What is "soul"? [Archive]

ismu

01-30-02, 02:56 AM

I have bothering thought in last several months...

What is soul?
In lots of religions, believe that people still remember what was happened to theirself after they died, and their body (including brain) become dust. Is this meant that soul is kind of our "twin" in "abstract world" which connected to us in "real world"? ...And all thinking proccessed by our twin?
if that so...
What is brain for?
Is it just a "tranceiver radio" to link us with our twin's "brain"?

About telepathy...
...that believed truly can happen, is this because our twin do direct contact in "abstract world" with somebody's "twin"?

About dreams...
... is that really just random pulse in our brain create bizzare visions and feelings? or it "really happen" with our twin?

Or... it just a software...
"programmed" by God, and "installed" on us while we were a fetus?

...sounds silly isn't it? but lets think "philosophicaly" for a moment... :rolleyes:

Riomacleod

01-30-02, 04:42 PM

I've been saying this forever, that the brain is just a complicated reciever through which the soul sends messages and controls the body and through which the body sends its collected data through to the soul. Of course the mechanism for this is still a bit of a debate.

The reason why we cannot find a soul in the modern psycological realm is simply because we're not looking the right way for it. Take for example a radio controlled car. If we simply look at the car, we see that there is this electronic brain which is powered by a battery, and seemingly data which comes from this brain solely controls the car. Lo and behold! The car moves on its own. Amazing! Of course, we can look beyond the car, and see that there is someone working controls and sending information to the little electronic receiver.

Anyway, that's the 10c tour.

Merlijn

01-30-02, 06:25 PM

Hi,
At first glance the idea of the brain as a receiver for the soul looks nice. It is such a obvious and intuitive notion that it has been among us since ages.
In the mid-seventeenth century the French philosopher René Descartes came up with a new idea of how the body functions and explicitly stated that the mind (soul) interacts with the body via the pineal gland. This made some other philosophers to re-evaluate the idea of the mind interacting with the body. Soon they caame up with the term "Dualsm" to describe the notion. And the conlusion was that there is no way that Dualism can be right. something non-physical just cannot interact with the physical world.
So we either abandone the idea of an immaterial soul, abandone the idea of the existence of the physical world, or bring some form of strange magic into play. If you choose the last option, you may just as well ask of 'science' to start all over again...

Cris

01-30-02, 10:54 PM

Merlijn has the essential answer, but why does the brain have to be a receiver? Neuroscience shows quite clearly that the brain is fully capable of generating its own messages. It has no need to receive anything from anywhere else.

Not only is there no way that something immaterial can communicate with something material but there appears no need for a soul to exist in the first place.

Cris

ismu

01-30-02, 11:12 PM

Originally posted by Cris
Neuroscience shows quite clearly that the brain is fully capable of generating its own messages. It has no need to receive anything from anywhere else.

If... brain works such as multi-frequency tranceiver, of course the brain SEEMS to be generated it's own message. If we broke a small parts of the brain, says wich one it's control vision, he gonna blind, because the signal from the eyes can't be "transmitted" to the "soul" software to procces it...

Riomacleod

01-31-02, 11:00 AM

Merljin, I have to disagree, there are all sorts of immaterials which we use in our own daily life. For instance, how much is a pound of understanding? What is the volume of love? Is there a charge density of beauty?

I personally think that descartes is on crack, and most of his philosophy has been debunked over the ages, if nothing else it has been better reasoned. And even I have to admit that the only reason he gave the pinneal gland for the transition point was because he was pressed for a discussion of neurochemistry which he simply could never have been prepared for, and it will take a good deal of time before we have any of the technology to sufficiently probe it. I think that plato discusses much more eloquently the nature of the body/soul interaction.

Furthermore, saying that things don't exist because we are unable to measure them is something along the lines of saying that stars not visible to the naked eye popped into being when the first telescope was used to experience them.

Cris

01-31-02, 02:57 PM

Riomacleod

there are all sorts of immaterials which we use in our own daily life. For instance, how much is a pound of understanding? What is the volume of love? Is there a charge density of beauty?These things are not immaterial they are simply extremely ill-defined. In all examples an attempt is being made to quantify a human experience. All human experiences are manifestations of the human brain in terms of neural and chemical interactions. Our level of knowledge of how to isolate and accurately measure such interactions is currently limited. Measuring love for example might well be possible eventually and be indicated, perhaps, in terms of the number of brain cells that participated, the amount of hormones used, and the quantity of protein and electrical power consumed in the neural activity.

Furthermore, saying that things don't exist because we are unable to measure them is something along the lines of saying that stars not visible to the naked eye popped into being when the first telescope was used to experience them. [/B]I don’t think we are claiming an immaterial soul doesn’t exist but that it cannot exist. For an immaterial soul to influence a material person then at some point it must be material in which case it cannot be immaterial. It is a paradox; it cannot exist and therefore does not exist, not because we can prove it does not exist but because it is a nonsense to start with.

Cris

ismu

02-01-02, 12:04 AM

The fact is that brain's dendrites works using electric pulses, switched by chemichal reaction. But, it's pules always dynamic. there is no such ROM-BIOS that stays permanently to hold our memories.

Neural network system that "understand" patterns (no matter how much cells it used) seems to fail to completely replicate mind wich was able to do more complex stuffs, intuition, and else.

Electric and magnetic pulses --even still being in debates-- shows phenomenon to interact with unknown energy. And also soul, it's unknown, but believed to be exists. Perfect condition of body obviously can't "run" without soul...

iced_earth

02-01-02, 12:25 AM

ok im sorry im trying to understand you pep's

so is energy, material

ismu

02-01-02, 01:04 AM

not really energy/material, it was just an analogies. But yes, we have to talk about substances in reality to understood unreality. What i'm trying to say is about "unknown existance", which i'd like to understand, even it was may be physically not even exists.

iced_earth

02-01-02, 04:17 PM

maybe in terms the "soul"is really just "thought" i mean what exactly is thought, but electronic signals right? prossesed thro chemicals,and perceved thro recepters. the fact we use only 10 % of our brain might also have something to do with the "soul," einstein said that if we used 100% there'd be no need for the body, or the brain , we'd be pure energy.

maybe "soul" is just the higher frequence of the mind, magnified from the 10% to 100% capasity , you get what im saying...

Cris

02-01-02, 10:59 PM

Hi iced,

The 10% notion was debunked many years ago. We use 100% of our brain.

Einstein was good in his field but that doesn't mean he was good at everything.

Sorry.

ismu

02-02-02, 12:18 AM

Second thought... may be the abstract existance of soul, it's only a single application running in God's multitasking OS mainframe. Running together with angel's, devil's, ghost's soul and and also dead spirits :)

That's why God know everything, every thought. We just a simulation program. Angel was made from light (electromagnetic waves, as scientist says), living lights. Ghosts, genie and devils was made from fire (it might be means energy), living energy. And we was made from mud (material), living material!! They all "alive" because of soul.

Just because our "soul application program" still connected to our interface -- "brain"-- we're alive. We'll drop dead if the our "interface" broken, or the aplication disconnected from the "interface" device... pufff!!! :rolleyes:

...phew... Bizzare. But make sense isn't it?... :D

Merlijn

02-02-02, 05:50 PM

Please get over the computer-analogy of the mind-brain problem. It may have looked promising in the early days of computer science, but we (philosophers of mind) have grown over that allready. I have spend some years in this field of philosophy and I have gone over the mind-brain problem. I can assure you that I have heard the arguments, and they are not convincing.
There remains another problem, however. It is the problem of qualia (to be explained beneath). It is much harder to tackle and much more essential than the mind-brain problem.

The problem of qualia is this. The brain processes can be described, but the experiences that they produce/repesent (depends on your position of thought) can not. That is becuase the experiences are like a 'first-person' kind. There is a qualitative difference. E.G. if one shoud hurt ones knee there is a particular neural reaction in the brain asssociated with the pain. But that neural reaction does not equal the experience of the pain.
One can can communicate the idea of 'pain' but not the experience. Another example: this very idea can be communicated, but the understanding of it must come from oneself, it cannot be conveyed.
To this qualia problem I believe a beginning to the answer is that the virtual space, if you will, of the information processed by the brain (which one might call the mind) is of such a complexity that it in itself has the ability to convey 'meta-information'. This meta-information may be self-refferring (i.e. of the 'first-person' kind)*.
It's just hard to put in words...Hope you get the idea.

Merlijn

* I think the term 'emerging property' can be applied here, but that term, does not say anything. It's an empty phrase. The qualia are an emerging property of the mind (say, the virtual space of the information processedby the brain).

ismu

02-03-02, 11:27 PM

Merlijn,
ok, i got the picture, not clearly tough... but that's my limitation perhaps.

So... let's back to the title. What is the Soul...

- Is it a 'meta-substance' which drive life and thought,
- or just a 'named term' for things as a results of life and thought itself,
- or else?

:confused:

Cris

02-03-02, 11:51 PM

Merlijn, ismu,

Summary of Merlijn's post.

We cannot remember pain. We can remember that we had pain, but we cannot recall the pain itself. Try it for yourself. Go back to a time when you knew you were in pain, can you recall the actual pain?

I'm not sure where this takes us in the discussion though.

Cris

FyreStar

02-04-02, 03:47 AM

For those of you who may be interested in an analysis of the 'soul' by a formerly frequent poster in this forum, go here:
http://www.sciforums.com/t2539/s4bb9018c5d9a5885d12355681920eeb2/thread.html

Specifically, the 4th post, written by the user named Boris, and the ensuing discussion if you are so inclined.

Enjoy!

Thanks,
FyreStar

ImaHamster2

02-04-02, 06:33 AM

FyreStar, thanks for the excellent seed. Wish Boris were still posting. This hamster will look up other Boris posts.

Merlijn

02-04-02, 07:04 AM

FyreStar, thanks for the link.
We philosophers of mind prefer not to use the word 'soul' (nor 'spirit', for that matter). Note however, that Boris' essay seems to deal both with 'soul' and 'mind' and then mixing them up. They are quite different notions!

Cris, you missed the point completely. That is not at all a summary of my post. (Where did you get the idea of memories? I haven't mentioned them did I?)
The point is: there is a discrepacy between the description of neurological (and cognitive, emotional, etc.) measures on the one hand and the actual experiences themselves.
* descriptions of natural events are in a 'third person' way of putting it ("it has properties A and B", it can be "the cilinder on the table", "your emotions", as well as "my memories", and so on)
* whereas the experience is of a 'first person' point of view and cannot be put into words, without making it a description again. The words "my brain hurts" is of a totally different category than the hurting itself.
The relevance to the discussion is this: the duality problem (a no-material soul interacting with a material world can be ovecome by redifining issues and accepting we have to look at things in a new way) The problem of Dualism deals with difference in properties of the objects.
The qualia problem is much harder to tackle. The Qualia problem deals with a difference in category of the objects. On toop of that the Dualism problem may be 'unasked' by denying the existence of one of the two objects (i.e. the physical world, or the non-physical), whereas the existence of Qualia cannot be denied. (I know Daniel Dennett tries to, but he is a loony and I cannt take his efforts serious).
But as tgo what is 'soul'? I have nno clear picture to that. Maybe just a myth, maybe just a feeling and kind of music, maybe it something devine. who can tell?

If you are intereseted, I can recommend this book:
William Bechtel. "Philosophy of Mind - an overvie for cognitive science." Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Publishers (1988).

Merlijn

scilosopher

02-04-02, 11:27 PM

Souls could possibly be re-defined to be consistent with science. The basic idea is that you have an essence that lives on after you die. The affects of your actions satisfy this criteria. Children are a more tangible extension of this ... especially since you help shape there thoughts.

Boris talked about killing off the rest of your body and the brain still being you (I didn't manage to read the whole thing despite interest). The brain is definitely influenced by the rest of your body. I'm not sure I would agree that the brain alone is you, but I would say that it carries much of your nature within it. A clone would be less you, but would hold a lot of the order that made you you.

No one would argue that a soul isn't supposed to be your essence. Order is never lost completely it can just lose focus and disperse throughout the universe once it's main bastion in the world falls into ruin.

Then again sometimes I re define things to an extent that some consider me to be talking about something entirely different (it just reflects me being different). So is qualia basically just that? The fact that anything thought no matter how well recorded and transmitted to anyone else is fundamentally different outside of the context of your mind? Why is this a problem?

Fathoms

02-07-02, 10:35 PM

Nuerochemicals are made of matter, consciousness exists as some form of energy. This debate is about which came first, the chicken or the egg. Why do neurochemicals behave the way they do? Are the chemicals doing the work or is the consciousness causing our observations? It seems rather silly to me that I don't really exist-that I'm just the result of some crazy orchestration of neurological drama. I mean, if there is no purpose for the soul, than why is there a purpose for consciousness? Why should this subjective, seemingly free-willed intelligence be allowed to exist at all, especially when it cannot be measured in any way if you subscribe to the standard reductionism principles? Consciousness alone become totally unnecessary. Consequently, the fact that I exist is ridiculous.

In spite of this thinking, it still doesn't mean there is a soul.

Cris

02-07-02, 10:49 PM

Fathoms,

Why do you assert "consciousness exists as some form of energy"?

Do you have any basis for that?

We know the brain consists of neural networks (primarily electrical) and other biochemical reactions. These appear sufficient to explain the complete functioning of the human brain and how we think.

Inventing an additional mystical component is not needed.

Cris

Fathoms

02-07-02, 11:10 PM

I'm not adding a mystical component at all. It's a very basic, logical observation. I exist, therefore I exist. If you're implying that consciousness is nothing more than a purely PHSYCAL phenomena then where is the evidence? You simply cannot quantify things that don't physically exist by observing the physical properties of neurochemistry. A person's ego cannot be felt, seen, tasted, smelled, or observed in any way. It cannot be placed inside a jar. I'm talking about the nature of perception itself. It's as far away from being explained as ever.

scilosopher

02-07-02, 11:41 PM

Cris,
I don't think consciuosness having qualities of energy is such a crazy thought. In many ways order and energy interconvert - just consider thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Or even just a simple enzyme/catalyst - it lowers the energy necessary and thereby modifies the energetics of a system greatly. The two are closely linked.

Fathom,
Pysics has also demonstrated that energy and matter interconvert. We divide up the world in order to think about it. When you smell a flower, the flower is in your nose. It's chemicals get incorporated into you.

Just because something has a mechanical nature doesn't mean it can't be wonderful. Matter and energy can do wonderful things, but only as a team and only if configured correctly. Luckily there are many ways of being correct and there are certain types of patterns that grow instead of dying out ...

Unfortunately many who believe in science want to strip the world of all that they can't understand. Only believing that what they understand is real. Even when scientists KNOW they don't understand everything, and KNOW they have physical contraints on what can be tested and limits on what can be known about a system.

People who feel and see the qualities of nature which we can't understand - that which has been washed out with such a view - still shouldn't ignore what science has made clear. And people who think that way just have to snap out of it. That isn't being hard nosed realistic and scientific it's actively choosing to forget and ignore essential subtle beauty of the world. That's just nuts.

As to whether we have souls, it mainly depends on what we would define a soul to be. Maybe the word soul has to much baggage and we should come up with a new word. Personally I think all people have aspects that are soul like. Order they create that will always exist in the world even if unattached to their physical body. A person can only guess what that's like until they find out. Maybe we get a glimpse though, in our friends and what we've helped them become, in what we've said and accomplished in our lives, in gardens, children, and maybe even the raw sewage we leave. My soul infuses my body, but my body smells too (unfortunately flowers smell a bit better ; )

Merlijn

02-08-02, 02:14 PM

Hello?
Has anybody been reading my posts?
Why is it that when you are a scientist in the field of physics everybody looks on you as an authority, but when you are a scientist/philosopher in the field of cognition & consciousness you are just ignored.... It is getting frustrating.

Cris:
We know the brain consists of neural networks (primarily electrical) and other biochemical reactions. These appear sufficient to explain the complete functioning of the human brain and how we think.
The brain is mainly a large ganglion, obviously true. But neither the structure, nor the activity of the brain has been - and with our present instruments they cannot be- studied to such an extend that there is a clear (let alone complete) picture of its "functioning [...] and how we think."
I believe Dennett (or somebody else) has mislead you.

Pathoms, what is to you the difference between "soul" and consciousness"?

Merlijn

scilosopher

02-08-02, 02:23 PM

Merlijn,
I asked about qualia in my second to last response (before this one). I read them. Have you read mine?

Maybe it's cause cognition is much murkier and it isn't always clear the relationship between what one person is saying and what you think ...

I certainly know what it's like to get ignored. Q once asked me how I integrated science and religion in my viewpoint and never even responded after I posted it. I can't even get responses when solicited ...

Not that I would consider myself an expert on science or religion. I'm mainly an expert at noticing inconsistencies ... which makes me question if anyone is an expert at anything.

Merlijn

02-08-02, 02:37 PM

scilosopher, it's all so true.

Merlijn.
(and you are not alone: I too see no conflicct between science and religion. On the contrary, I was raised as a atheist but science and philosophy made me become a believer)

Merlijn

02-08-02, 03:12 PM

Sorry scilosopher, I admit that I missed your post alltogether. i thought mine was the last on the page, so I went to page 2. My mistake.
The fact that anything thought no matter how well recorded and transmitted to anyone else is fundamentally different outside of the context of your mind? Why is this a problem?
Here is the deal. The pictures you see, the sounds you hear, every sensation is of a different order than the neurological events that encompass it. The first vs. third person point of view is only a matter of speaking.
You see a picture, not some neural electrochemical activity. Descartes pointed out this this as follows: I can boubt the existence of the world ("maybe I am just a brain in a vat dreaming the world") and one can doubt the existence of the brain ("maybe I am just a consciousness that thinks to be in a brain") but I cannot doubt the fact that I have experieces and thoughts. This is what Descartes meant when he wrote "Cogito ergo sum" ("I think therefor I am"). Because if you do, who is doing the doubting?
Most of the criticism to this can be reduced to the misunderstanding as to what Descartes means with "I". Many fail to see that Descartes makes no claimes about the nature of "I"! It may be that there is only one thought, maybe there is a butterfly who dreams to be a human being, ..... who can tell?
So qualia are the phenomena of our world of experiences which do not necessarily (logically forcing) relate to the neurological states of our brains.

Does this help?

scilosopher

02-08-02, 06:20 PM

Merlijn,
So qualia are a thing of indefinite existence because an extreme skeptic can disbelieve that our sensory apparatus even exists let alone whether it accurately delivers information about the surrounding world to our conscious mind. Do I have it right now?

If that is what qualia are, I'm not quite so skeptical. If it is harder for me to disbelieve I believe as a matter of lazyness ... whether they accurately depict the world I'm not so sure either, but they're still the best thing I have.

Merlijn

02-08-02, 07:02 PM

vampspade

12-11-06, 09:36 PM

i for one truely believe in the soul...i think that your soul does not have the limitations that our minds are set on having...after all, some use this methode of using their souls to break don the limitations of their body...

glaucon

12-11-06, 09:44 PM

Scilosopher,
I have no clear clue what you mean by : "So qualia are a thing of indefinite existence because an extreme skeptic can disbelieve that our sensory apparatus even exists let alone whether it accurately delivers information about the surrounding world to our conscious mind. "
Are there others who have troubles understanding this? Or am I totally vague about the meaning of Qualia?
I will try to think of a clear description.... maybe I should quote.

later more

I think what Scilosopher means here is that the ontological status of qualia is dynamic, and contingent upon the 'experiencer'. Just as our senses can trick us sometimes (the spoon in the half-filled glass 'looks' bent...), the sceptic can call into question the hypothesis that our reality truly enjoys an objective existence.

With which I agree....

glaucon

12-11-06, 09:46 PM

I almost forgot... just to get on topic.

"Soul", is a word used by some people to describe an invisible, non-physical, personal 'essence'.

Sauna

12-11-06, 09:53 PM

So qualia are a thing of indefinite existence

Qualia is a question of quality, not of thing, especially to do with the appreciation of perception, rather than the definition of it, the classic question being, when we see a color is what we see the same as what somebody else will see?

Depending thus on consciousness, indefinite existence barks up the wrong tree.

glaucon

12-11-06, 09:58 PM

Qualia is a question of quality, not of thing, especially to do with the appreciation of perception, rather than the definition of it, the classic question being, when we see a color is what we see the same as what somebody else will see?

Depending thus on consciousness, indefinite existence barks up the wrong tree.

Not at all; in fact, arguing that perception of qualia is contingent upon consciousness directly implies indefinite existence.

Sauna

12-11-06, 10:06 PM

Not at all; in fact, arguing that perception of qualia is contingent upon consciousness directly implies indefinite existence.

How do you figure that?

Qualia is of perception, not perceived of, subjective not objective, and consciousness directly defines it because it means nothing apart from consciousness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia

glaucon

12-11-06, 10:19 PM

How do you figure that?

Qualia is of perception, not perceived of, subjective not objective, and consciousness directly defines it because it means nothing apart from consciousness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia

LOL

Wikipedia??

Anyways...

You're exactly right.
Which is why 'indefinite existence' is implied.

As opposed to definite existence, where an ontological objective status is implicit.

Prince_James

12-11-06, 10:24 PM

Thou

Shalt

Not

Commiteth

Thread

Neceromancy!!!

Thus Sayeth The Prince!!!!!!!!!

Prince_James

12-11-06, 10:26 PM

Good move towards qualia, though.

It should also be noted that qualia is the essential character of mind. All which is experienced in mind is experienced by way of qualia.

Sauna

12-11-06, 10:51 PM

As opposed to definite existence, where an ontological objective status is implicit.

Opposed?

I am not arguing that qualia is contingent on consciousness, rather the opposite, consciousness is contingent on qualia, the palette of the painter so to speak.

glaucon

12-11-06, 10:54 PM

Opposed?

I am not arguing that qualia is contingent on cosciousness, rather the opposite, consciousness is contingent on qualia, the palette of the painter so to speak.

Ouch.

You've got some rough going there then.

So you'd take an ontologically objective position on reality... but... it in some way has a causal effect on the human brain?

How then would you explain that a blind, deaf, dumb and mute person can exist??

Prince_James

12-11-06, 11:01 PM

Glaucon:

Is that person also incapable of smelling, tasting, and feeling anything?

glaucon

12-11-06, 11:05 PM

Glaucon:

Is that person also incapable of smelling, tasting, and feeling anything?

Just for the purposes of hypothesis, let's say no.

Sauna's put himself (?) smack dab in the middle of alll the problems the hard-core Empiricists found themselves in.... just curious to see....

p.s.: I'm still pondering over my thoughts on the 'global morality' thread....
Quite slowly however...

Sauna

12-11-06, 11:06 PM

So you'd take an ontologically objective position on reality... but... it in some way has a causal effect on the human brain?

The latter rather than the former.

We make reality; there being no way to prove the existence of it except for the palette we use to paint our picture of it.

How then would you explain that a blind, deaf, dumb and mute person can exist??

If you've seen one or heard of one, I'll take your word for it.

Mind you, there are many who just pretend to be to claim the welfare benefit.