The nature of the Soul (in Off-topic)

Hi all, a theological discussion, not aimed at any one religion.

What is the Soul? Do we have one, and if we do what relevance does it hold?

There's a hole in mine that's letting in water

Oh here is what I think soul is:

it is the body of the spirit which is the mind of the soul being the body, so the two then go into brains making them well, us :)
So we are spirits in our soul bodies which are in the human brains.

Define "we". :P

Fine then, every human is apart of the "we" except me since I am an automated spamming machine :) Happy now?

Not you, Brainless!

"What is the Soul? Do we have one, and if we do what relevance does it hold?"

All people? CB community? All living organisms? All objects living and nonliving?

In other words, I would have to start my definition with some of idea of who has whatever it is. (clearly there are exclusions in the CB community alone, nevermind whether that is representative of some larger universe of potential we)

Sorry WAB, didn't quite grasp that. Do you think the Soul is seperate to the physical body? Does both the soul and the physical body contain our thoughts, memories and emotions?

Does the Soul only manifest when the physical body dies, or is it everpresent?

What if any, is the difference between Soul and Spirit?

:) Hi Bast.

I'm not defining it yet. What are your opinions? Do we as individuals posses an individual soul? A shared one? Does all life on the planet posses individual souls? Or is all life connected by a single 'Soul'?

The problem with the notion of Soul is that no one seems to agree on a fixed definition. What I want to know is people personal opinions on what they perceive Soul to be and mean.

:)

search in a bookstore for things about this person:

Sri Ramana Maharshi


I have read some of his work and really impressive, and since then I have become more and more interested in the art of Eastern philosophy

Yes so basically thats what I think of the soul, it is seperate from physical body.

I think kind of a good example would be a fighter pilot flying a Jet which would lets say represent the Physical Body

The pilot himself-The brain would represent the spirit, the Body would represent the soul.

Then once he is inside, let us say that the Plane he is flying has a computer which can interface with the pilots brain.

So what happens here is: Pilots mind which is in the body interfaces with the planes mind(being the computer)which is on the plane which is it's body. So this would be like

The spirit is in the soul(soul being the body of the spirit) which interfaces with the brain which is in a human body.

And just like the pilot if he needs to survive a plane crash he can eject saving himself while the plane gets destroyed.

Hence we get spirit/soul moves on and the body dies.

So this is what the world looks like without nicotine....


somebody get me a cigarette quickly!

So the mind of the Spirit (The soul) is seperate, yet connected to the mind of the physical body?

Connected how?

Do alterations to the physical mind (Amnesia, mood altering drugs, etc) also change the soul?

Does the Soul contain our memories and emotions?

Ok here is how it is:

Spirit is with soul as brain is with body

What happens is spirit in the soul would enter the human body and control the brain to perform functions that the brain would normally not do such as have higher consciousness, be able to do things that animals would not be doing.

So without the spirit/soul the human body would be just like any other animal going on basic animal instincts.

Now as far as things like drugs go, the spirit would not be hurt by that but would be able to learn/remember those things. The brain though on drugs would cause the spirit to missinterprut things so technically yes the spirit would hallucinate too if the brain does.

Remember that saying that we only use 10% of our brains?

Well if we were just brains then that above phrase/statement would not be true because then we would be doing everything, thinking and telling every piece of cell in our body what to do.

Same with computers, we only use certain % of the computer to perform the functions, the computer itself does the rest.

I'm not exactly sure why but dictionary.com seems to have soul and spirit being the same thing.

But the way I like to think of it is that the spirit is the actual mind and the soul is the body/protective layer if you think of it that way.

Or it could be that the spirit and the soul are two words meaning brain. Not really sure about that one.

Spirit:
n.

1.
1. The vital principle or animating force within living beings.
2. Incorporeal consciousness.
2. The soul, considered as departing from the body of a person at death.
3. Spirit The Holy Spirit.
4. A supernatural being, as:
1. An angel or a demon.
2. A being inhabiting or embodying a particular place, object, or natural phenomenon.
3. A fairy or sprite.
5.
1. The part of a human associated with the mind, will, and feelings: Though unable to join us today, they are with us in spirit.
2. The essential nature of a person or group.
6. A person as characterized by a stated quality: He is a proud spirit.
7.
1. An inclination or tendency of a specified kind: Her actions show a generous spirit.
2. A causative, activating, or essential principle: The couple's engagement was announced in a joyous spirit.
8. spirits A mood or an emotional state: The guests were in high spirits. His sour spirits put a damper on the gathering.
9. A particular mood or an emotional state characterized by vigor and animation: sang with spirit.
10. Strong loyalty or dedication: team spirit.
11. The predominant mood of an occasion or a period: “The spirit of 1776 is not dead” (Thomas Jefferson).
12. The actual though unstated sense or significance of something: the spirit of the law.
13. An alcohol solution of an essential or volatile substance. Often used in the plural with a singular verb.
14. spirits An alcoholic beverage, especially distilled liquor.


Soul:
soul
n.

1. The animating and vital principle in humans, credited with the faculties of thought, action, and emotion and often conceived as an immaterial entity.
2. The spiritual nature of humans, regarded as immortal, separable from the body at death, and susceptible to happiness or misery in a future state.
3. The disembodied spirit of a dead human.
4. A human: “the homes of some nine hundred souls” (Garrison Keillor).
5. The central or integral part; the vital core: “It saddens me that this network... may lose its soul, which is after all the quest for news” (Marvin Kalb).
6. A person considered as the perfect embodiment of an intangible quality; a personification: I am the very soul of discretion.
7. A person's emotional or moral nature: “An actor is... often a soul which wishes to reveal itself to the world but dare not” (Alec Guinness).
8. A sense of ethnic pride among Black people and especially African Americans, expressed in areas such as language, social customs, religion, and music.
9. A strong, deeply felt emotion conveyed by a speaker, a performer, or an artist.
10. Soul music.

Now here is the akward part.

The Spirit (and the soul it contains) is ethereal? Otherwise It wouldn't be able to a) occupy the same physical space as a tangible body and b) wouldn't have access to other realms (Limbo, Heaven or Hell for example...).

Being ethereal, how can it be influenced by physical activities? How can it 'opperate' our physical brain? Or retain our physical memories and emotions?

If my Soul/Spirit doesn't contain my memories and emotions, is it really me? Why should I care what happens to it, where it goes after I die if it's not actually me?

"Why should I care what happens to it, where it goes after I die if it's not actually me? "

Why should you care what happens to _anything_ after you die? You are dead.

:) A reference to the idea of living by a set of religious moral codes so that after I die, my Soul can go to a better place, or not go to a bad place.

If it doesn't contain my memories or emotions, why should I worry in this, my only life what happens to this thing unrelated to me after I die?

the soul that holds the most relevance to me is james brown.

Soul was created to threaten people or set scale/example of what's good and bad. The wish of long live forever has led people NOT wanting to die. The dream goes on to the after life which has one element created to fit the story : Soul. Soul was humanly created to serve such purpose in life. However, knowing such thing, rich spiritual beliefs is what makes life a rainbow.

and then hello kitty was created in Japan to represent someone who is cute, sexy and dangerous. Hello Kitty does have soul too :P

So the Soul doesn't really exist. It's just an idea created by society to help control the masses through religion?

Rather like Hello Kitty in that regard as well, apparently. :P

Rather like Bast in that regard as well, apparently. :P

Precisely! Except I have thousands of years of social control, in the name of pleasing cats, behind me. :)

The divinity of cats notwithstanding, assuming inhuman animates have soul(s), do they worry about theirs the way humans do?

Cats have no soul. They are evil evil creatures, who think nothing of toying with you and causing pain all in the name of pleasure and spite. They only love you when they want something and ignore you quite often when they don't.

I love cats. My heroes. :)

The soul.....

is tasty.

Ah yes Mr Undertow I'd forgotten that. Mmm, something else I can munch on while trying not to smoke....lol

Soul = some kind of consciousness which religions have named
When you're asleep all your logical/brain controlled thinking and muscle movement stop, = Body.
Yet and you can be aware of your dream. remembering some faces and maybe seeing your car, remembering that it is your car and where the keys are. You aren't supposed to remember those things as your brain has stopped logical thinking.
So soul must be that little guy inside your head with insane tv set which he watches at night.

Dude... That's so wrong..

I move in my sleep all the time. Then there are sleepwalkers etc..

I also remember quite a few of my dreams.

Conscious/Subconcious is physical. What does that have to do with an ethereal soul?

Unless the Soul is physical?

How about anmesia? What happens to a total amnesiac. Someone who leaves thier old life and morals behind, and carries on with a new one. Does he have two different Souls?

What makes you, you?

I eat souls....

mmmm souls.....

:)**

Soul is a religious creation believe it or not. Almost all belief systems are based on historical precedent and communities of people reinforcing these beliefs, either voluntarily, or compulsorily.

For instance, to believe in God, or Buddha, or FSM or any other deity, (real or fake) you first have to know that it exists. Second you have to understand a little about this deity, to know that it IS a deity and not just some crazy guy down at Taco Bell. Third, and most importantly, a accepted method or ritual for reinforcing your belief in this deity has to be known.

Through all those steps, you build relationships with the people around you, and are able to become a part of a community. Religion is a way of drawing people (who otherwise would not) together. It serves its purpose to put together strong communities of people. These communities of people get strength through their belief, because it is a foundation in your mind, that means one less thing for your mind to busy itself with and therefore relax.

To understand this, think if you were just born, and dropped into a fish tank, nobody was around to tell you what was going on, and you couldn't see outside the fish tank. Being Human, you would probably have a lot of questions. You would want stimulation and would only have your basic instincts to rely upon. You wouldn't understand anything, so you would be constantly thinking about everything, trying to figure it out. As you might guess, being completely helpless can be a stress inducing thing. Stress causes pain in the body, so anything to relieve this stress is a good thing. Religion is a way to relieve this stress by simplifying everyday life into blocks of things wholly understandable by the human mind.

Once people are formed into communities, they have a much better chance of survival, both from food gathering to defending against hostile intruders. So you can see, Religion is a very important thing. The soul is just a piece of Religion that is a concept that permeates most religious beliefs inextricably.

The nature of awareness is existence, consciousness, bliss.

This is what I have had for my MSN name for the past year or so, and it fits in what I believe

"inhuman animates"

Weird, I work with a bunch of those... I'll have to use that, great phrase.

Oh, andum, I'm with the hihicat, I could go on for a few pages about this, but really, it is so...blah anymore.

/\88/\

"If it doesn't contain my memories or emotions, why should I worry in this, my only life what happens to this thing unrelated to me after I die?"

It does contain memories after you die. Look at all the people who believe in how many lives someone lived or seeing themselves remember their past lives. All that comes from the spirit/soul. The brain is there for the current life so when it dies all the memory would go into the soul/spirit and move onto a new life.

Actually the best explanation I can think of for a Soul, is...

The soul is what you make it to be, its different for everyone.

For me, the soul is a combination of the spirit and the physical body of man (or woman). When the spirit leaves the physical body at death, the soul is no longer complete. The body becomes worm food and the spirit continues on.

If you believe the scientific principle that matter cannot be created or destroyed only changed/modified/reformed, then the spirit can never become non-existent, it will always exist in some form of matter.

I believe that at some time after death, that the spirit and body (a physical, yet non-mortal) body will be reunited in a perfect state and the soul that is formed from the reuniting is now complete and immortal.

My take on the Nature of the Soul. :)

If I were to be labelled then it would be as a pantheist/agnostic who believes that the soul is immaterial, it cannot be seen, or touched, or observed in any way: ergo it doesn't exist.

G cuts to the heart of the matter! ;)

Glory. How can the soul be part of both a material object and an ethereal one?

WAB. "The brain is there for the current life so when it dies all the memory would go into the soul/spirit and move onto a new life."

So what happens if you die an amnesiac? Or you enter a vegititive state before dying? Or are lobotomised and lose a chunk of what it is to be you? And as I've asked Glory, how can something purely physical (your brain) influence something wholy ethereal (your soul/spirit)?

GL:

The spirit is composed of matter as well as the physical body. They both together comprise the "Soul". The matter of which the spirit is comprised is more refined and cannot be discerned by human senses.

If it's matter, how can it occupy the same physical space as our material body? If it's matter, then how does it reach any realm of afterlife?

a friend of mine lost his soul in a bet, half of it is now owned by a rock...

Biblically to my understanding, soul speaks of breath life. The you of the physical you. Are you talking about Spirit? the third part that was "lost" in the garden?

I'm rather agnostic myself, believing that the very act of searching for a god is folly,
however I've spent a bit of time with my nose in books to get here, so I'd just like to clarify things before I share my stupid opinion on the idea of spirit, or soul, one way or another.

GL:

The same way that a hand fits inside a glove and gives it animatory properties. As far as "how" the unjoining takes place and the spirit goes to an "afterlife" state is beyond my ability to explain. :)

"So what happens if you die an amnesiac? Or you enter a vegititive state before dying? Or are lobotomised and lose a chunk of what it is to be you? And as I've asked Glory, how can something purely physical (your brain) influence something wholy ethereal (your soul/spirit)?"


Well let me ask you this: What happens when you got ton of paper work or memorized it in your head and then decide to rewrite it onto the computer which then gets hit by a virus and all your data is gone.

Are you then not going to remember your information from your head where you got the info from in the first place?

A soul is not something to be debated, because it is wholly different to each person. To rationalize and quantify the soul is to the defeat the point of a soul. It is not to be rationalized, quantified, or even identified. As it is, trying to have a conversation using Logic and Reason to conclude something about the Soul is the equivalent of me taking a pick-axe to a server, hoping to 'mine' data from it.

Studies have been done that show that the dendryds (not sure of spelling) that are created in your brain when information is stored are still there in the cases of amnesia and other memory loss diseases, it is just the access to them is blocked for some reason. A brain is just a network of information stores, nerves and sensory modules which are triggered by electric impulses. The brain is powered by the spirit in my view, if you have been close to someone who has died and been there for their death, it is very clear that something (in my view the spirit) leaves that body at the time of death.

I refuse to touch the rest of the conversation (being a muppet and by definition souless) ,but I have to back up Glory's statement. Something leaves when you die and then your loved ones are left holding the hand of an empty shell.

Novice, that's one of the problems. Spirit and Soul seem to be analogous.

Now, it seems the soul has to be somewhat material, and not wholy ethereal. It also (either at point of death, or constantly) keeps a copy of our memories. Does it also keep our emotions?

When it has left it's physical body, without a brain, can it store additional memories? Can it experience emotions?

If so, how? As these are purely physical things. Could your soul feel hunger?

GL, do you actually read any of the things I say? Because I addressed each of those things already. The Soul is different for each person. If I believe that my soul is in my good deeds that I do for others, then that is my soul. If you believe that your soul is the Oscar Meyer weiner you just ate, then so be it.

But please, the Soul is not a separate entity to be dissected, diagnosed and rationalized. That, if anything can be gleaned from this insane thread, is what you can take away from this.

Verifex, that is your opinion. I saw no reason to discuss your opinion with you.

On the other hand, I would like to explore Glory's and WAB's in more detail. Which is why the on going questions.

i agree with g bee, if you have no real interaction with it, no way of sensing it measureing it or affecting it in any rational way, how did it come to be? is it worth wondering about? Did some guy just get really high and feeling lightheaded thought he was separated from his body and invented the 'soul'?

I believe that the spirit is a more refined piece of matter than our body, and as such it can hold our memories just as efficiently if not more so than our physical brain. I believe that anything that is stored in our brain is also stored in a comparable "spirit brain" which is just an element of the spirit that does stay with the spirit after death.

On the emotion front, I believe that there are two types of emotions and/or feelings, those that come from our spirit and those from our physical body. Hunger would be a physical body feeling, and once the body and spirit separate it is no longer felt or experienced. With that said, I also believe that addictions like smoking cigarettes for example become part of our body and spirit if they are bad/strong enough addictions, and those feelings or desires will continue with the spirit even after death.

This is a great discussion btw and very thought provoking. :)

:)

As all emotions can be physically manipulated in some way, can we assume the emotions that emanate from the spirit into the physical body can be manipulated in the same way?

Is it therefore possible to physically manipulate the spirit once it has left the physical body?

If so, the realms of afterlife must be physical in nature.

The next question must be how does a spirit once seperated from a host body (and can they be seperated by anything other than death?) move?

For someone unfortunate to die in a sealed space, how does, or can, the spirit move on?

I would contend that "all emotions" cannot be physically manipulated. We cannot simply sit and make ourselves feel elation or joy, or for that matter true anger or love just by "doing" something internal.

I believe that it is very possible to manipulate the spirit once it has left the body, but only by substances as refined as the spirit itself.

I absolutely believe that the afterlife is physical in nature, but not the unrefined physical nature that we experience in this life. The "physical" there takes on different attributes and characteristics, while still tangible in some way.

I believe that a spirit once separated from the body can move and act just like a physical body, but is no longer restrained to the limits of our "physical" state. Movement in this life is done through electric impulses which stimulate nerves and muscles into movement via our control center (brain). The same principles would apply to the spirit brain/body as well, more refined impulses would stimulate the spirit into movement unhindered by our current physical state to that of a higher and less hindered state.

Just as the spirit fits inside the body as in my glove example above, it could also move through unrefined "physical" things like walls etc...

The human brain records memories by way of the input "the senses". Your emotions are byproducts of those sense memories. Stubbing your toe = pain, kissing someone you love = pleasure, getting punched in the face = pain. When the brain picks up those feelings of pain or pleasure, it starts recording, then it starts building relationships between the memories it has recorded and makes rational and irrational deductions based on these.

Your brain is like Tivo, it records things that your 5 senses give it.
Your emotions are kind of like the Ad Skipper, removing things from the Tivo that aren't important.

If you believe something, it is because you have come to conclusions using your brain and these senses. Not because what you believe is actually true.

If you hadn't heard from someone at some point in your past that God exists, God loves you, your soul does this and your soul does that, you would have no concept of these things. The concept of God and the Soul and all of these things is not something that transcends human beings and exists outside of human beings. Just look at the animal kingdom.

We created the concept of all these things out of necessity. We created the concept of religious things transcending humanity, we also created the lie, to say something that is not true.

What would be an interesting discussion would be, where did you first hear about God, the Soul, and any other religious teachings and when did you first accept these concepts as true for yourself.

This post is a perfect example of why I don't bother with philosophy/theology questions...

(Hint: 34 replies hidden, and still way too much to bother reading)

"If you believe something, it is because you have come to conclusions using your brain and these senses. Not because what you believe is actually true.

If you hadn't heard from someone at some point in your past that God exists, God loves you, your soul does this and your soul does that, you would have no concept of these things. The concept of God and the Soul and all of these things is not something that transcends human beings and exists outside of human beings. Just look at the animal kingdom."

I respect your opinion, however I must disagree with you conclusions. Just because that is how you come to conclusions about truth or beliefs does not make that the only way to come to conclusions.

Are you telling me that there is no such thing as original thought? I cannot think of something completely irrespective of anything else? That in my view is a very narrow way to look at things, any time a person thinks, designs, builds, or uses something new or in a new way, are you saying they are just doing that become they were pre-conditioned to do so? That is inline with the deterministic philosophy which I do not prescribe.

I believe very much in freewill, and original thought, and for that matter, original conclusions. :)

I believe in free will as well. And hell, I know that I use it sure enough myself. What I think it means to be Human, is to take a amalgamation of your experiences and build off of them. The experiences you have are what makes you what you are. It is possible to have original thought of course, but not without stimulation. As an example: A musician can come up with the most awesome song in ever existence, but not without the proper tools beforehand. Likewise, you and I could not be holding this conversation without the tools of logic, reason, rationalization and a common language with the words we are using right now.

So as you can see, we do have original thought, given stimulation, and the tools needed.

Glory; "I would contend that "all emotions" cannot be physically manipulated"

How about drugs? Anti depresents and others. Physical manipulation of the body, to such an extent some things can not be felt. Problems with the Brain, or nervous system.

Veri, "Not because what you believe is actually true."

That exists, it's blind faith.

"If you hadn't heard from someone at some point in your past that God exists, God loves you, your soul does this and your soul does that, you would have no concept of these things. The concept of God and the Soul and all of these things is not something that transcends human beings and exists outside of human beings. Just look at the animal kingdom."

Thinking of things that transcend Human beings probably started the moment the first sentient creatures saw fire. Things we don't undertand have always been attributed magic or devine status. Doesn't mean to say they aren't!

I can't remember exactly when and where I first learned about the many Gods of mythology and the spiritual side that comes wtih them, probably my Dad. As for accepting the concepts as ture, I accept the existence of these concepts as true! ;)

"That exists, it's blind faith."

Blind faith does not exist independently from reason. You believe in something for a compelling reason, to believe in something for no compelling reason (ala Flying Spaghetti Monster), is stupid. Without admitting to us, or maybe even yourself what that reason is, you have convinced yourself there IS a compelling reason to believe in what you believe, just as the same for me.

"Things we don't understand have always been attributed magic or divine status. Doesn't mean to say they aren't!"

There is a lot of things I don't understand, but based on the things I do understand, it is unreasonable for me to attribute the things I don't understand to 'magic'. How does your mind react when something that conflicts with your beliefs comes up? Does it come up with a reason on the spot, or are you able to live without knowing the answer? If asking "why" about your beliefs conflicts with your beliefs, maybe you should rethink your beliefs? (damn thats a mouthful)

Hypothetically, if a scientist discovered a gene that controls someones level of feeling spirituality, would you call that magic, or the scientific method in practice? What if a simple couple of switches in the brain could control which religion someone followed. How would you view that?

Verifex:

If you subscribe to the idea of freewil, yet you think that every action is dependent on previous stimulation, that is a logical paradox. Deterministic ideology argues that every choice is fated or destined because of previous stimulation/environment/experiences. I subscribe to a different philosophy that your previous choices can affect your current choices, but they do not always have to.

Actually, I never said every action is dependent on previous stimulation, although I can see why you are deducing that from what I said. I think that because of the massive amount of stimulation we receive as humans, it is fallacy to believe that every action we take is not affected (however little, or much) by our experiences.

Saying that what we do is either based on our experiences or not, is impossible to determine. However, since it is impossible to determine we can still observe and quantify what we have, if the overwhelming evidence suggests something that might prove that your philosophy is flawed, would you interpret that evidence as wrong?

People are gifted with intelligence, and with the capacity for rational and irrational thought. Because I don't understand how the human brain works, I can't definitively say, "This is how we work." I can be irrational though, and say: I think we all live in a giant yellow octopus made of pudding and wood.

As man has evolved, much of what was once attributed to spirituality has moved into the realm of science. However, the unkownable is still by definition unknowable, and the human adaptation mechanism kicks in to reassert spirituality. That doesn't negate the existence of a spiritual realm, nor does it prove wrong those who chose to disbelieve.

Actually, your soul is the sum of a remainder of an unbalanced equation, which while assidiously avoided, is not beyond a measure of control. So there.

Well said, Gman! :)

Very Good G! That said exactly what I mean. I think I was just taking it a step further and saying, what if that trend continues. Would be weird huh.

"GentlemanLoser, October 14 2005 3:11 PM EDT
Glory; "I would contend that "all emotions" cannot be physically manipulated"

How about drugs? Anti depresents and others. Physical manipulation of the body, to such an extent some things can not be felt. Problems with the Brain, or nervous system. "

A little detour: Your emotional state is deeply entwined with your physical state. Seratonin - a neurotransmitter connected with mood - can be affected by drugs, diet and high levels of seratonin bring with it a feeling of euphoria - the drug ecstasy/mdma brings on this condition. Low levels of seratonin are seen as a symptom, if not the cause, of some types of depression and mental illness.

I've found my mood to be very connected to my physical state - if I'm hungry for instance I get in a very bad mood. You cannot separate the emotional state and the physical state - we are emotional and physical creatures and each state is dependent on the other.

Of course your mood is connected to your physical state.

Your mood is a physical thing caused by the chemicals in your brain/body reacting in a different way.

The soul is as "real" as the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot and things that go bump in the night... It doesn't exist :p

"Blind faith does not exist independently from reason. You believe in something for a compelling reason, to believe in something for no compelling reason (ala Flying Spaghetti Monster), is stupid. Without admitting to us, or maybe even yourself what that reason is, you have convinced yourself there IS a compelling reason to believe in what you believe, just as the same for me."

That's what Blind Faith is. It's beliving in something without any reasoning or understanding. You just believe. You might call it stupid, but Blind Faith exists. There is a fundamental difference between Faith and Blind Faith.

I've enjoyed this so much I'm going to start another. :)