What happens when we die?

Can anyone really know?  Many religions and theologians assert that there is an after-life.  Some imply a heaven and a hell. Naturalists live here and now and do not believe in an afterlife. They look upon the afterlife as wishful thinking. 

Many religions claim that their  followers will be rewarded by their belief with an afterlife of eternal joy.  At the same time they claim that non-believers will be punished in a place of eternal suffering 

All the major religions have this reward and punishment ( carrot and stick) component to their doctrine. Pascal, the French mathematician, developed a wager:

The question of life after death is the million-dollar issue for all of us, the biggest question in life. Our mental faculties are dependent upon a functional brain. This is easily observed in Alzheimer’s, dementia, anesthesia, brain damage and age. When we die, the brain decays. Without the brain, there would be no sight, no hearing, no senses, no sensations, no feel, no memories. The personality, the patterns of neurons firing in our brains, would not remain after the brain has ceased and decomposed. What would be in the remaining ghost? Nothing, zero. There would be no consciousness after the brain has stopped and decayed. There would be no ability to say – Cogito Ergo Sum, I think, therefore I exist. We would all love to be immortal, except that it is a fantasy. Rather than harboring a false hope for eternity, let’s accept and embrace the present life we have.