RE: Soul
March 31, 2013 at 1:20 am
(This post was last modified: March 31, 2013 at 1:31 am by Ryantology.)
(March 31, 2013 at 12:31 am)Tex Wrote: Ouch! That's quite a bit. However, I think it all stems from the "Quantities are not material" line. The prime example of why quantities are not material is because they do not have any material qualities. You cannot isolate them. You cannot shoot them like electrons. They have no spacial dimensions. They have no physical traits whatsoever. From my knowledge, material things, as a whole, act materially. Quantity does not. More so, quantity lacks any material attribute that allows a human body to sense it. There is no reason we should know quantity. However, we do. This leads me to believe there is a non-bodily processor that can recognize the quantity.
The problem is that you assume that concepts which are innately tied to material objects can exist separately of material objects. The fact that the number itself is immaterial is, itself, immaterial. The immaterial number is nothing more than a helpful representation. It means nothing by itself, unless you can define what a fourteen is without referencing other numbers or anything material. I would love to see someone attempt to teach a child how to count simply by explaining the immaterial concept of numbers. So when you say
Quote:What must be said first is that the brain can only process stimuli which is has received.
How does everybody, ever, learn how to quantify? By counting objects. That is how you recognize that $$$ is a pattern to which we've given the designation '3' and $$$$$ is a pattern to which we've given the designation '5' and so on. Furthermore, unlike anything, ever, which is actually immaterial, quantities are not open to interpretation. The integer 3 is always the integer 3. You cannot interpret the integer 3 as being the integer 2 unless you modify the integer 3 in some way that it is no longer the integer 3, such as subtracting the integer 1 from it. This is an artifact of the innately material nature of numbers.
The same mistake is made of thoughts in general. Every human thought is based upon, or refers to, either something material, or a concept which either describes or is analogous to a material object. Thoughts (and all brain processes) are the result of electrical impulses in the brain. No immaterial concept, from thought to memory to imagination, has ever been shown to exist without a material brain conceiving it. None has ever shown to be exhibited by a creature without neural activity or some analog thereto. There is no need for a "non-bodily processor" and you have invoked it not because there is evidence of any such thing, but because your assertion can't work at all without it.