The "soul" enters the human embryo at approximately 28-30 days. Religious cultures, west and east, have brought forth this figure which is confirmed by supersensible observation.

Of note is that the incarnating human soul is also involved with his embryonic body prior to entry of the soul. That which heredity mainly gives to the newborn is the human "form" but it does get complicated for of course we see entire families of mathematicians (Bernoulli) and musicians (Bach).

For example, the Bach family had a litany of stellar musicians but for a human soul/spiritual being to become a good earthly musician he would have to enter into a body with a good "ear"; without this "ear" which is a function of heredity, this man would have not been able to proceed in a musical course.

Previous lives come into effect and in no way is it written( in fact to the contrary but each specific individual must be considered individually here) that J.S. Bach continued to be or previously was a musician, of course previous lives.

To the question "where does the soul come from?" there comes a point where further questioning does not register. A soul is a "drop of the Godhead" and human soul beings entered into the earth at the time of the "Fall" as noted by the religious. the soul existed prior to this entry but was not earth bound. There were "heavenly souls", for want of a better word prior to Eden, but in a sense "ego less" and literally contained within the hierarchies of spiritual beings (angelic realm, etc..). This is the "land of milk and honey".

The idea of soul should be appreciated by that which "experiences" but this is only a pointer. The entry into the earth began the ability of the total human being body/soul/spirit garnering an individuality or "Ego Being", or sense of self. Prior to incarnation, at the "Fall" the individual human was not an individual but his progression throughout the incarnations develops his individuality, his "I".

There are some religions who would have the human "submit" and some thought processes, eastern in origin, who wish to deny the "ego" and in fact proceed to do this very thing.

The western ethos , like it or believe it or not, is the very futuristic substrate for the evolution of the human soul/spiritual being, India and the East notwithstanding. Gone off course, almost, but Finis.

I've stared and still don't see the problem. "Dark matter" is simply a placeholder term for something we don't yet understand what it's comprised of. That is very different from not knowing its existence. "Something" is there. That's a fact. We've measured it. Now I invite you to stare at your comment below:

Think about what you're saying here. Your proposal is completely unsupported. We've all experienced it? I haven't. You're confusing not knowing what something is with its existence. A soul and dark matter are illegitimate comparisons. And I could say the same thing about how throwing around words like "fundamental connection" doesn't make it so.

I'm not familiar enough with the placebo effect to comment. If there have been exhaustive blind studies that have shown placebos have merit, then it's good enough for me to call it real. We can work on understanding the mechanism (and I'm sure work is being done on this). Again, it has to do with measurable effect and evidence. The soul has no such mechanism for detection so again I don't agree with the comparison.

You could be right about this and I'm not smart enough (or haven't thought about it hard enough yet) to argue this point. What I meant is that to me, it is logically inconsistent to what (I think) I know about evolution and embryology. The soul would have had to evolved along with our species and not just one day placed in full into the first human. Ditto that there needs to be a logical formation of a soul along within an embryo. So it's inconsistent to me... I could be wrong. Your welcome to suggest other ways.

There are a number of reasons. I assume you don't think the soul evolved. Yet, everything else about a species does evolve. I pretty much explained my problem above so I'll refer you to that. Basically, I accept evolution and what we know about embryology and there is no room for the growth or insertion of a soul.

Do you have experiences which connect you to the world around you in some way that is self-reflective (which may include things like the capacity for logical thinking)? Then under a wide range of conceptions of the soul, you've experienced what it is to have one or to be one. Many cultures have identified something that is tied to their fundamental experience of reality as being something incorporeal (non-material) and yet seem quite clearly to be something that is experienced by all persons.

Do you deny your own experience of reality?

Do you believe that there is something akin to a first "hand" in the animal kingdom?
* If so, then why is it so hard to imagine there being a first soul?
* If not, do you agree that hands currently exist but did not exist at some point in the past if we go far enough back?
In both cases, we see no logical problem with the existence of souls from an evolutionary perspective.

You shouldn't assume things. I make no statement about whether the nature of souls change with time or are completely static.

It's very important for you to realize that you haven't actually raised any objections. There's a gap between objecting to something and raising an objection. You clearly object. But you have not provided any meaningful description of the reasons for rejection. Simply saying "embryology" doesn't advance your argument in any meaningful way.

I lump all of this into the problem of consciousness. We don't understand it yet, but I personally see no reason to assume it's anything other than a product of neurons and firing of synapses. In other words, a product of intelligence. The fact is, nobody knows for now so it's not a subject I can intelligently discuss other than to say there's no reason to think it's anything other than a physical process.

Actually no and that's the point. The hand gradually evolved over millions of years. At some point it became something we would refer to as a hand, but there was no first one.

Your neglecting the ever changing purpose of a hand. At one point it may have been a webbed foot primarily used for swimming. Some may have evolved into a wing, etc. Are you contending that the soul is similar in that it has served multiple purposes throughout the ages? Some which have nothing to do with what the soul is currently designed for? If so, that's certainly an interesting viewpoint. But I don't think that most believers in souls would accept this view and it's definitely not what they mean when they say soul.

I reject the claim that souls exist much for the same reason I reject existence claims of other things for which there is no evidence. That's my baseline. Then there are other things that don't add up (to me). For instance, I reject the claim that a god exists for lack of evidence. But my disbelief is augmented by a myriad examples that I see as additional problems with the existence god. The problem of suffering in the world is not by itself my sole reason for not accepting the claim of a loving god. However, I view suffering as problematic and inconsistent with the existence of a loving god.

As I stated very early on, these are not the only reasons I don't accept the claim that souls exist. They are just two things I find problematic in accepting their existence.

lestat: I think where aaron is going with his line of questioning may be made clear by asking a slightly different question: do you think that minds exist? Note that even if "mind" is entirely reducible to "brain" it's stil meaningful to to distinguish between "mind" and "body". There is a similar way of understanding "soul", and not just even "human soul".

I would guess the best objection to this way of approaching souls though is going to be to ask whether such souls are immortal

Again, it's worth reading your words very carefully. What I see is a lot of labels being thrown around (consciousness, intelligence). All you're doing is creating sub-layers of things you know nothing about and pretending as if that gives you a foundation to stand on.

Who said that the soul is necessarily distinct from all physical processes?

Are you saying that a hand is the same thing as a webbed foot? Also, are you willing to concede that there was a time in evolutionary history when a "hand" (or "webbed foot" or "wing") didn't exist at all?

Who said anything about "design"? You *REALLY* don't want to use that word when talking about evolution.

I would guess that the conscious experience of reality is useful. Wouldn't you agree?

Given that there is no cohort of "most believers" that have a singular conception of a soul, I don't think this is really a problem. Up to this point, it seems that you're mostly just waving your arms around and saying, "I don't believe this stuff." It doesn't really seem that you've actually addressed anything in particular.

Again, let's look at your own experience of reality. You do experience reality, don't you? I would take that as part of your baseline.

I hope you realize that your evolution/embryology arguments are pretty weak, and supplementing that with your 50% embryonic souls arguments doesn't enhance your viewpoint in any meaningful way.

I'd like to speak to the question of "immortality". As noted in what I wrote above the 'soul" of Man existed prior to the "Fall" but at the "Fall" Lucifer entered into the being of Man and became his impediment. Because of this impediment to the development of the Human Soul/ Spiritual Being there began the fall into what you and I might call earthly existence. Prior to this fall the individual human, if I may call it that, saw the spiritual cosmos through the "eyes of higher beings" to which he was ensconced. the individuality was not present, more like a babe in the womb.

And so, we have the Luciferic temptation, so to speak(humankind never had a chance here) in which death, and knowledge of good and evil arise, heretofore not known to this individual finger of cosmic dyanimis. Because of this the human being entered into development, a schooling, and in this schooling the human being gained powers to which he previously not had, and in this through this the "Ego' developed within the "soul" of humankind.

As to the question of "immortality" the question must be brought into context, as with the abstractions of our present language it could mean "always like a baby in the womb" or "a man standing tall amid the elements" or others.

Paul spoke to immortality and he saw that the individual man, in order to defeat death and enter immortality he would have to be conscious after death. the Christ Being came to the earth in order to lead all mankind into the spiritual world and in this the learning, so to speak, is accomplished on the earth. Christ knowledge is that knowledge , carried within the heart, which is the guide to immortality. Knowledge of Christ is the gate to immortality, consciousness after death.

Knowledge of world workings, such as reincarnation and karma, is knowledge of the spirit in man and of man himself. To understand the spiritual one must understand man himself. To comprehend the bodies of Man, that which gives Life, Sensation and Thought is the beginnings of the "immortality' of man.


Man asleep is Alive or has Life.
When Man awakens after sleep into Earth Consciousness we have Sensation.
When Man reflects on these matters we have Thought or thinking.

The first above of the bodies of Man is known as the Etheric Body, or Life Body, or Formative Force Body.

The second is called the Astral Body, the bearer of passions, desires, and sensations.

The third is known as the "Ego" or "I", that which is manifest in the highest of regions of the spiritual world to which Mankind relates to thoughts or thinking.

"Immortality" is scholled and related to "consciousness:" of the spiritual world.

I suppose I have a lot more thinking to do about this, but offhand, I don't see it as a meaningful distinction to make. The mind is a product of the body (or brain). For now at least, I don't need to go any further than that. Why would you?

This is only true when debating a creationist, which I assume you're not. There IS design in nature albeit via strictly natural processes.

I'll think more about your other points. You could be right that my argument is weak. At the very least, I'm running out of anything new to say.

I'm just going to strongly caution you against using that word because it implies intent. And that concept of intention is going to get you into trouble in arguments involving evolution.

There are meaningful ways of talking about "mind" using a set of concepts, abstractions, analogies, etc that wouldn't be very useful when talking about your brain at a physiological level. And not even just meaningful, but that distinct level of description is probably even required for the concepts involved to be intelligible, at least for us. In the same way chemists speak a language other than that of physics, although chemistry reduces to physics. There are many examples of this kind of thing. Distinctions don't have to be ontologically real at the level "substances" or "essences" to be meaningful.

That said, defining "soul" in a way analogous to "mind" will leave some metaphysical issues for a certain Christian anthropology to resolve, which is why I mentioned the idea of an immortal soul, but also the nature of salvation and the distinction between human and animal "souls" and all of that. But I mentioned it because it seems to me that this was the kind of idea aaron was trying to get at

Point taken. But I'm still not too worried about this when talking to someone sophisticated enough to know that snowflakes show design, but don't think God is personally involved in the crystallization process of water molecules in each individual one. The appearance of design is present throughout nature. There's no getting around that.

snow flakes show design? I guess it might depend on your definition of "design" but I would totally disagree with this.

Interesting... I don't think I've ever heard of anyone using snowflakes as example of design. Maybe "pattern" or "symmetry" but not design.

You're right. This time I made a bad comparison by using design as in pattern. Heck, I'll even refrain from using design altogether except to say apparent design.

I've read some reviews of that book. I hope you really didn't pay 15 dollars for it.

http://deeperwaters.wordpress.com/20...ting-atheists/

Apparently, he's an internet atheist Christ-myther.

I'm curious as to whether TheProbst will return to this thread. It seems that he attempted to apply the instructions in the manual he read (maintaining a Socratic approach, trying to focus on epistemology), and even the atheists kind of saw through it as being shallow and superficial.

Anyone who defines "soul" to include the unique qualities constituting the self able to exist causally independent of a functioning physical brain has a lot to resolve with current neurobiological evidence, as well as the implications of evolution.

Thanks. We're a little dim sometimes.

I like to define soul as that part of an entity not captured by a complete physical description. The advantage being that even a materialist can work with this - they just think it's non-existent.

I dont see a lot of value in speaking about souls without an attempt at delimiting what you're speaking of. It's like arguing about whether something is enjoyable.

I think a big part of Aaron W and Lestat's disagreement is that they are referring to different things - Lestat some specific, although ill-defined conception which probably is inconsistent with evolution and Aaron W something broader (though still not defined) which isnt.

Yes to both of your comments. I was trying to help Aaron make his point that Lestat's conception of soul was not the only one possible, while also pointing out that the kind of less-objectionable-to-lestat conception of soul that Aaron was working towards has some issues from a Christian perspective.

Although in that regard (the idea of disincarnate "soul"), it is interesting that for the most part Christianity has insisted upon a resurrection "of the body". Or that docetism (the idea that Christ's physical humanity was an illusion) was rejected as a heresy. The anthropology in which man "is" a soul and "has" a body doesn't quite fit with traditional Christian views, although there is that tension with the duality between "flesh" and "spirit" both in Jesus' and Paul's writing. Not that any of them were thinking about present day issues of neurology, but the comparison is interesting

LOL -- I know that those are the words I used, but that's not what I meant!

I don't have anything intelligent to add, but yeah it is interesting.

I like the bolded. Haven't seen that before.

RGT debating tactics are all coming back to me...

Hope this doesn't catch on or im going to have to come up with a put down for Christ as the messiah believers since that is even more unlikely then him being a myth.


Seriously though i hate when people do that myther thing.