So, I'm a Buddhist now.

[Agent]

[Despanan]

Eventually there would be enough good Karma generated at the same time for a long enough period by random chance that everyone could become enlightened...possibly. But this would take considerably longer and I'm not sure good karma is the key to enlightenment anyway, at best all it can do is put you into a fortuitous situation where enlightenment is likely.

Like Buddhas can emerge on their own, but that's considerably rarer and more difficult so that would have to happen for literally 100% of sentient beings.

So mathematically it COULD happen, but it would take way, way,way longer and the process would result in considerably more pain for everyone involved.

[Agent]

Are you sure there's nothing supernatural about this?

[Despanan]

There isn't. Think of a Buddha not as a person or an entity but as a tendency among people. Think of enlightenment as a specific state of mind a person can find themselves in.

Which happens faster? Everyone lucks into enlightenment randomly, or specific teachers emerge and help other people do the same thing?

[Agent]

I don't see why it matters after everyone is dead.

[Despanan]

Well it matters for two reasons:

1) An enlightened person is happier while they're alive and better able to face death.

2) Life continues, even after everyone is dead the things that we have done and felt and thought and seen endure because they effect the future. That's Karma. The more enlightened beings there are and the wider the understanding of the message of the Lotus Sutra spreads, the better the future will be.

Buddhism holds that consciousness is not the default state of the universe, it's something that happens - like the wind blows, or the forest grows or the ocean waves, the universe "peoples".

Why? I dunno. I've heard a few theories that I like (particularly Karl Sagan's "We're here so the universe can experience itself") but the point is that the separate-ness and distinctness that we experience ie: my unique consciousness, your unique consciousness etc. isn't the primary state of things - rather we're all "one" and we only think we're separate because that's a somewhat unfortunate biproduct of consciousness ie: it's delusion.

Which is not to say that's it's bad to be us, but it's hard to be us. Life as a human is really rewarding but it's also really difficult for like, a million reasons. We can feel alone, disconnected, angry, sorrowfull, anxious, afraid and confused. We can also feel alot of awesome stuff too and that hard stuff I mentioned is also a big part of the awesome stuff, but the point is no matter how good or bad it is, it's not permanent - it's more like a dream.

So if life is a dream, then we should dream the absolute best we can. What does that mean? I dunno - I think it probably means something different for you than it means to me, but being happy and successful and finding meaning is usually a big part of that and that's what the Buddha-nature helps with, that's what enlightenment is all about.

[Agent]

[Despanan]

What's not true? That life goes on after we die? That the past effects the future?

I'd figure those are two extremely uncontroversial things.

[Agent]

Life does not go on after all life is over, no. I was talking about the death of the entire universe.

[Despanan]

Life as we understand it may not, but life easily could and most likely will.

If our universe happened once it can happen again, and even after the heat-death of the universe, physicists think it's likely that we'll drop down to another dimension and have the rules of reality rewritten and the whole process will start over again.