Disproving The Soul

[Mudhammam]

This short amount of information is intended to disprove the existence of a soul and afterlife.

I will add more later on, as I am busy at the moment.

Anyways, I was reading up on neuroscience, consciousness, and anesthesia and found that anesthesia disproves the existence of a soul and afterlife.

For there to be an afterlife, consciousness cannot be based in a material world. Also known as a "soul".

However, anesthesia eliminates consciousness temporarily. How is it that something material can shut down something supposedly immaterial?

The answer is simple. Consciousness is based materially and an afterlife is not possible.

Have you ever been under anesthesia? What if someone put you under that state for eternity? It's exactly like death: absence of consciousness.
I also feel that further evidence is provided by the memory you have before life: NONE.

Leave a post below and I will hopefully respond.

I'll play devil's advocate; while the person is still alive, and as the soul can only cohere in a material existence--as it makes rational, and also therefore empirical, intuition possible, and nothing else beyond that limit unless another vehicle is presented for it, namely one in Space-time--then the material body is required. Only when the soul is granted another source or body can it experience, and since our knowledge is limited to the empirical world, the soul remains perfectly mysterious but metaphysically possible. It is the simple substance, ontologically distinct from your brain, that allows the billions of cells in your brain to form the idea that you call "you."

[Baqal]

What this reveals is perhaps the importance of presuppositions. Start with materialistic presuppositions and you will, unsurprisingly, reach a materialistic conclusion.

Answer these questions:
-where is the soul is located?
-what is it made of?
-what purpose does it serve?
-how can we detect the presence of a soul?
And if you could answer these questions with evidence that fits the parameters of our reality, I'm quite sure that materialists will adopt the idea of a soul.

Start with presuppositions that allow for the metaphysical, that allow for God, and you will allow room for other conclusions. Both are internally consistent. Each of us must follow the path that is most persuasive to us.

Uh, no, it's not consistent. And you know why? Because it offers room for subjective definitions. Where is the soul?
"It's in our chest region!", says person A.
"No, it's in our brains!", says person B.
"That's nonsense, the soul exists outside of our physical body!", says person C.
What proper conclusions can be made here if these people can't agree with each other?

And if you decide to go on the "the soul is immaterial" card, I'll have to stop you, because everything that is not made out of matter or does not interact with it is pretty much non-existent. Ignoramus has already pointed out that, no matter what explanations you offer to those who believe in a soul, they will always twist and change definitions in order to suit their argument. Yet another example of the inconsistency in this way of thinking.

[Michael]

Baqal, I think you most have missed my opening paragraph, because you too seem to pursuing, and dismissing, an Aristotelean view of the soul, from which I distanced myself in the opening paragraph of my post ...

Firstly, the OP seems to adopt an Aristotelean model of soul, that a soul is something we have. I would say the biblical meaning is much more that we 'are' souls; that 'soul' describes the essence of our identity.

But I am intrigued by your idea that nothing immaterial exists. This would seem to be self-refuting, as that very proposition is immaterial and therefore does not exist. This, of course, was the reason that the logical positivism movement collapsed; it pulled the rug out form under itself in just the same way.

[downbeatplumb]

Baqal, I think you most have missed my opening paragraph, because you too seem to pursuing, and dismissing, an Aristotelean view of the soul, from which I distanced myself in the opening paragraph of my post ...

Firstly, the OP seems to adopt an Aristotelean model of soul, that a soul is something we have. I would say the biblical meaning is much more that we 'are' souls; that 'soul' describes the essence of our identity.

This appears to be just meaningless pretty words.

[DramaQueen]

When I was a kid, I believed your balls were your soul (ruh-soul is a euphemism for dlawyz-testicles).

[Baqal]

Baqal, I think you most have missed my opening paragraph, because you too seem to pursuing, and dismissing, an Aristotelean view of the soul, from which I distanced myself in the opening paragraph of my post ...
Firstly, the OP seems to adopt an Aristotelean model of soul, that a soul is something we have. I would say the biblical meaning is much more that we 'are' souls; that 'soul' describes the essence of our identity.

I do not believe in a soul that interacts with the world AT ALL. As I said, things like souls are always open to subjective definitions. I have two options. I can believe either description of a soul or not believe in any of them because I am able to recognize that the idea of a soul is nothing but pulling the concept to you and modifying it in order to suit your worldview.

But I am intrigued by your idea that nothing immaterial exists. This would seem to be self-refuting, as that very proposition is immaterial and therefore does not exist. This, of course, was the reason that the logical positivism movement collapsed; it pulled the rug out form under itself in just the same way.

Do you really have to fiddle with abstract ideas? Abstract ideas are measurable in our reality, so they exist. That is the minimum requirement for the existence of anything. They would be completely useless if you do not have a properly working brain that can make them up or recognize them.

[ignoramus]

Michael, I gave you kudos because I know where you are coming from (I think?).
We athiests love empirical evidence. We also acknowledge and understand many concepts.
The concept of the soul is intrinsically connected to the heaven/hell concept.
Again, if it doesn't exist as matter/energy and cannot be measured or qualified, then it doesn't exist in our physical reality.
Sure it exists as a concept and in the minds of billions of believers.
It then becomes unfalsifiable like so many other religious stories and concepts, and also ghosts, ufo's, bigfoot, etc

[Whateverist]

Let me try rephrasing those questions substituting "your identity" for "the soul".

-where is your identity located?
-what is your identity made of?
-what purpose does your identity serve?
-how can we detect the presence of your identity?
And if you could answer these questions with evidence that fits the parameters of our reality, I'm quite sure that materialists will adopt the idea of your identity.

I have no problem making sense of a 'soul' in this way. What I do have trouble with is the idea that 'my' soul/identity is in God. You might just as well say that who you are essentially, your soul/identity, is in another dimension. Or use a nonsense word: your soul is in igplumz. I find the word 'god' equally unhelpful.

At best I think you can say "my soul/identity is a mystery". We begin to find out about it when I'm born and lose contact with it when I die or slip into dementia. To say the dead are "with god" is fancy talk for "they're sure not here". Apparently there are and have been billions and billions of souls. Why does it matter that god's memory retains each one? Is there another file for the shape of every snowflake .. and why should I care in either case? I should add that in saying this I do not feel the least bit of nihilism.

[Michael]

Baqal. Firstly, the OP seems to adopt an Aristotelean model of soul, that a soul is something we have. I would say the biblical meaning is much more that we 'are' souls; that 'soul' describes the essence of our identity. So let's work with your example. You say that "abstract ideas are measurable in our reality, so they exist". What would I measure to validate that idea itself? What are the units of that idea that I need to measure?

Or take the classical philosophical position of cogito ergo sum, I think therefore I am. This is generally taken as a 'basic belief' that cannot actually be substantiated without circular reasoning (you need to validate it without relying on an 'I' or an 'am' to avoid begging the question). How does your idea that all ideas can be measured relate to that?

I'd encourage you to open a little more to the world of 'ideas'. Hard materialism collapses in on itself it cannot allow for ideas that cannot be measured themselves. Think, for example, of the laws of logic; measurement depends on applying some basic concepts in logic for measurement to make sense. But if you says that the laws of logic must be substantiated by measurement, you then pull the rug out from the very idea of measurement. You simply beg the question again. Science itself rests on axioms that we cannot prove or measure.

---

Whateverist. It seems to me you still become trapped in the same problem by trying to reduce 'identity' to a part of us and asking "where is it?" and "what is it made from?"

For example, in what part of me is the identity I had when I was seven years old? Or has that identity completely gone? What was, and is, that identity made of? Using materialism alone I can't see how we can come up with particularly satisfactory answers. This is an area where I think philosophy, and even the arts, may have more useful things to say than materialistic science. Materialistic science generally, I would say, presupposes the existence of 'I'. Indeed it must if one is to try and work from a subjective/objective division which science usually tries to do.

---

Ignoramus. I love science. It's my profession. But I would still disagree strongly with the idea that we need to measure something in order to explore it. When it comes to questions like "what is it to be human?" I find the arts have as much to say as science. And that's because the arts can speak from the subjective, from within humanity itself, within 'soulship', if you like. Or we might say the arts speak 'from the soul'. Indeed there have been forms of art that seem to so clearly articulate what it is to be human that we called them 'soulful', or we might even describe a type of music as 'soul'. This existential exploration of soul makes more much sense to me than asking "where is the soul?" or "what is the soul made from?". And so, going full circle to my original point , the soul, both in the bible and in the arts, is something we are and not something we have. And so I find existential exploration of 'soul' much more productive than reductionist analysis. If you insist on a reductionist and analytical approach (where you can measure things) I think you find it very hard to see something that the poet, the musician, the novelist, knows full well exists. Sometimes art gives voice to things that science finds very hard to even to begin to grapple with. Soul is one such thing, I have found.

[Baqal]

Baqal. Firstly, the OP seems to adopt an Aristotelean model of soul, that a soul is something we have. I would say the biblical meaning is much more that we 'are' souls; that 'soul' describes the essence of our identity. So let's work with your example. You say that "abstract ideas are measurable in our reality, so they exist". What would I measure to validate that idea itself? What are the units of that idea that I need to measure?

Or take the classical philosophical position of cogito ergo sum, I think therefore I am. This is generally taken as a 'basic belief' that cannot actually be substantiated without circular reasoning (you need to validate it without relying on an 'I' or an 'am' to avoid begging the question). How does your idea that all ideas can be measured relate to that?

I'd encourage you to open a little more to the world of 'ideas'. Hard materialism collapses in on itself it cannot allow for ideas that cannot be measured themselves. Think, for example, of the laws of logic; measurement depends on applying some basic concepts in logic for measurement to make sense. But of you says the laws of logic must be substantiated by measurement, you then pull the rug out from the very idea of measurement. You simply beg the question again. Science itself rests on axioms that we cannot prove or measure.

I am quite aware of that, in order to commit inquiry, I have to take three basic assumptions.
A lot of people use abstract ideas and they are able to recognize them. Because of that, I can be maximally certain that there are abstract ideas in this world. We can't ever "substantiate" the abstract, because we have to resort to abstract thinking again.
So, yes. I think I see your point now, Michael. I only wonder what makes you certain that our souls somehow equate to how we express ourselves in this world to be?