When is a soul born?

When does a soul die?

theres no such thing

Rubbish, I have soul. I was just listening to Sam & Dave.

If there isn't even any reason to suspect a soul exists in the first place, how could we possibly answer questions about its birth or death, if these even make sense for souls.

Being a practically minded man, I'd rather ask

1.) What IS a soul.

If that question is unanswerable, claims about "souls" are useless. If the answer is unclear, "soul" is an unclear term. If the answer is only pretty gibberish, then "soul" is merely pretty gibberish.

And yet billions of people believe without doubt that they have one.

Its funny, because I am guessing that you also believe that you have one, although you dont call it a soul. You believe that theres some essence of you, the true mightyboosh, that thinks the thoughts, is the owner of the body, is the recipient of the gift of life ,is the decision maker , the chooser, etc ( maybe I have it wrong, and you dont believe all that, but you would be one of the few people in western society who doesnt)

Ez 18:4 Behold, all souls are mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine: the soul who sins shall die.

Actually I don't believe in anything that might be classified as a 'soul'. I truly believe that life is an accident of chemistry and biology and consciousness is result of that and when the mechanism breaks down, so does consciousness. I think that when we die, there's nothing.

The whole concept of the soul is simply more religious nonsense and self importance, in my world view.

So, the things you mention here is the soul - in its entirety?

no? I dont believe in a soul. But when people describe a soul, these are the things they talk about, or they imply some sort of entity that inhabits the body, or the thing that possesses characteristics, or whatever it is. Of course, they use different definitions depending on what they are trying to say, but generally, their definition includes some or all of the above.

I am saying that most people still believe in that, even though they say they dont believe in a soul.

I totally agree with everything you say, but is self-importance a net-plus or minus for human beings? Is it important to feel self-important?

It sounds a lot like you are doing the equivalent of accusing people who don't believe in Yetis for accepting Gorillas.

well possibly. Although it seems to me more like Im accusing people who say "I dont believe in large humanoid mammals" but accept gorillas.

The word 'soul' and whatever word you want to use to describe one's idea of self have very different connotations. Much than "large humanoid mammals" and "gorilla".

What I consider my consciousness doesn't have to have the same properties as those expected in a soul.

For some things, empirical study is in fact less perceptive than reflection and thought.

For example, when deciding how funny something is, or how beautiful, we do not rely on empirical testing, rather our personal judgement. Yet we do not doubt that these things exist.

The soul is harder to define. Can we say that it is the sense of perceived self present in a living being? There is no doubt that we spend our lives and a good deal of our brain preoccupation with concerns related to our self. Our reputation, our sense of embarrassment, our sense of self-worth or guilt. These could be said to be questions of the soul.

We also experience the existence of something similar in others. When we love someone, or hate them, we focus our emotion and thoughts on something at that person´s very core. It doesn´t reside simply in their body, but in the idea and the memory of that person.

Of course, we cannot measure that these things exist, but they undoubtedly cause the impression, or illusion, of existing.

I have no problem in dismissing theistic claims and even deistic ones, and I am comfortable doing so not only since there is no evidence, but because I can explain the motives for believing in a god.

However, the existence of a soul, or a sense of self, is not so easy to reject in terms of evidence, because I do experience the albeit flimsy evidence of the impression given to me by my brain (much like a religious person may experience their faith in God, I freely admit), and it is not something I can measure independently. However, the fact that souls are inextricably linked to religious beliefs, and are used as a vehicle to justify strange ideas such as continued consciousness after death, may cloud my judgement on the area when I believe it is something that deserves more thought.

You believe that theres a something that possesses consciousness though, it appears.

Haha, thats it exactly. The idea and memory of that person. Thats all it is. There is no thing at the core. Its just thoughts about that person. And your thoughts, your idea of who that person is, will be totally different from someone elses idea.

A SENSE of self undoubtably exists. but thats all it is, a jumble of thoughts, memories, sensations, that the mind then puts together to create another idea.

I believe that there's a biochemical matrix, our brain, that causes what we experience as consciousness but I can't go any further than that as I'm not a Neuroscientist. It's a very lay opinion

Since thought isn't classed as 'soul', (otherwise wouldn't animals have souls?) I don't class consciousness as soul.

This would imply that consciousness is a subset of "soul"- which I think says more about your beliefs than anything else. But this is exactly why I don't like "soul". It's just a word people twist around, so it fits whatever argument it is they are currently engaged in.

If we had known from the start that you had seen "consciousness" as a subcategory of "soul", I'm sure MB would have been able to make good counter-argument (probably something along the lines of "I don't agree that consciousness is soul", which I think he made already).

Instead we're now in this class-war, where all the lowly materialists probably secretly believe in souls - because the definition is made to fit whatever it is they believe in.

I dont think I mentioned consciousness anywhere. Maybe thats just a definitional thing tho.

I dont believe consciousness is a soul either. Not sure what your saying here

Then why didn't you say this when Mightyboosh wrote about consciousness - and why did you say this:



I think you are hard to follow in this thread. As is typical when people start using "soul" in arguments - claims quickly becomes extremely loose. We believe in souls, we don't believe in souls, souls possess consciousness, soul possess awareness; you don't believe in souls, everyone else believe in souls, everyone else might not believe in souls - but it is almost certain they do believe in souls, if someone believes in an aware self they must believe in a soul... etc etc etc.

Frankly, just remove "soul" completely from this thread - and it might start to make some sense and become mildly interesting.

More like arsoul, amirite?

So the soul is the brain now?

is the brain commonly thought of as the thinker of thoughts, the owner of the body, the recipient of the gift of life , the decision maker , the chooser, etc?