Originally Posted by augie_

it's unthinkable that the soul could be proven outside of science and experiments. science is the only way we prove anything.

Originally Posted by RLK

This statement is obviously untrue. The square root of two is irrational, proven by mathematics without any experiments.

Originally Posted by NotReady

I don't think one can prove the existence of the soul. The problem is that if the soul doesn't exist then materialism must be true, and as C.S. Lewis and Victor Reppert have shown by the argument from reason, materialism is self-refuting. Therefore, if materialism is false, some form of dualism must be true.

Originally Posted by RLK

True. But that was not my question. My question was, would it change your confidence in atheism?

Originally Posted by augie_

mathematics is a science...

Originally Posted by RLK

Lol. I am done for tonight. Time for a glass of scotch. It cannot get any better.

Originally Posted by BenT07891

Now, like I said, this is easily testable. We can't take some people, randomly assign them to two groups, and give one group a brain damaging drug and the other a placebo. But we can look at accidents that have already happened.

The results: No soul. Material damage to the brain changes one's personality and all things previously thought to be associated with the soul. For example:

1. Persistant vegetative state. With this condition, damage occurs to the brain but the person is still alive, yet their personality is literally "gone". The person has disappeared. Yet they can move, eat, breath, ect.

2. Alzheimer's disease. Plaques build up in the brain and the victim loses memory and forgets who they are.

3. Drugs like alcohol change a person's personality to extroversion and light heartedness.

4. Drug overdose can permanently make someone "retarded".

The list goes on and on. The soul has been disproved.

Originally Posted by newguy1234

This is no more true than saying smashing your tv with a sledge hammer will kill godzilla forever.

Originally Posted by BTirish

In Catholic philosophy and theology, which is heavily influenced by the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, it is first important to note that "soul" just means, following Aristotelian philosophy, the principle that makes a living thing alive. This is how the ancient Greeks defined psyche, and this is why even materialists like the Atomists acknowledged the soul, because they recognized the distinction between living things and non-living things.

For the Atomists, the soul was just a collection of atoms--made of the same material stuff as the body, in accordance with their strict materialism. For Aristotle, by contrast, a soul is the substantial form of a living thing, i.e., the principle that makes a living thing to be what it is, to be of an essentially different kind from non-living things. The evidence, for Aristotle, that living things are essentially different from non-living things is that living things perform activities that non-living things do not, such as reproduction and sense awareness.

The point is that "soul" doesn't have to mean an immaterial substance distinct from the body--everyone's comments here seem to assume that anyone who believes in the soul is a substance dualist.

Originally Posted by asdfasdf32

If it's an invisible ethereal Godzilla then you're right.

Originally Posted by RLK

In the interest of having this thread be something more than a bunch of atheists cheering for each each other, I will respond from the point of view of a theist who does believe that there is a soul.

The OP has a number of points that I would consider simply incorrect or at least poorly constructed. The soul is of course a difficult concept to define but I will give at least one example that I think captures part of the problem. Imagine that I construct a computer that is programmed to completely reproduce my response to any situation but does not have a "self-awareness". By "self-awareness" I do not mean that it cannot utilize a reflection in a mirror or answer a question relating to self-awareness in the manner that I do. What I mean is that when untested, it does not have the spark within it that is aware that it exists in the way that I do. The difference between that computer and me, is the soul. The problem for the scientist is "How would you distinguish between those two entities?" As it has already been stipulated that the computer will produce the same response as me to any stimulus, I would submit that you cannot. Thus, science is ultimately unable to answer the question of the existence of the soul.

Your list of "proofs" that the soul does not exist are simply without content. You have not tied any of them to the presence or absence of a soul. I am not even sure why you listed them. Perhaps if you pick one out and really dive into what it tells you, we could have a discussion.

Originally Posted by BenT07891

Again, to make sure we're on the same page, I define soul as "the immaterial part of a person or living thing that contribute's to the person in some way (e.g. personality or emotions or memories)". If there is a soul, in my mind, this is how it would work. It is something that constantly "works", invisibly since its immaterial, to cause a person to have a personality and self awareness while he/she is alive on Earth. It does not have to be something that causes, say, one to switch to REM sleep or to involuntarily jerk one's hand away from a hot stove. These can have physical causes. But personality cannot have an entirely physical cause if there exists a soul. Upon physical death, this is how someone continues existing, by the immaterial soul (notice if you don't include "immaterial" in soul's definition, then you can't believe in life after death).


Anyway, I would say that the difference between you and that computer is not the soul. The difference is that you have more complex material stuff than the computer, and this extra stuff is what is responsible for your self awareness compared to the computer. If you add enough physical stuff (e.g. circuits, wires, act) to that computer, there will come a point where that computer becomes "aware" in the same way you are aware. It might take a lot of stuff, so much stuff that it may take millions of years of advances in artificial intelligence for that point to be reached (we humans have 85,000,000,000 neurons).

Originally Posted by RLK

I have no problem with the first paragraph. That seems reasonable.

My problem is with the second paragraph. The bold statement is not proven. It is a belief. It is simply another way to say "I believe there is no soul". There is certainly no way at present to prove that it is true and it may well be that there is no way ever to prove that it is true. Once the computer is complex enough to produce behavior indistinguishable from a human, there is no test that will differentiate between a computer that is "aware" and one that is not.

Originally Posted by RLK

Once the computer is complex enough to produce behavior indistinguishable from a human, there is no test that will differentiate between a computer that is "aware" and one that is not.