The human brain is under a delusion that it is a mind

[Blackrook]

The human brain is a physical object under a delusion that it is something more than a physical object -- a mind, that exists outside the realm of the physical.

An atheist's task is to convince the human brain that it is nothing more than a biological machine, which operates with neurons and chemicals, rather than gears and levers.

Once that task is complete, we can abandon all belief in the soul, the spiritual world, and the afterlife.

Discuss.

[DeistPaladin]

The human brain is a physical object under a delusion that it is something more than a physical object -- a mind, that exists outside the realm of the physical.

An atheist's task is to convince the human brain that it is nothing more than a biological machine, which operates with neurons and chemicals, rather than gears and levers.

Once that task is complete, we can abandon all belief in the soul, the spiritual world, and the afterlife.

Discuss.

You're conflating two issues.

Atheism is the lack of a belief in any god or gods. Nothing more.

My wife is an atheist who believes in ghosts and an afterlife.
I am a deist who believes we live in a strictly natural universe and I don't have any believe in an afterlife.
These are two separate issues.

Then we move on to the "task" part of your thread.

Atheists don't have a "task". Atheism is simply a word for what you lack a believe in. There is no assigned task.

[Mudhammam]

The human brain is a physical object under a delusion that it is something more than a physical object -- a mind, that exists outside the realm of the physical.

An atheist's task is to convince the human brain that it is nothing more than a biological machine, which operates with neurons and chemicals, rather than gears and levers.

Once that task is complete, we can abandon all belief in the soul, the spiritual world, and the afterlife.

Discuss.

Nope. I'm not under the delusion that my soul exists outside of the "gears and levers" of my "biological machine." The soul is the illusion that these experiences resulting from physical interactions between "neurons and chemicals" and external objects are contained within a unity of apprehension (mind) that is divisible from the multiple simultaneous functions of the brain.

[Chad32]

If you mess around with the brain, you can completely change a person's personality, their memories, and pretty much everything that makes them an individual. You don't remain you if something happens to your brain, so there is no you outside your brain that keeps your whole persona from changing when someone tweeks it. Is that enough to prove there is no soul?

[JesusHChrist]

If you mess around with the brain, you can completely change a person's personality, their memories, and pretty much everything that makes them an individual. You don't remain you if something happens to your brain, so there is no you outside your brain that keeps your whole persona from changing when someone tweeks it. Is that enough to prove there is no soul?

Exactly.

Given the effects on the brain of everything from LSD, alcohol, the electromagnetic "God Helmet" to Alzheimer's , all causing direct physical/chemical changes in the brain, it is obvious our "being" is the result of those same chemical processes in the brain.

How it all works is vastly complex, but there is no reason to think anything other than physical processes are involved.

[The Grand Nudger]

The human brain is a physical object under a delusion that it is something more than a physical object -- a mind, that exists outside the realm of the physical.

Perhaps you're under the delusion that a -mind- is something more than a physical object?

An atheist's task is to convince the human brain that it is nothing more than a biological machine, which operates with neurons and chemicals, rather than gears and levers.

Well.....that -is- how our brains operate....so I don't know that it would require much effort in the convincing dept, and?

Once that task is complete, we can abandon all belief in the soul, the spiritual world, and the afterlife.

I never held any of those beliefs in the first place, it would be categorically impossible for me to abandon them. But does any of that actually follow anyway? So what if the brain were nothing more than a physical object, a machine - neurons and chemicals...what does any of that have to do with a soul, a spiritual world, or an afterlife, even more specifically, what does any of that have to do with belief in those things?

[Madness20]

Religions go a long way into imposing wishful thinking and mindless obedience on the followers, so soul and afterlife are natural weapons for religions to "judge" and recruit people seeking some kind of comfort in their theological views.

[Exian]

What exactly was the point of the OP?

[Chad32]

He believes that souls exist, and believes we as atheists need to prove they don't?

[Esquilax]

The human brain is a physical object under a delusion that it is something more than a physical object -- a mind, that exists outside the realm of the physical.

Or, the mind is a process arising from a specific arrangement of matter. Don't get hooked into the object/nonexistent dichotomy that spiritualists so often do: things can also be attributes of other things.