Does the Soul Exist?

[Kapyong]

Gday

If I had been raised in some more strict religion/religious family then I just might. To continue my previous line of thought then, if I had claimed to have met Jesus as a ghost and he told me he had existed as flesh and blood at one time, would you change your mind about what you've read in old scriptures? That maybe they were correct after all?

Well, isn't the answer entirely symmetrical ?

If Jesus appeared to you, you would almost certainly believe him; but you would have almost no chance of convincing me.

If Jesus appeared to me, I would almost certainly believe him; but I would have almost no chance of convincing you.

Haven't you ever had the experience of someone close, often an older person, convinced they saw a ghost (or whatever), and having to struggle with why on earth they would believe a thing ?

As you say - this whole field is very subjective.
Problem is - almost everything is rather subjective.

Look at how intelligent adults can observe the same evidence and genuinely come to different conclusions (if not to blows ).

Furthermore - you must have seen how entirely false views can be believed by almost everybody.

Objective reality, if it exists, is not so easily discerned as you may think. Common knowledge is highly suspect.

Yes, I do appreciate you sharing your experiences; I have a difficult time accepting how a person's objective explanations for what they've experienced subjectively should actually carry any weight as evidence for actual existence of souls or ghosts.

Isn't personal experience good evidence ?
Aren't eye-witnesses credible ?
Would you quibble if I reported seeing a dolphin ?

Anyway -
how could an Out Of Body Experience NOT be subjective ?

How can ANY experience NOT be subjective ?

We test our experiences for objectivity by comparing them with others.

Wise ancients like Socrates argued for a soul and re-incarnation.
Various religions and philosophies believe in re-incarnation of souls.
Many people now believe in the re-incarnation of souls.
There is a great body of evidence and study in India supporting it.

My belief in re-incarnation is backed by much evidence, religious teachers and wise masters, and supported by subjective personal confirmation.

Most especially since we can, almost at whim, produce those same sorts of experiences by messing with the brain — through electrical stimulation or medical stimulation.

So ?
What is your argument exactly ?

The brain can be forced to do strange things,
therefore re-incarnation must be false ?

No argument there at all.

Can you force a brain to remember a past life correctly ?
If so, I'd really like to know more.

But, I hate to say it though true, is that yes, it does somewhat lessen your credibility in my eyes; that you're willing to apply scientific principles to many things, except for this. In my opinion, of course.

Pardon ?

In fact I did exactly that - I studied the subject at length, learned about the experiences of others, and I have also confirmed much of it through direct personal experience.

The very essence of the scientific approach.

Please tell me why you think I did not apply scientific principles, and what I should have done differently, if you were in my shoes

Kapyong

 

[Kapyong]

Gday

You were almost certainly dreaming

I understand my tales are unlikely to convince anyone.

I spoke openly and honestly,
of course posters should respond in kind

It's just a perennially interesting subject.

Kapyong

 

[Porpoise of Life]

This life experience rests on a layer that might not be explainable in purely materialistic terms. Materialistic science cannot fully make sense of questions like "Why am I me experiencing what I am in this body, and not you experiencing what you are in your body?" If "I" am nothing more than atoms and chemicals and a pattern of behavior formed solely by physical experiences, the question doesn't make sense. But if I have a soul, then why could at least understand the question why "I" as a subject am not directly experiencing what you are in your body. It alludes to a deeper common human sense, where I, my soul, am experiencing my body at this moment.

Of course it can. Because your consciousness is a product of your body and mine is a product of my body. Just like it's not a mystical conundrum why I can only run using my own legs, or why I can't drink from a glass located on another continent. No immaterial soul needed.

Just the opposite, I'd say.
If our consciousness is independent from our bodies, you'd expect crossovers, shared subjective experiences between bodies, and ESP to be possible, yet they aren't.
The concept of a soul raises more questions than it answers

 

[Pixel42]

I think that the process of observing one's physical body counts as evidence of a soul distinct from the body, but I doubt that it is provable to anyone who is not undergoing the same experience.

I am undergoing the same experience but I do not consider it evidence for a soul distinct from the body. On the contrary, the evidence points strongly to that experience being entirely generated by, and dependant on, my body.

 

[MikeG]

Which one of those wordy excuses is the "no" option?

 

[MikeG]

.........When I run, does my running exist distinct from my legs and body?..........

The Eagles put it best some decades ago:

Someone show me how to tell
The dancer from the dance

 

[Kapyong]

Let me put it another way -

Have you studied and considered the evidence for re-incarnation The Norseman ? Has anyone here ?

Wouldn't that be the scientific approach ?

Would the religious approach be to reject it based on beliefs without evaluating the evidence ?

Kapyong

 

[MikeG]

When there is some testable, falsifiable and repeatable "evidence"of re-incarnation, Kapyong, let us know. Until then, your beliefs on the matter are just that.

 

[Darat]

I think that the process of observing one's physical body counts as evidence of a soul distinct from the body, but I doubt that it is provable to anyone who is not undergoing the same experience.



...snip....

When you observe someone else's physical body do you consider that evidence of a soul distinct from the body?

 

[Darat]

Let me put it another way -

Have you studied and considered the evidence for re-incarnation The Norseman ? Has anyone here ?
...snip...

From my experience many people here have read a lot of the literature available and some I know have interacted with believers in reincarnation here and in "real" life.

And as ever the evidence simply does not point to the experiences being best explained by people recalling past lives.

 

[Pixel42]

Let me put it another way -

Have you studied and considered the evidence for re-incarnation The Norseman ? Has anyone here ?

Over the years I've examined quite a few claimed cases of reincarnation. None of them stood up to scrutiny; there was always a plausible mundane explanation. But I'm always willing to look at another one.

 

[MikeG]

Which one of those wordy excuses is the "no" option?

I'm serious. This poll looks like a collection of questions designed to only give one conclusion. It is misleading, and probably deliberately so.

 

[Resume]

I cannot explain it
Cannot tell you how
Honey, it’s something you’ll never know
If you don’t know by now
London give you accent
L.A. give you gold
New York give you attitude
But Memphis gives you soul

It's a Memphis thing . . .

 

[Pixel42]

I ticked "I exist" and "I understand from my own experience that observing the world and one's body can lead a subject to think that he/she has existence distinguishable from his physical body" because I do understand the latter, even though I don't believe the conclusion is correct.

 

[SusanB-M1]

Which one of those wordy excuses is the "no" option?

That's what I was wondering. I could not vote.

I find it surprising that so many people who want to believe in a soul do not consider that the four letters forming a word soul are chosen by humans (different words in different languages of course) to talk about an aspect of ourselves.


Personal incredulity crops up quite a lot I think.

 

[Bikewer]

I’m entirely a materialist, and I too wonder about the obvious lack of a “no” option and the positive opening statement that simply assumes the existence of a soul.

To my way of thinking, and the thinking of contemporary neuroscience, “the brain secretes consciousness like the liver secretes bile.”
A rather snarky but accurate representation.

To me, the idea of the soul is simply an appealing hang-over from thousands of years, starting with a belief in primitive animism. Likely the first sort of “religious” thinking among our primitive ancestors, this is the idea that everything has an “animating spirit” which gives it’s essential nature.
No great leap from thinking humans have such an animating spirit to thinking that this spirit survives death (most all primitives practice some sort of ancestor worship, and have shamans to “communicate” with spirits.
Very comforting notion... And incorporated into all emerging organized religions.

No one to my knowledge has ever bothered to describe how such a thing could exist or how it could function. Mere hand-waves to “Well...It’s spiritual...” Or, silly appeals to “energy can’t be destroyed” which implies an essential misunderstanding of that particular aspect of reality.
How does a soul, with no physical presence whatever, retain memory or accomplish thought? These are the properties of the physical brain. The body devotes some 25% of it’s resources just to maintain consciousness.
How would it continue with no physical support system whatever?

The notion is retained because it’s comforting, and the spectacular lack of evidence is simply ignored.

 

[jrhowell]

Anyway -
how could an Out Of Body Experience NOT be subjective ?

How can ANY experience NOT be subjective ?

We test our experiences for objectivity by comparing them with others.

A true out-of-body experience could be objectively verified by reporting information that could not have been discovered any other way. So far attempts to do this have failed, leading to the conclusion that it is no more real than a dream.


I wonder about the feeling of having a soul. Is it any different from the feeling of being alive? I feel that my whole body is alive and is part of me. I can feel and move my hands naturally without thinking about it. But I know that if the nerves that connect my arm to my brain are severed then my hand would no longer feel a part of me, even though it is just as alive as it was before. So does my soul extend into my hand or is it confined to my brain?

If a soul exists it would have to imbue us with abilities not already inherent in our physical bodies. So what are the properties of a soul?

If you close your eyes your soul can't see. Therefore your soul lacks vision. The same applies to all of the senses, so a soul without a body would have no sense of its surroundings at all. Memories are associated with the brain and can be destroyed by various diseases. So a soul without a body would have no memories at all. If you eliminate everything that clearly has a physical cause there isn't much (I would say nothing) left for the soul to do.

 

[Thermal]

Well,
I have travelled out of the physical body,
so have many others.

I remember an event from a previous life,
so do many others.

I have met beings without a physical body,
so have others.

Yes, I think a soul exists apart from our physical body, and other subtle bodies.


Kapyong

Hi Kapyong:

I too have seen ghosts since I was a kid, and have had two out-of-body experiences. I attribute them to hallucinations/neural misfires/overactive imagination. What is it about your experiences that leads you to rule out these simpler explanations?

 

[Hokulele]

The phenomenon of the existence of first person subjects itself does not appear to be a purely physical phenomenon. It is not an issue simply of moving, electrolyzed matter interacted with other moving matter in the universe. There appears to be some subject or observer distinct from this physical matter who himself/herself observes these physical processes.

It has been shown to be simple to trick the brain into thinking that your body doesn't actually belong to you, or that immaterial objects are parts of your body. To me, this suggests that the whole "observer" phenomenon is simply an illusion generated to convey a sense of continuity and narrative, which can provide a distinct advantage when it comes to survival.

 

[Pope130]

I've had several experiences which could be interpreted as spiritual or psychic. On close examination, none of them imparted information that was not already in my own mind, and all had mundane explanations. No positive evidence of a soul.