Disproving The Soul

[Whateverist]

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?"

Actually I was agreeing with you. I meant to show that those questions were not helpful by substituting "your identity" for "the soul". Obviously having an identity makes sense to anyone who has one. I don't think there is actually any problem. When you ask "what", "where" and "why" questions regarding identity, you are using third-person categories for first-person phenomena.

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.

But I presuppose an "I" as well. I quite agree with you that the arts constitute loads of evidence for it. I likewise have no problem using "soul" and "transcendence" to describe what these kinds of first-person experiences are like. What we do as doers is better handled by the arts than by science. I wouldn't use a hammer to tighten a faucet and I wouldn't use calipers to measure a sonnet. Science handles the physics and physiology of what we do, but the arts are better for sharing how we feel about what we do.

[Michael]

Baqal. I'm not certain about anything :-) I just find existentialism more useful when considering the soul (or what it is to be 'me'). Artists of all types have mined that approach so well, that I find it a compelling approach. And I would say that approach is warp and weft through the bible itself; the human experience is described in a series of amazingly diverse narratives. What it is to be human is explored through narratives; we find what it is to be human through understanding the story of the peoples throughout the ages. Sure science throws some light on this, but the arts, including history, really speak to us about who we are. We don't need to measure everything; sometimes Dostoevsky or Steinbeck or Orwell or Shakespeare or Munch or Gorecki, or even the writers of the bible, can speak profoundly to what it is to be human, to what it is to be a soul, without a measuring device in sight. But in order to hear those voices we do need to shift the soul from something we have to something we are. "Who am I?" is a very different question to "Of what am I made?" Both are important questions, but I find the question of 'soul' to be more productively linked with the former than the latter (both Aristotle and Aquinas would disagree vehemently with me, so I'm not unaware I'm going down a path that some of the greatest thinkers of our race would tell me is wrong).

Anyway, that's just my experience, and I do accept there is always a certain tension between the world of ideas and the material world. I've pushed back on materialism here not because I think it's wrong or useless (quite the contrary) but because I think, like science, it can't explore everything.

I think that's probably all I'll say on this, as I think I've covered the key things I wanted to throw into the mix of this thread, and especially because I've just been reminded that I promised to make the family a banana cake, and we must get our priorities straight - cake always comes first :-)

[Baqal]

I think that's probably all I'll say on this, as I think I've covered the key things I wanted to throw into the mix of this thread, and especially because I've just been reminded that I promised to make the family a banana cake, and we must get our priorities straight - cake always comes first :-)

Wishing you luck on that banana cake, sir. By the power of Melisseus, let it be sweet!

[vorlon13]

The soul is also that which distinguishes human beings from all animals. Animals do not have souls, they mey be 'aware' in animalistic way that humans have them.

I also note, 'souls' are implicitly what is capable of 'freewill' although a better phrase would be knowledge of good and evil. Souls, if worthy, are what experience Salvation. Ascribing to an animal characteristics implicit of having a soul is blasphemous. I would advise the Christers here to suppress their odd urges in that direction in my presence. I also think a strong case can be made that people born deformed or grossly disabled do not possess souls. I would entertain discussions as to when a person disabled or disfigured outside of congenitally might no longer possess a soul.

Another fact about souls is that the presence or absence of one is the determinant of whether or not a specific Christer is deemed to be alive or not.



And if all of that sounds like it was processed through a 3 graders head while in a small midwestern Sunday school by a Sunday school marm that while sincere, might have been a tad less than intellectually rigorous about her beliefs, go get yourself a celebratory non-carbonated, non-caffeinated beverage !!!

---

As for the actual topic, disproving the soul, understand that while the physical traits ascribed to them in Holy Scripture are ludicrous, Christers are 100% stuck with every odd jot and tittle Inerrantly recorded in the Bible about them.

And the consequences.

[Michael]

Just to report an excellent outcome for the banana cake (well, if you can consider being eaten an excellent outcome). Melisseus was obviously feeling kind

[Severan]

My major point here is if something like anesthesia can affect the brain in such a way that there is an absolute absence of consciousness, why can't death?

Many christians claim that consciousness is in a "soul" of sorts, and when your brain stops working(death), the soul leaves the body for an afterlife.

They say this "soul" is immaterial and it explains consciousness.

My argument is that because of anesthesia and the effects that it has, consciousness cannot be explained from an immaterial perspective. It absolutely must be explained through a materialistic point of view. Therefore, when your material body ceases to function, so does your consciousness.

My side argument is that we were not conscious before birth, so we will not be conscious after death.

[Whateverist]

My major point here is if something like anesthesia can affect the brain in such a way that there is an absolute absence of consciousness, why can't death?

Absolutely does. Unfortunate parallel though. With anesthesia you can ask 'where does your consciousness go' since it obviously returns. With death, there is no return and no place to go.

They say this "soul" is immaterial and it explains consciousness.

My argument is that because of anesthesia and the effects that it has, consciousness cannot be explained from an immaterial perspective. It absolutely must be explained through a materialistic point of view. Therefore, when your material body ceases to function, so does your consciousness.

My side argument is that we were not conscious before birth, so we will not be conscious after death.

I largely agree but I'm not sure there is much agreement on the definition of terms, especially soul. I agree with you that there is no you (and what-ever-you-want-to-call-it) before or after death. But I wouldn't think you can exhaustively explain what it is like to be conscious in a solely materialistic fashion. Science should/may eventually lay bare the necessary physiological conditions for the existence of consciousness. But I have to doubt how that approach could ever yield the sufficient conditions to create a novel, poem or a painting. I doubt that the necessary and sufficient conditions for the writing of Vonnegut's Cats Cradle will ever be known. Likewise I don't see how we will ever be able to do more than catalog the first person phenomena of consciousness through our own reportage.

My only difference with Michael is that I don't see what imagining a being or a place where every stray thought, soul and snowflake can be warehoused for all time makes any difference. For me, soul/identity is a mystery to be experienced and enjoyed here, the only place it will ever exist, and now, its only fleeting time.

[Jackalope]

Have you ever been under anesthesia?

Yep, twice, total darkness, missing time occurs (alien abduction comes to mind, lol), one second they are putting you under, next one you are already waking up

It's very likely you were given an amnestic agent like propofol or rohypnol. My last experience with anesthesia involved such agents and my last memory was signing the consent form Monday morning, my next was waking Friday afternoon. I have to wonder if I would have had any memories or dreams if I hadn't been administered an amnestic. I have been told that I had brief periods of consciousness where I was able to communicate non-verbally (I was on mechanical ventilation and could not speak).

[Brakeman]

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. .. 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.

I am finding it very hard to believe your claimed science credentials with answers like these.

There is no "gulf" between "the Arts" and science. The "arts" are merely thought pathways of our very chemical brain. That is all they are in total.

Just as there is no true separation of the physical computer's processor and a software program, there is no true separation from the human brain's thoughts and ideas (or Arts as you call it) and the proteins, lipids, and other components that comprise our human brain.

One can study any facet of human existence with science. We may not yet be able to do a satisfactory job of it today, but no true scientist doubts that we will be able to in the reasonable future.

There is no soul because there is no energy for there to be a soul. The idea of a soul as an "Identity" is superfluous and furthermore useless, as an identity is only useful to other sentient beings that need a segregant, of which none in the form of a creator god, exists.

[RobbyPants]

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

Yeah, except for one of those paths will lead to actual, predictable results on which you could base your decisions. It yields something useful.

The other is a descent into nonfalsifiable madness, which can yield no useful predictions for the really real world. I mean, yeah, maybe I have a soul, and if I fail to do X, something bad will happen to it.

Maybe there's an invisible leprechaun that's going to fleem my floom with floum. Wouldn't that suck? I don't want my fleem floomed! I'd better pay homage to the leprechaun since I can't prove it's wrong with my materialistic bias!

Michael, no one cares about an infinite amount of non-falsifiability. They only care about the one particular brand they made up/were told as children.