The soul and Consciousness

[ragarth]

Does the soul contribute to consciousness and cognizance?

Is the soul the source of human cognizance? Does the 'I think, therefore I am' postulate exist only because of the of the human soul?

 

[Gracchus]

Does the soul contribute to consciousness and cognizance?

Is the soul the source of human cognizance? Does the 'I think, therefore I am' postulate exist only because of the of the human soul?

That is, of course, impossible to answer until you tell us about the properties of the soul. I have never observed such a thing, and as far as I know, none of its properties have been measured.

Can you even demonstrate that such a thing exists?

Your question is as meaningful as. "Does the beauty of flowers arise from the machinations of leprechauns?" or "Does the sun rise because of faeries?"

 

[tansy]

Maybe it partly depends on what is meant by 'soul'.

Soul in Christianity (at least from my understanding) is looked upon in slightly different ways according to one's views. It's often taken to include the mind, so I would say that the possible answer to your question is 'yes'. However, in Christianity, I think that we might say that our spirit informs (or at least, can, inform, our mind..though we are free to act against or for that). And, of course, beyond that we would say that the Holy Spirit (and perhaps other spirits) inform our mind.

Of course, so also, do all our other external stimuli...

I'm not sure if this quite answers your question - but one wey or another (whether or not one believes in God, which was kind of the angle I took), I would say that it is essentially the soul..or at least the mind, which causes us to know we exist...at least whilst we are here on earth. (It could be argued, further to my initial point, that even after death we still know we exist, although we are not in our body...but a lot of these things hinge on how we view the soul I think)

 

[AV1611VET]

Does the soul contribute to consciousness and cognizance?

Is the soul the source of human cognizance? Does the 'I think, therefore I am' postulate exist only because of the of the human soul?

Here is the 411 on the tripartite nature of man:

1. body = soma = gives us world-consciousness via the empirical senses
2. soul = psyche = gives us self-consciousness via the mind, the will, and the emotions
3. spirit = pneuma = gives us God-consciousness via the Scriptures

 

[Vermithrax]

Here is the 411 on the tripartite nature of man:

1. body = soma = gives us world-consciousness via the empirical senses
2. soul = psyche = gives us self-consciousness via the mind, the will, and the emotions
3. spirit = pneuma = gives us God-consciousness via the Scriptures

So what happens to the soul and spirit when the body suffers from brain damage?

 

[ragarth]

Here is the 411 on the tripartite nature of man:

1. body = soma = gives us world-consciousness via the empirical senses
2. soul = psyche = gives us self-consciousness via the mind, the will, and the emotions
3. spirit = pneuma = gives us God-consciousness via the Scriptures

Mind expounding on this a little bit? To me, there is consciousness, talking of 'world' 'self' and 'god' consciousness is meaningless without having the role of the term 'consciousness' in these statements more thoroughly explained. Keep in mind you're explaining things to an atheist, we communicate and comprehend differently than theists.

 

[ragarth]

Maybe it partly depends on what is meant by 'soul'.

Soul in Christianity (at least from my understanding) is looked upon in slightly different ways according to one's views. It's often taken to include the mind, so I would say that the possible answer to your question is 'yes'. However, in Christianity, I think that we might say that our spirit informs (or at least, can, inform, our mind..though we are free to act against or for that). And, of course, beyond that we would say that the Holy Spirit (and perhaps other spirits) inform our mind.

Of course, so also, do all our other external stimuli...

I'm not sure if this quite answers your question - but one wey or another (whether or not one believes in God, which was kind of the angle I took), I would say that it is essentially the soul..or at least the mind, which causes us to know we exist...at least whilst we are here on earth. (It could be argued, further to my initial point, that even after death we still know we exist, although we are not in our body...but a lot of these things hinge on how we view the soul I think)

To me, we are the mind, the act of cognizance and consciousness is integral to the experience of sentient life. Both traits are part of the philosophical structure referenced when we talk of the mind, and both traits are critical to the phrase 'I think, therefore I am'. Given this, it can be said that for mental existence to be maintained, the mind must be part of this, and any afterlife that does not include the mind is not, in actuality an afterlife- If the mind is not part of the soul, then the life after death is akin to keeping your arm on life support. Your soul lives on, just as your arm might, but you do not. This is my opinion at least.

To the greater meat of your statement, what is the general, over-arching belief as you see it as to what properties of mind belong to the soul?

 

[tansy]

To me, we are the mind, the act of cognizance and consciousness is integral to the experience of sentient life. Both traits are part of the philosophical structure referenced when we talk of the mind, and both traits are critical to the phrase 'I think, therefore I am'. Given this, it can be said that for mental existence to be maintained, the mind must be part of this, and any afterlife that does not include the mind is not, in actuality an afterlife- If the mind is not part of the soul, then the life after death is akin to keeping your arm on life support. Your soul lives on, just as your arm might, but you do not. This is my opinion at least.

Yes, I see what you're saying, I think. Hm...we differentiate between the brain and the mind..we think, using our brain, yet also our mind..our mind seems somehow, more intangible...I wonder if our spirit also has a mind, as it were...perhaps, that would be what carries on after death, taking who we are and our memories etc with it. Question is, what is the essence of our being...lots of difficult questions..not sure of the answers..

Do you think that our mind is separate from (though still maybe an integral part of) our brain? Or do you think what is called 'mind', is just a particular function of some part of the brain?

How about animals..do you think they are conscious of their own existence..that they know that 'they are'?

To the greater meat of your statement, what is the general, over-arching belief as you see it as to what properties of mind belong to the soul?

I'll have to think about this a bit more..it's stuff I've vaguely thought about in the past, but don't know any definite answers - I'm not quite sure how to answer you on this - you've just made my mind go into over-drive LOL...rather like when one gazes out at the unimaginable vastness of the universe, and it makes one feel dizzy trying to picture it

.

 

[LifeToTheFullest!]

We are molecules of emotion.

 

[ragarth]

Yes, I see what you're saying, I think. Hm...we differentiate between the brain and the mind..we think, using our brain, yet also our mind..our mind seems somehow, more intangible...I wonder if our spirit also has a mind, as it were...perhaps, that would be what carries on after death, taking who we are and our memories etc with it. Question is, what is the essence of our being...lots of difficult questions..not sure of the answers..

Do you think that our mind is separate from (though still maybe an integral part of) our brain? Or do you think what is called 'mind', is just a particular function of some part of the brain?

How about animals..do you think they are conscious of their own existence..that they know that 'they are'?

To the greater meat of your statement, what is the general, over-arching belief as you see it as to what properties of mind belong to the soul?
​

I'll have to think about this a bit more..it's stuff I've vaguely thought about in the past, but don't know any definite answers - I'm not quite sure how to answer you on this - you've just made my mind go into over-drive LOL...rather like when one gazes out at the unimaginable vastness of the universe, and it makes one feel dizzy trying to picture it

In my opinion, cognizance, consciousness, etc are all resultant properties from the brain. Much like we can talk about momentum as a separate entity from a moving car, we can talk about the mind as a separate entity from the brain, however the momentum is a result of the physical properties of the car and the mind is a result from the physical properties of the brain- they cannot be divided from them because they are not physical entites, they are 'virtual'. This dependence of the mind upon the physical structure of the brain can be proven, in cases of brain damage, such changes as behavior, personality, or various forms of lost cognitive function are produced.

Alien Hand Syndrome is a disease in which bodyparts are capable of taking complex action without the conscious control of the individual, and was the rare product of certain forms of brain surgery to treat epilepsy. In one case a woman who was attempting to quit smoking had her right hand continuously try to put a cigarrette in her mouth. My understanding is, however, that the movements of the uncontrolled limb are of a pretrained manner- things the individual had done frequently with that hand, and not new and spontaneous behavior. This leads me to conclude that many of those actions we consider core to conscious thought are not in actuality integral to consciousness. Further relevent experimentation involves the removal of the cerebrum in animals. Lower chordates that have their cerebrum removed show little change in action, but as the complexity of the decerebreated animal increases, so does the change in behavior. At the higher levels, such as cats, dogs, and birds, such actions as flying, walking, eating, etc are preserved, sexual interest is preserved, etc, but the animals tend to view their surroundings as a collection of objects and frequently lack significant complex behavior- Their movements are readily predicted, the animals become nothing more than automata carrying out scripted actions to stimuli. This tells us that the 'mind' that which produces spontanaity, personality, is dependent upon or within the cerebrum.

A text-book of human physiology - Google Books

One can still make the claim, however, that the brain is an antenna, and certain parts of it pick up stimulus from the 'soul' if we assume animals have souls (though if we say animals don't have souls, then proponents of the soul have problems since this shows that significant levels of cognition, reason, and behavior are dependent upon a particular brain region). To answer this query, we can take a look at humans who have had portions of their brain damaged. If the mind is separate from the brain, then damage to the brain should impair actions and gross behavior in an all or none way but should not effect such traits as personality (food preference), morality, etc. It has been observed, however, that brain damage does indeed impair or change these things. Damage to the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex impairs rational decision making- people who suffer this trauma have a distinct tendency to take larger risks, they also have a tendency to be less 'moral' than us, being more likely to be willing to kill their own child to save their life. Other results of damage to this region include reduced feelings of shame, compassion, and guilt.

Moral Decision-Making and the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex The Phineas Gage Fan Club
A neural substrate for moral decisions Neurophilosophy

As per my personal opinion, as stated, I see myself as my mind, not necesserily my body (it's a convenient vessel for the mind), however my mind is dependent upon my body in a critical way. To establish this we look at what physical properties of the brain result in the mind: electrochemical reaction, and physical structure. Without the electrochemical properties, the brain would be an inanimate lump of mass at best performing the processes of cellular metabolism only- ie no mind, and without the physical structure there's no basis for the electrochemical properties. Even if the electrochemical properties could be divided from the brain, without synapses, soma, and axons to give structure to the electrochemical reactions, all you'd have is some hypothetical electrical and chemical glob- no structure, no mind; you may as well be the static cling holding some socks together.

 

[ragarth]

Completely forgot: The incredible case of Phineas Gage : Neurophilosophy

A case of brain injury producing personality change.

My conclusion is that unless one is willing to strip everything that makes us 'us' from the soul, then the soul itself does not exist. Indeed, if the soul does indeed exist then it cannot be the vessel for us to achieve an afterlife since it's transition into an eternal form would not take us with it- God providing an afterlife for the soul and not for us would be a cruel joke.

 

[tansy]

In my opinion, cognizance, consciousness, etc are all resultant properties from the brain. Much like we can talk about momentum as a separate entity from a moving car, we can talk about the mind as a separate entity from the brain, however the momentum is a result of the physical properties of the car and the mind is a result from the physical properties of the brain- they cannot be divided from them because they are not physical entites, they are 'virtual'. This dependence of the mind upon the physical structure of the brain can be proven, in cases of brain damage, such changes as behavior, personality, or various forms of lost cognitive function are produced

.

Thanks for clairifying that..however, as I believe we also have a spirit, I do think..with obviously know way (so far as I know) scientifically, of proving it, that perhaps the mind is kind of also attuned to one's spirit, which is, or can be, attuned to the spiritual realm. Others may have a better or more informed take on this.
So perhaps the mind informs us of ouselves and through (or as part of our brain), informs us of our surroundings, and is the way we evaluate things? Also, as I said in a previous post, our spirit informs our mind of things from the spiritual realm?

Alien Hand Syndrome is a disease in which bodyparts are capable of taking complex action without the conscious control of the individual, and was the rare product of certain forms of brain surgery to treat epilepsy. In one case a woman who was attempting to quit smoking had her right hand continuously try to put a cigarrette in her mouth. My understanding is, however, that the movements of the uncontrolled limb are of a pretrained manner- things the individual had done frequently with that hand, and not new and spontaneous behavior. This leads me to conclude that many of those actions we consider core to conscious thought are not in actuality integral to consciousness. Further relevent experimentation involves the removal of the cerebrum in animals. Lower chordates that have their cerebrum removed show little change in action, but as the complexity of the decerebreated animal increases, so does the change in behavior. At the higher levels, such as cats, dogs, and birds, such actions as flying, walking, eating, etc are preserved, sexual interest is preserved, etc, but the animals tend to view their surroundings as a collection of objects and frequently lack significant complex behavior- Their movements are readily predicted, the animals become nothing more than automata carrying out scripted actions to stimuli. This tells us that the 'mind' that which produces spontanaity, personality, is dependent upon or within the cerebrum.

Yes, that would seem to make sense to me.


http://books.google.com/books?id=jA...ng the cerebrum&pg=PA618#v=onepage&q=&f=false

physiology - Google Books

One can still make the claim, however, that the brain is an antenna, and certain parts of it pick up stimulus from the 'soul' if we assume animals have souls (though if we say animals don't have souls, then proponents of the soul have problems since this shows that significant levels of cognition, reason, and behavior are dependent upon a particular brain region). To answer this query, we can take a look at humans who have had portions of their brain damaged. If the mind is separate from the brain, then damage to the brain should impair actions and gross behavior in an all or none way but should not effect such traits as personality (food preference), morality, etc. It has been observed, however, that brain damage does indeed impair or change these things. Damage to the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex impairs rational decision making- people who suffer this trauma have a distinct tendency to take larger risks, they also have a tendency to be less 'moral' than us, being more likely to be willing to kill their own child to save their life. Other results of damage to this region include reduced feelings of shame, compassion, and guilt.

Moral Decision-Making and the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex The Phineas Gage Fan Club
A neural substrate for moral decisions Neurophilosophy

http://books.google.com/books?id=jA...ng the cerebrum&pg=PA618#v=onepage&q=&f=false

Yes, interesting,,,for me, as a Christian, it shows even more how we need to be redeemed and healed (I know thinking about this also from a spiritual point of view may not be really relevant to you, but it is from my POV) Maybe this is one of the reasons Jesus told us not to judge etc, as at least some behaviours (if not all, if one thinks about it on a certain level), cannot be helped.

As per my personal opinion, as stated, I see myself as my mind, not necesserily my body (it's a convenient vessel for the mind), however my mind is dependent upon my body in a critical way. To establish this we look at what physical properties of the brain result in the mind: electrochemical reaction, and physical structure. Without the electrochemical properties, the brain would be an inanimate lump of mass at best performing the processes of cellular metabolism only- ie no mind, and without the physical structure there's no basis for the electrochemical properties. Even if the electrochemical properties could be divided from the brain, without synapses, soma, and axons to give structure to the electrochemical reactions, all you'd have is some hypothetical electrical and chemical glob- no structure, no mind; you may as well be the static cling holding togethesome socksr.[/

That makes sense to me...except of course, I would also say, that our spirit would recognise itself withOUT our body....having said that ultimately, when resurrected we will again have a body and (physical)mind. But I certainly wouldnt say that for absolute fact, and I'm sure others would have varying and different takes on that.

quote].

 

[tansy]

Completely forgot: The incredible case of Phineas Gage : Neurophilosophy

A case of brain injury producing personality change.

My conclusion is that unless one is willing to strip everything that makes us 'us' from the soul, then the soul itself does not exist. Indeed, if the soul does indeed exist then it cannot be the vessel for us to achieve an afterlife since it's transition into an eternal form would not take us with it- God providing an afterlife for the soul and not for us would be a cruel joke.

Yes, I see exactly what you're saying..the only thing I can think is, if our spirit ALSO has a mind that is also essentially us (but non-physical), then we would actually be taken into the after-life.
I think there are some Christians who think that when we die, that we don't actually carry on, as it were, until we are resurrected, when we will have a new (imperishable) body, mind etc. That COULD be an answer to that problem...really it is difficult to be entirely sure of how these things will pan out. The Bible says that God will create a new heavens and earth and we will be raised imperishable (and in fact i think we will be then our true selves with nothing wrong with us or anything)...I am at least certain of that.

 

[Nathan45]

That is, of course, impossible to answer until you tell us about the properties of the soul. I have never observed such a thing, and as far as I know, none of its properties have been measured.

Can you even demonstrate that such a thing exists?

Your question is as meaningful as. "Does the beauty of flowers arise from the machinations of leprechauns?" or "Does the sun rise because of faeries?"

I'm not religious at all but i don't really understand what the confusion about the soul is about, its fairly obvious to me what the soul is.

I'm going to have to go with C.S. Lewis's explanation for this: "You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body."

I also don't really see why or how I should present evidence for the obvious fact that I exist.

When christians talk about souls i'm pretty sure they're just talking about you-the-observer. I've never seen a good scientific explanation for where I-the-observer comes from but that doesn't change the fact that i obviously exist.

 

[Thistlethorn]

I'm not religious at all but i don't really understand what the confusion about the soul is about, its fairly obvious to me what the soul is.

I'm going to have to go with C.S. Lewis's explanation for this: "You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body."

I also don't really see why or how I should present evidence for the obvious fact that I exist.

When christians talk about souls i'm pretty sure they're just talking about you-the-observer. I've never seen a good scientific explanation for where I-the-observer comes from but that doesn't change the fact that i obviously exist.

I think the confusion lies were some of us fail to see how we can be anything other than a set of cells that has become self-aware. The self-awareness in itself does not make a soul. What you are describing is more appropriately called the 'ego'.

 

[Nathan45]

I also think that for this discussion to be productive we should distinguish between two distinct meanings of the word "consciousness".

what i mean is, even when someone is unconscious they are still conscious of their dreams... although their memory is impaired so they can't remember more than the last few seconds of the dream, and half the brain is shut off or doing things unrelated to you while you are "unconscious".

But my point is, that i don't think the observer really disappears when one is asleep (or dead, maybe?), it simply doesn't/can't store any memory of the event so it's all completely forgotten. If brain activity goes to zero, the brain wouldn't produce any thoughts, impulses or stimulation so there'd be nothing for the observer to remember, anyway.

as a programmer, i would liken the soul (the observer) to a user interface.
It receives input from the brain. this much is obvious and indisputable.

By all appearances it gives output also, although i'll concede this could be an illusion created by neural impulses.

...

if you read about descartes he hyposized that there must be an organ in the brain which connects the brain to the "immaterial spirit" Nobody ever found one but descartes thought it was the pineal gland. Mind-body dichotomy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Nathan45]

I think the confusion lies were some of us fail to see how we can be anything other than a set of cells that has become self-aware.

i've never seen a good explanation of how a set of cells could become an observer if the observer didn't exist apart from the cells. Sure, i see people try to explain this, but it's never even remotely convincing.

edit: changed "self aware" to "the observer" to clarify what i really mean.

 

[Nathan45]

Philosophical zombie - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Thistlethorn]

i've never seen a good explanation of how a set of cells could become an observer if the observer didn't exist apart from the cells. Sure, i see people try to explain this, but it's never even remotely convincing.

edit: changed "self aware" to "the observer" to clarify what i really mean.

Hence why we have religion and philosophy. I don't think scientists can truly answer why we are self aware yet. The mysteries of the mind are plentiful. Personally, I wouldn't equate the soul to self-awareness, though. A soul is something much more divine, and as far as I'm concerned, imaginary.

 

[Nathan45]

Hence why we have religion and philosophy. I don't think scientists can truly answer why we are self aware yet.

I don't like the word self-aware, by the way. I'd prefer just to call it an observer. Something who is not self-aware is not necessarily aware of absolutely nothing. They may be aware of things (neural impulses) which are not themselves, have no concept of self, yet still be an observer. yet at the same time, scientists will conduct tests on monkeys and toddlers or dogs, or whatever, to try to determine if they are "self-aware" using a mirror or whatever, and this will be construed as saying anything at all about the observer, when it really explains nothing.

I don't think that ego is a good word either. I think "ego" and "self-aware" have more to do with intelligence than the existence of an observer.

Personally, I wouldn't equate the soul to self-awareness, though. A soul is something much more divine, and as far as I'm concerned, imaginary.

I'm simply going with the C.S. Lewis explanation of the soul, which seems to be the consensus.