To Aldous Huxley and Steve Shaw:

Had you not been born, there would be another born with your consciousness so that would still be you.

Got it? :)

That's a delicious thought, and, a bit like when we're contemplating the after-death, we'll simply never know. I like it that there are things I'll never know, mainly because it's probably a good job that I'll never know them. If I die an atheist and there really is no God, if I could know it I'd be chuffed, but I never will know, which could be construed as faintly annoying. If I die a Christian and there's a God, I'm on a winner (as long as I've been good, of course). If I die a Christian and there's no God, well I'm not really a loser because I'm on the same footing as that atheist (though he might have led a more free and easy life, I suppose...), and anyway I won't know much about it. The only loser is the atheist who dies and finds out there really is a God. Bejaysus, he'd be at the mercy of the Almighty then all right! How bloody fair is that lot!