is it better to lose or resign?

Exactly the same rating points.

When you say "time out", I hope you don't mean "just stall until your flag falls".

That is bad sportsmanship and can get you banned, or at least placed in a pool of players where you can only get paired against other bad sports.

Who wants to play a whole series of poor sports, one after the other?

I am a beginner player and although some here express annoyance at those that play to the very end, keep in mind that it is a learning experience. So if someone wallops me early on, I just keep on playing. I'm probably going to lose, but I will learn more by playing against a stronger oponent. If I'm going to lose, my rating is going to go down the same amount but I will learn more.

My suggestion:

Play on until

1. You feel certain that your position is completely lost, AND
2. You can clearly see how YOU would win the game if the sides were reversed.

In other words, only resign when you feel that there is nothing more that can be learned by continuing.

Is that true?? That's AWESOME. I hate it when people do that. I report every one of them for "stalling/quitting games". Never knew if it actually did anything.

Yes, it's true.

There's a segregated pool for bad sports. They are forced to play each other.

A fate worse than death, I suspect.

Actually chaddumb is right we learn something new from loosing like how we lost it is better to loose

It seems to me the question is better phrased "Is it better to lose by checkmate or to resign?"
Since by resigning, one loses anyway.
And I disagree that one is objectively better than the other. Each person plays chess for his or her own reasons, and as such what is important is whether that person is getting what he or she wants out of the game.

I resigned this game instantly after my last move, realized I was done for before my opponent even reacted:

Because even though I didn't lose by checkmate, I knew the game was an inevitable loss. Some people say play on no matter what, and I get it, and if you want to that's fine. But I make little distinction between playing on in an objectively losing position and hope chess. And I don't want to play hope chess.
I don't always immediately resign after a blunder. But sometimes it is the right thing for me to do given my schedule, frame of mind, look on my cat's face, or direction the wind is blowing. Sometimes post game engine analysis is enough for me to understand how I went wrong without needing to go through the demoralizing process of inevitability.