Souls- Do we have them?

[Cliff_m85]

No point to even think of souls unless evidence is presented. Until then it goes in the "No" pile.

I always thought looking for evidence was missing the point in questions such as this. For me, it would be piontless if there was evidence, because it changes from faith to just knowing somthing is there.

For me I always thought having faith was stupid because there is no evidence. People shouldn't just 'believe' things without any factual evidence to back it up.


Alot of people had faith that blacks weren't equal to whites. Alot of people had faith that interracial marriage was wrong and that our country would crumble if we allowed it. Alot of people believed in a supreme race in Germany. All faith, no evidence.

 

[Iron Mal]

I am certain that I don't have a soul or spiritual essence of any form, but this would not stop me from exploiting the concept.

My plan is to sell my soul to the Devil, when it comes to the day when I have to pay up, hand him my soul and go to Hell I would simply turn around and say 'I am sorry but I have no soul to give you, you should have read the small print, better luck next time Nick'.

Not smart. If there were a devil that'd appear before me, I'd probably reevaluate my understanding of the universe before I'd sell my "soul" to him. Because why would there be a devil if there were no souls for him to collect? He'd have nothing to gain by granting people's wishes - that wouldn't make sense.

I'd also see a psychologist, stat.

While you do have a point (what would be the point of having a Devil if people could easily talk their way out of a situation like that?) but surely you must have had someone go back on a deal with you at some point with little in the way of things you can do about it? ('Ok, I got those tickets for you, you said you'd pay me back?' 'sorry man, I haven't gotten my pay from work yet so...can't' or 'I let you stay at my place last night so I can borrow your car today, right?' 'sorry, it's in the garage at the moment, I'd love to help you but I can't').

Same principle really.

I can openly admit that I am probably a souless being (being an Athiest automatically makes me devoid of a soul or moral compass according to some) so the aforementioned selling of a soul (when I don't have one) would be like a homeless man with no feet offering to sell you the new shoes he claims to have (only an idiot would take him up on the offer).

 

[CheeseSandwichCake]

That really depends on what your religious views are...

 

[massau]

yes i think we have there must be something after this maybe we will become a human again

 

[massau]

No point to even think of souls unless evidence is presented. Until then it goes in the "No" pile.

I always thought looking for evidence was missing the point in questions such as this. For me, it would be piontless if there was evidence, because it changes from faith to just knowing somthing is there.

For me I always thought having faith was stupid because there is no evidence. People shouldn't just 'believe' things without any factual evidence to back it up.


Alot of people had faith that blacks weren't equal to whites. Alot of people had faith that interracial marriage was wrong and that our country would crumble if we allowed it. Alot of people believed in a supreme race in Germany. All faith, no evidence.

you can't find evidence for everything some things can't be explained

 

[Xvito]

Given how you define a soul, then no, I don't think that we have one.

 

[Spleenboy]

Difficult question. The Soul has many definitions, and whether you believe it exists all depends on that definition. For example, if you take the Soul as being the seat of all emotion then yes something exists which controls emotion, which could be called a Soul.

When a person says that a soul controls emotion and someone else says, "No that's the mind/brain", both are correct, they are just using different terms for the same thing.

In the case of an immortal Soul which lives on after your body dies, there is no evidence of it's existence, therefore many people say it does not exist. There is no proof that it does not exist either, so others believe it does.

When people take the argument that there is no evidence to suggest it exists ergo it does not, they ignore the fact that there is no evidence to say it doesn't, yet believe it anyway.

As for animals having souls, Humans are animals. Therefore, if humans have Souls, so do animals. The only difference between humans and other species is that we are more intelligent.


Also, something I can't seem to understand. I have thought for hours upon hours about this. Why if we are just large groupings of atoms, can we think? Where does our consciousness come from? We are no different from rocks or stars, just massive clumps of protons, neutrons and electrons, yet we have complex emotions, morals and thought patterns. Anyone got input on this?

On topic: Not certain, hope we do.

 

[Arrers]

No point to even think of souls unless evidence is presented. Until then it goes in the "No" pile.

I always thought looking for evidence was missing the point in questions such as this. For me, it would be piontless if there was evidence, because it changes from faith to just knowing somthing is there.

For me I always thought having faith was stupid because there is no evidence. People shouldn't just 'believe' things without any factual evidence to back it up.


Alot of people had faith that blacks weren't equal to whites. Alot of people had faith that interracial marriage was wrong and that our country would crumble if we allowed it. Alot of people believed in a supreme race in Germany. All faith, no evidence.

I find your definition of faith a little loose, but I get your logic. My problem with what you said is was under the imression that those people thought that their cultrue was superior to others, and saw that as evidence. Then again, a lot of this is just me typing thoughts, so I could be completely wrong.

Anyway, I see the subjects we talked about were very differnt. I was talking about how spritualy matter work on faith because, if you know that gods and souls are scientifically proven to be true, believeing in their existance is no different than believeing in the existance of the postman.

What you are getting at (in your reply)is that, if I'm correct, is that peple believe(d) in things that are wrong, or that people have done bad things in the name of faith (if the latter is true, you should have mentioned apartheid, as I've heard it has an origin in a very literal interpretaion of a bible passage, but I'm getting side tracked).

Anyway, most of this just comes things I've heard, so it could all be wrong.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

*snip*

Government conspiracies, the existance of a soul, stuff "man was not meant to know," and "we are not alone"?

Can I stop laughing yet? I mean, the fact that you think your government is hiding the existence of a soul, among other things "we were not meant to know."

1) You think the leaders of the religious right would just sit on that information?
2) Real life isn't that much of a hackneyed chiche. Sounds like a bad paperback or the plot of a Christian video game.

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

When a person says that a soul controls emotion and someone else says, "No that's the mind/brain", both are correct, they are just using different terms for the same thing.

It's not different terms for the same thing - it's a different explanation for an occurrence. It's like the difference between saying lightning is the result of clouds returning a built up negative charge to the ground, and that we get thunder when someone angers Zeus. We're explaining the same occurrence, but in different ways.

If we say it's the mind, that can be studied through sciences, including evolutionary theory. It can be understood.

If we say it's the soul, it's holy magic brought forth by a god that separates us from all other beings, and can't be understood.

It's a question of whether or not we're fine with saying our emotions and personalities are magic and forever beyond our understanding.

 

[Andalusa]

I would really like to think so, otherwise I'm being nice for no reason.

 

[HentMas]

Ok, well, here are my thoughts, sorry if it gets wordy

in my philosophy I believe we have some kind of energy that maintains us as a whole, the memories, the though, the feelings one have are part of that energy and it makes us who we are, a soul??, I won´t go into religion because well, I don´t believe in any religion, but allow me to make an example taking a paraphrased text out of a book of Isaac Asimov (don?t remember which one).

"in the end of all times, every human energy that existed was going into the Galactic super computer, (or something) to save at least their knowledge, at the end, one last man stood before the computer and looked back to the dying galaxy, then turned around and asked the super computer,-is there any way to stop the degeneration of all the stars in the galaxy?- the computer answered, -I am sorry, I still don´t have enough data to answer that question- so the last man entered the computer where all his thoughts and knowledge would be merged within the computer and all who entered before him, after the end, the computer was left alone in the void, where nothing existed except it, after some time, the computer came to a conclusion as to how to reverse the decay of all the stars, but there was no man to tell what that was, so the computer thought the best way to give an answer is by example, so the computer said -let there be light...-"

well, in my point of view there is something greater and more powerful than us, but in the end, it can only exist trough ourselves, which continues in a cycle of "give-take" energy from ourselves to that entity, the "GOD" concept, well, I do not portray it as the religion dictates, and the "soul" well, it is just the fuel to our emotions and our thought, am I afraid of death?? yes, I certainly am, and perhaps that is why I "need" a soul, to feel part of something greater, to have a "meaning" in my life besides just being "here" because there was some kind of explosion and we "spontaneously" started to exist, if we all did not had a soul, well, in my personal opinion we would be no more than animals... I understand that there are a lot of stupid or perverted people out there that can disprove my notion of humanity being "good" because humanity haves a "soul", but in the end I don´t believe anyone is evil, they may be sick, they may need psychiatric help, or even they might just be wrong in their way of thinking, but in the end, take away all that and you still only have a man.

I need a soul to keep going, to keep living, because in the end I will ask myself "is this it?, that is all I came here to do?, there is nothing else?, in an instant I am no more and everything I did was worthless?"

Immortality trough any means is a really lovable concept, one which I want to embrace as the circumstances come.

I hope my thougths came out as I wanted to, I am not an English Speaker, so I might be wrong in how I placed some thoughts, but thank you all who read this

 

[HentMas]

I am certain that I don't have a soul or spiritual essence of any form, but this would not stop me from exploiting the concept.

My plan is to sell my soul to the Devil, when it comes to the day when I have to pay up, hand him my soul and go to Hell I would simply turn around and say 'I am sorry but I have no soul to give you, you should have read the small print, better luck next time Nick'.

Not smart. If there were a devil that'd appear before me, I'd probably reevaluate my understanding of the universe before I'd sell my "soul" to him. Because why would there be a devil if there were no souls for him to collect? He'd have nothing to gain by granting people's wishes - that wouldn't make sense.

I'd also see a psychologist, stat.

While you do have a point (what would be the point of having a Devil if people could easily talk their way out of a situation like that?) but surely you must have had someone go back on a deal with you at some point with little in the way of things you can do about it? ('Ok, I got those tickets for you, you said you'd pay me back?' 'sorry man, I haven't gotten my pay from work yet so...can't' or 'I let you stay at my place last night so I can borrow your car today, right?' 'sorry, it's in the garage at the moment, I'd love to help you but I can't').

Same principle really.

I can openly admit that I am probably a souless being (being an Athiest automatically makes me devoid of a soul or moral compass according to some) so the aforementioned selling of a soul (when I don't have one) would be like a homeless man with no feet offering to sell you the new shoes he claims to have (only an idiot would take him up on the offer).

Well, in most Theological studies, it is said that the "soul" of a man does not belong to that man, it belongs to GOD, so selling your soul to the devil would be a void contract, how can you sell something that is not yours?? (i saw it in Bedazzled )

 

[ThrobbingEgo]

*Snip*

Energy does not contain information. You can put it into bins, and use them to represent information, like a super-fast abacus, but once you take the beads of an abacus out of their slides they are no longer numbers - just regular beads. You take the charge out of a computer's processors and you can look at the combined charge under a super microscope until your eyes fall out, and you won't see any encoded information. The charge in your brain will dissipate and ground out, because energy can't be destroyed, but it'll have nothing to do with you. It'll just be energy that once happened to run through parts of you. Nothing more.

Asimov's novels are science fiction.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

Not since I made that bet...

 

[HentMas]

*Snip*

Energy does not contain information. You can put it into bins, and use them to represent information, like an abacus, but once you take the beads of an abacus out of their slides they are no longer numbers - just regular beads. You take the charge out of a computer's processors and you can look at the combined charge under a super microscope until your eyes fall out, and you won't see any encoded information. The charge in your brain will dissipate and ground out, because energy can't be destroyed, but it'll have nothing to do with you. It'll just be energy that once happened to be a part of you.

Asimov's novels are science fiction.

well, i understand what you mean about "energy", but it was just a way i used to represent the concept of soul, i don´t know the words i want to use in english, and keeping some individuality was not something i was making reference to, but i would like to keep at least something of my former self if i die (when i die).

and i used the extract of Asimov to put an example of what i "think" or what i "believe" (incidentially, that was one of the writings that made me question my person as a whole) another good example is in one of the later "fundation" books, when he talks about "gaia" or "one sentient being in touch with all the others" a group of people that are in contact with everyone and share every feeling, sence and thought (SHARE is not the same as "everyone thinks the same")

thanks for the thoughts

 

[Zersy]

Do you believe in the human soul, or not?
Discuss.

Well.....

For Modern Medicine we have all the things required to make another human or to bring someone back from a recent death but it just won't happen.

you see the soul has no physical or infact any form at all therefore there is no proof of it but it's there. in theory we should be able to create life by now seeing our modern technology but no matter how hard we try it just doesn't happen.

i think the soul has some connection to your free will or to your ability to "Think" since animals in my opinion just exist they dont't have souls..

overall.

you can't prove it exist but you can't prove it doesn't exist either i beleive we have one but it's alot more complicated then some sort of spirit thing.

 

[Sixties Spidey]

No... The After-Life is a crock of shit anyway.

 

[Zacharine]

No, I don't believe a 'soul' exists.