whenever you die in one universe, your consciousness just gets transferred into another universe where you survive,” she said.
In a nutshell, that is the idea here.
Of course, it’s a lot more complicated than that, involving a lot of maths and science, but we’re working on a word count here, and honestly it’s really quite difficult and boring in truth.
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Joli explained how – if there’s anything to this theory - we wouldn’t remember the previous world that we switched over to but might have some basic recollections – much like the Mandela Effect.
"So after the inevitable apocalypse occurs, you're going to wake up the next day in a new reality, and the next thing you know, you're going to find yourself on Reddit talking about 'since when did Pizza Hut have two Ts?” she explained.
"Arguing with people who are native of this new reality, talking about 'it's always had two Ts?'"
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Joli added: "You don’t believe me? Okay, it’s been about 65 million years since the asteroids allegedly took out the dinosaurs.
“So you mean to tell me that in the last 65 million years, no other asteroids have come through the neighbourhood and taken us out?
"What I'm saying is that Earth is probably always being taken out, and our consciousness just keeps transferred to another parallel universe - and then another one, and another one.
"For all you know the apocalypse probably already happened last night..."
Anyway, the very idea of this has some people’s heads in a spin.
"BYE NOT TODAY," said one comment.
"Ok, I’m actually kind of freaking out right now coz I’m not the conspiracy typa guy, but you’re like eerily making sense," said another.
"The thought of never being able to actually die is extremely depressing, and it’s giving me a headache,” a third added.
Yep, you can just rock me to sleep tonight.
Tom Wood