Re: What is a "soul?" -- It's Debateable

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Subject: Re: What is a "soul?"

Author:
Astrid

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Date Posted: 20:48:32 07/18/02 Thu
In reply to: Michelle 's message, "What is a "soul?"" on 15:59:33 07/18/02 Thu

>I have been thinking/pondering/reading about this for
>a while now. I truly believe the soul is our being-
>that our bodies are simply "shells" in which we live
>while we are in this life.
>
>I know that others do not believe in an afterlife- so
>what is a soul? If you believe there is no such thing
>as a soul, how do you explain our "beings?" How can
>we all be such individuals- created by science,
>instead of something much higher?
>
>Looking forward to any responses...

Wow, this will be easy to answer! Ha ha.

I think you've hit upon so many different ideas... like, what is consciousness? (Nobody has totally explained it yet, I don't think!) Why does it feel like anything to be us? Which is more right--dualism or materialism? Etc.

My belief is that the soul doesn't exist at all. We are simply our bodies, which include our brains. But we've evolved a consciousness that causes us to feel like the people we are--that gives us that sense of "me" that our bodies alone don't give us. Why we evolved this is a very hard question--clearly it was adaptive, but I think it can also be maladaptive, too (for example, other species don't commit suicide).

I don't believe in any afterlife that doesn't involve helping the flowers grow. I like Sagan's idea that we are made of starstuff--starstuff pondering the stars. And when we die we're still starstuff, just in different form again.

So in a sense, there in continuity. Just, sadly, not of our "souls" (or our minds as I like to refer to it).

Oh, and how we are individuals is that we're all different--genetically and through environment. Just like snowflakes.

Astrid

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Replies:

Subject	Author	Date
Re: What is a "soul?"	Michelle	05:49:05 07/19/02 Fri
Re: What is a "soul?" -- Astrid, 10:16:55 07/19/02 Fri Re: What is a "soul?" -- Siannach, 20:56:43 08/04/02 Sun