I.  Introduction
        A.  Suppose that a child asks you, "What happens to people after they die?"  I think that an honest answer would be, "I don't know, and I don't think that anyone else does either.  Many different beliefs have been proposed, but all these beliefs are passed along to us by others who don't know either although many might be very ready to offer various arguments to try to support their beliefs, whatever they might be.
        B.  What if a child asks, "What happens to dogs (or cats or pigeons or mosquitoes) after they die?"  I think that we would need to give the same answer, namely, "I don't know, and I don't think that anyone else does either."
                1.  But it is worth at least a moment's thought that in fact not many different beliefs have been advanced and argued for on this particular issue of what happens to other living beings when they die. Life-after-death is a much more lively issue when our focus is humans rather than other species.
                2.  The only time the issue is likely to come up with regard to animals is if we are dealing with a pet, especially a child's dearly loved pet.  And thus it should be obvious that the important question is not what happens to the animal but what is going to happen to the child who has lost a pet.  The problem is to address the feeling of loss on the part of the child rather than discovering objectively what if anything happened to the pet after it dies.  And maybe that is a clue to
what is really at issue in dealing with the question of what happens to people after they die.
        C.  What if the question is, "What happens to flowers (or vines or shrubs) after they die?"  A few persons might be genuinely concerned about discovering the answer to such a question, but I think that most of us would just be puzzled.  After the flower or shrub or tree dies, it is no longer a living thing.  It gradually withers as the water in it evaporates.
Then it usually gets broken into smaller and smaller pieces.  It just ceases to exist as a complex object.
        D.  So the first thing to notice about the question of what happens to people after they die is that no one really knows, and the second thing to notice is that the question has importance mainly because of our subjective interests rather than anything objective.

 II.  Moving into the question further, let us for a moment assume that in some fashion or other people do go on existing after they have died.  For a person taking this assumption seriously, a number of puzzling questions will come to mind.
        A.  Does what happens to a person after death depend in any way on how old they are when they die?  Is the situation the same for a baby who has lived for only an hour as for an old person who has lived 70 years?
        B.  Does what happens to a person after death depend in any way on how they die?  Is the situation the same for a person who has been hacked to death or blown to pieces by a bomb as for a person who dies of a heart attack or a person who dies of an infection that can't be treated?
        C.  Does what happens to a person after death depend in any way on how and when and where they have lived?  Do people who died in prehistoric times have the same kind of life-after-death as a 20th century American? If they all have the same kind of life-after-death, won't that be a kind of "culture shock" for at least some of them, especially if they are in some way able to communicate with each other?
        D.  Do people who have died continue to have new experiences of some kind, or do they just continue to contemplate the experiences they had before death?  If so, this would be similar to sensory deprivation, which
after a while usually produces mental problems for living persons.  If  those who have died have new experiences, what are these experiences like? Are they somewhat similar to the kinds of sensory experiences we have before death, or are they totally different?  If they are similar, does that mean that after death people still have the same kinds of senses of
sight and hearing and smelling and tasting and feeling that they had before death?  If they are totally different, how could such totally new experiences be comprehended?  But if they are somewhat the same as experienced during life, wouldn't the experiences of people who have lived at different times and places be quite different from each other?
        E.  If people do in some sense live on after death, do they continue to live on forever or only for a certain period of time?  Are people who died in the first century still alive?  How about people who died fifteen thousand years ago?  And even if they are alive, who cares? It seems that people might be concerned about whether their siblings or parents or grandparents are still alive, but are they concerned about ancient descendants whose names they don't know and whose life-style would be totally alien?  Once again, it seems that what counts is not some objective fact about whether people have some kind of life-after death but rather the totally subjective issue of whether the people I care about are in some sense still alive so I  can see them again and they can see me again.
        F.  Of course, there is also the issue of where all these people who have died are and whether they are experiencing any passage of time over the centuries?  If they aren't experiencing anything, aren't they for all practical purposes dead until they are in some fashion brought back to life?  And if they are experiencing the passage of time, aren't they getting rather weary of just passively having experiences without being able to do anything, without being able to act?

III.  Even though no one knows whether there is life-after-death for humans or oysters or ants, let us nevertheless consider some of the various beliefs about this issue which have been advanced and the elaboration of them.
        A.  The main views which have been proposed about the nature of life-after-death for humans can be classified as:
                1.  belief in the resurrection of the individual personal body--This is the traditional Christian view based on belief in the resurrection of Jesus.  Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) Where is Jesus' resurrected body now?  (b) Is the story of the resurrection and subsequent ascension of Jesus believable?  (c) When and where are other
people to be resurrected?  (d) Is it possible for people to be resurrected after they have been dead for over 1,500 years?  (e) What are resurrected people like, given that they die at different ages and some from body-mutilating causes?  (f) If there is to be a resurrection, would it be dangerous to donate some of one's organs on grounds that they might then be missing from one's resurrected body?  (g) Or is the resurrected body totally different from our existing body, in which case one wonders whether we would be able to recognize each other?
                2.  belief in the immortality of the individual or personal soul--This is a view often associated with the Greek philosopher Plato. Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) What is the relation between the material body and the immaterial soul?  (b)  Do animals other than humans have souls; at what point in their life-history do humans acquire souls and at what point in their dying do they lose their souls? (c) Didn't Aristotle and other Greeks think of the soul as basically a way of talking about what living things do (as a collection of verbs) rather than as a thing (a noun) which could exist separately from a physical body? 
               3.  belief in reincarnation, that is, in the immortality of an individual or personal soul which gets reembodied in different bodies, perhaps even sometimes in the body of nonhuman animals--This is a view usually associated with some versions of Hinduism.  Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) If we don't remember previous existen-ces,
how can it make any sense to talk about the same soul being reincarnated again.  (b)  How can we tell whether an animal (or even a plant) has a soul or not?
                4.  belief in some kind of individualized life energy with moral characteristics which somehow gets passed on from one living being to another even if there is no actual soul which carries this energy or karma from one being to another--This is a view usually associated with some versions of Buddhism.  Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) With regard to karma, how can one tell which individual it is coming from  and which individual it is going to?  (b) Isn't this Buddhist doctrine just an attempt to preserve some aspects of the Hindu view of reincarnation without also accepting the doctrine of a substantial soul?
                5.  belief in the immortality of a non-individualized soul/universal consciousness,-This view is connected with the Greek philosopher Aristotle, who distinguised between the vegetative activities carried on by individual plants, the sensitive and locomotion activities of individual animals, and the rational activities of humans which seem to be universal.  (What is logical for one person is logical for all persons. Math and logical reasoning do not differ from person to person.)  Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) Are the rational activities of humans really universal rather than being connected with the particular histories of individual persons?  (b)  Isn't rational activity in a human being dependent on the functioning of a living brain, which would no longer exist in a person who has died?
                6.  belief that dying is like going to sleep and just not waking up.  This materialistic view which is put forth by ancient Greek philosophers such as Democritus and Epicurus essentially denies any kind of life-after-death.  Some questions to be asked for this view are:  (a) If there is no life-after-death, why do so many people believe there is?  (b)
If there is no life-after-death, why should people ever do anything harmful to themselves in order to help anyone else?  (c)  If there is no life-after-death, doesn't that prove that the universe is indifferent to human values and concerns so we might as well "eat, drink, and be merry" as long as we can and kill ourselves when the going gets too rough?
        B.  Many of these views advocating some kind of life-after-death are connected to some kind of after-death system of punishments and rewards so that good behavior is in some way or other rewarded while bad behavior is punished.  From a cynical point of view, one can view this as a scheme by which behavior is controlled by those in power (political and religious leaders working together) by speading beliefs about what will happen after death even if one can during life manage to escape from punishment for immoral behavior, that is, behavior not approved of by those in power (who
may be motivated by what is good for the community but also what is good for themselves, that is, the ruling classes).

IV.  The belief in life-after-death for humans seems to be connected with various psychological needs.
        A.  The need for security, to believe that someone bigger and more powerful than us is still taking care of us and checking on our behavior, just as when we were children.  The grandparents and parents have not died but are continuing to watch over us.  They can be offended if we act immorally.  In this case the departed do not need to live on forever but
only as long as their descendants whom they have known. 
       B.  We seem to need to believe that the universe is a "moral and just place" where eventually, even if not in this life, the righteous are happy & the wicked suffer as they deserve to do.
        C.  We seem to need to believe that the universe is a "friendly place" and not indiffer-ent to human life and human values.  Thus, belief in life-after-death is closely tied to belief in a providential God.  If there is a good God, how could such a being be indifferent to human love and concern?  How could a good God allow we precious humans to just go out
of existence?
        D.  We seem to need assurance that we humans matter, that our lives have some ultimate significance, that the universe is not "a tale told by an idiot signifying nothing."

V.  Still we must not forget the power of wishful thinking so cleverly satirized by the British poet Rupert Brooke (1887-1915) in his poem "Heaven":
 

Fish (fly-replete, in depth of June, Dawdling away their wat'ry noon)
Ponder deep wisdom, dark or clear, Each secret fishy hope or fear.
Fish say, they have their Stream and Pond; But is there anything Beyond?
This life cannot be All, they swear, For how unpleasant, if it were!
One may not doubt that, somehow, Good Shall come of Water and of Mud;
And, sure, the reverent eye must see A Purpose in Liquidity.
We darkly know, by Faith we cry, The future is not Wholly Dry.
Mud unto mud!--Death eddies near--Not here the appointed End, not here!
But somewhere, beyond Space and Time, Is wetter water, slimier slime!
And there (they trust) there swimmeth One Who swam ere rivers were begun,
Immense, of fishy form and mind, Squamous, omnipotent, and kind;
And under that Almighty Fin, The littlest fish may enter in.
Oh! never fly conceals a hook, Fish say, in the Eternal Brook,
But more than mundane weeds are there, And mud, celestially fair;
Fat caterpillars drift around, And Paradisal grubs are found;
Unfading moths, immortal flies, And the worm that never dies.
And in that Heaven of all their wish, There shall be no more land, say fish.

VI.  Concluding thought:  Perhaps the belief of so many people that there must be some kind of life-after-death is merely further evidence of the correctness of the view of the American psychologist and philosopher William James who said:  "The pivot round which the religious life . . . revolves, is the interest of the individual in his private personal destiny.  Religion, in short, is a monumental chapter in the history of human egotism."  From this James concluded that on the basis of their psychological needs, people will hold on to a supernatural religion which supports the belief in miracles and some kind of personal life-after-death even though their scientific discoveries and logical explorations indicate that the universe is rather indifferent to the fate of individual humans and even the whole of humanity and that belief in any kind of personal
survival after death is almost certainly baseless wishful thinking.