Do you believe there is some form of self-conscious life after death?

[skeptichaggis]

Well I agree with skeptichaggis on this although I lack his/her delicate tact.

It is impossible for a soul to exist because any self conscious entity must have a physical brain. I you can point to an example of a matter less thinking entity I will have to revise my opinion.

I AM a tactful guy,thank you for saying so. Usually folk say stuff to me like "did you have to be so untactful as to ask that woman if she was going for the Myra Hindley look".

 

[abaddon]

There is no clear definition for the word ‘soul’…just like there is no clear definition for countless ‘things’ that you live with without the slightest protest every moment of your life (‘self’ and ‘consciousness’ are two examples that come to mind)!

We live with a vast number of ‘things’ for which we have no clear definition….as well as a vast number of ‘things’ for which we have no empirical proof. It is trivially easy to locate them.

Sure, you are utterly unable to define what a soul might be, it is utterly undetectable. Yet you claim to have knowledge of such a soul. On the basis of nothing.

There are those who are making dumb claims. They are dumb because the primary features of those claims lack anything remotely resembling an explicit definition.

Like your claim that any "souls" exist.

How is it possible to definitively claim something does not exist when neither you nor anyone else has any clear idea what this thing is that you are claiming does not exist????

Science makes no such claim. Science actually claims that if one can produce evidence that a soul exists, it will fully accept it. Your problem

These are YOUR claims. If you don’t want to be guilty of making dumb claims …then don’t make dumb claims!

S’cuse me…YOU were the one who made the claim. That means YOU are the one guilty of moving the goalposts.

Wow. You of all people accuse others of mobile goalposts. Just wow.

Sure….if you can explain why only the ‘learned’ and or / ‘famous’ can possess an ideology.

Strawman. Anyone can do so. Why you think that anyone cannot is anyone's guess.

Since you obviously don’t have a clue what the word ‘empirical’ means, there is no point in continuing this discussion.

Are you really going to simply run away when challenged?

 

[Donn]

Are you really going to simply run away when challenged?

Yes. As sure as beans make little clouds.

 

[annnnoid]

We don't have to, of course. It is up to the people making the positive claim (that something exists) to support this with evidence. The null hypothesis is that it doesn't exist until it is shown that it does. So, if you've got evidence that there is such a thing as a soul, however you choose to define that, please, be my guest..............give us some evidence. Otherwise, the null hypothesis pertains. Onus.

But there are countless things that we accept the existence of without any empirical evidence what-so-ever. It is trivially easy to locate them. Thus…this argument has no credibility.

Sure, you are utterly unable to define what a soul might be, it is utterly undetectable. Yet you claim to have knowledge of such a soul. On the basis of nothing.

Really! Perhaps you could point out where I have made this claim?

Like your claim that any "souls" exist.

Once again…where have I made this claim?

These are YOUR claims. If you don’t want to be guilty of making dumb claims …then don’t make dumb claims!

Once again…where have I made whatever claim it is you are claiming that I have claimed?

Wow. You of all people accuse others of mobile goalposts. Just wow.

The pathos of your incredulity is overtly theatrical. Methinks thou dost protest too much!

Strawman. Anyone can do so. Why you think that anyone cannot is anyone's guess.

…ummm…because that is what Thor 2 requested. Maybe you oughta read stuff before posting too-hasty replies.

Are you really going to simply run away when challenged?

You obviously don’t know what ‘empirical’ means. We can hardly discuss empirical issues when you don’t know the meaning of the word.

 

[MikeG]

But there are countless things that we accept the existence of without any empirical evidence what-so-ever. It is trivially easy to locate them. Thus…this argument has no credibility.......

Sorry. Wrong..............unless you trot out some makey uppie nonsense about there being no imperial evidence for anything at all, including our existence. Science works like this: you make the case for the existence of something, you prove it. Until then, there is no such thing as a soul.

 

[Jodie]

Information can be lost certainly. Suppose I write information on a piece of paper then burn the paper then smear the ash. The information is irretrievably lost. As for the soul, what keeps it from following the law of increasing entropy?

As far as we know, it's not flammable.

Since I don't know how or what a soul is, beyond the popular concept, which is probably incorrect assuming anything remotely like it survives after death, I can't answer that question.

 

[Jodie]

When I look at myself, I recognize that everything in my "bucket" (memories, knowledge, experiences, vocabulary, skills) came directly or indirectly from the world or from the interactions of my brain and body with the world. Those interactions include tactile sensation, manipulation of things, the learning of narratives, acquiring images (whether directly seen, seen in print or on a screen, or imagined from e.g. text descriptions), schooling, conversation.

Is that what you mean by the soul? The world, or the parts thereof that contribute to filling the bucket? Because I'm pretty sure that the world does indeed continue on after our deaths and will continue on after mine. But calling that the soul seems rather at odds with most religious narratives both eastern and western, which seem to go the opposite way and consider the soul something completely individual and completely separate from the world.

I'm saying that your experiences, your conscious, make you who you are. I'm not certain that the soul is dependent on consciousness to exist. If you are simply looking at the function of the brain, i.e. the bucket, to determine how consciousness works then you are deliberately ignoring a large part of what creates consciousness. That consciousness may or may not have anything to do with what "animates" the body.

I reanimate from a state of non-sentience and non-self-awareness pretty reliably each morning (and often several times during the night as well). I've also re-animated several times from states of completely suppressed responsiveness and complete non awareness induced by anesthesiologists.

You may be sleeping but your body continues on with its functions regardless. I'm talking about what actually makes you alive, not your state of consciousness.

Re-animation from states in which brain cells have died due to oxygen deprivation or other metabolic disruption (a condition usually referred to as "dead") being impossible is no more evidence for a mysterious soul as the difficulty of starting a car that's been shredded for scrap is evidence of mysterious car spirits. Re-animation from temporary incapacitation of the brain in a state that preserves the brain cells' viability, such as severe hypothermia or the aforementioned anesthesia, is quite possible. Re-animation from freezing is so far a matter for speculative fiction or philosophical hypotheses, because we do not know how to freeze a brain in the first place without that resulting in massive damage to the membranes of the brain's component cells.

True, but so far no one has been able to reanimate a dead anything. If resuscitation happens it's because they weren't quite dead enough, so to speak. As you know it used to only take the absence of a heart beat to be declared dead but as technology has improved we now know that brain death is another criteria that we can use to define death.

Theoretically a brain dead body can be maintained for a while on a ventilator with vasopressors, hyperalimentation or tube feeding, and hormone supplementation but not indefinitely. If there was no "spark of life" or some key factor missing then one should be able to prolong this state until the person ages naturally but it doesn't happen that way.

 

[Thor 2]

As far as we know, it's not flammable.

Since I don't know how or what a soul is, beyond the popular concept, which is probably incorrect assuming anything remotely like it survives after death, I can't answer that question.

Hum .... You cannot define what this this soul thingy is and yet think it is not flammable?

You seem to be on shaky ground Jodie.

 

[annnnoid]

Sorry. Wrong..............unless you trot out some makey uppie nonsense about there being no imperial evidence for anything at all, including our existence. Science works like this: you make the case for the existence of something, you prove it.

Have a look in the mirror MikeG (or just pretend...the mirror just makes it more dramatic). What are you feeling when you look in the mirror? Whatever it is…you can be 100% sure that there isn’t a science on the planet that has the slightest capacity to empirically adjudicate it (btw…the word is ‘empirical’…not ‘imperial’; imperial has to do with kings and queens and such…empirical is about observation and experimentation).

…so shall we conclude that ‘whatever-you-are-feeling’ does not exist????

How do you prove that what you are feeling (or thinking)…is actually what you are feeling???? You can’t (and neither can anyone, or anything, else). In which case…according to your rather short-sighted argument…it does not exist!

So it is not I who is 'wrong' MikeG (but I certainly appreciate the apology).

...it is you.

Until then, there is no such thing as a soul.

Perhaps you could point out where I have claimed that there is.

 

[abaddon]

You obviously don’t know what ‘empirical’ means. We can hardly discuss empirical issues when you don’t know the meaning of the word.

Don't give me that malarkey. You are the one proposing that superstitious nonsense is real, yet invisible and undetectable. You have no footing to drone on about what empirical actually means.

 

[Thor 2]

Don't give me that malarkey. You are the one proposing that superstitious nonsense is real, yet invisible and undetectable. You have no footing to drone on about what empirical actually means.

I wonder how we can define where some experiences/observations by some become "empirical evidence".

We have many claiming to have seen UFO's, witnessing visions of The Virgin Mary, getting images burned in their toast, etc, etc, ............. So when do these become classified as empirical evidence?

 

[abaddon]

I wonder how we can define where some experiences/observations by some become "empirical evidence".

We have many claiming to have seen UFO's, witnessing visions of The Virgin Mary, getting images burned in their toast, etc, etc, ............. So when do these become classified as empirical evidence?

They don't. One of the classic failures is the lack of repeatability. That means all one has is anecdote, which is evidentially useless.

It is much like the thankfully brief "moving statues" of mary craze that went on here. Mass hysteria/delusion seems a very implausible thing until you actually see it happen right in front of you. That is how cranks operate.

The vast majority, regarded it as a side show, even the RCC stood off. Kneel in front of a statue for countless hours while fasting continuously will inevitably result in some weird delusions. And that is exactly what happened.

Not my countrymen's finest hour, to be sure.

The salient point is that biases colour everything one perceives. The scientific method removes that, dealing in incontravertable facts alone.

Some posters would have it that this alone is evidence for the immaterial, hence the thread title and interestingly, the poll which shows that an overwhelming majority think there is no afterlife at all.

 

[MikeG]

......Perhaps you could point out where I have claimed that there is.

Ah yes. I forgot. You're from the school of "nothing really exists".

 

[Belz...]

Considering that there does not even begin to exist anything remotely resembling an empirical definition for or description of this thing called a ‘soul’…it is also utterly impossible (a logical fallacy) to conclude that it is a fact that it is impossible for a soul to exist.

No but it's a good indication that it's made up.

There is no soul unless you have evidence that there is. You don't, ergo, we conclude that there is no soul. In fact, even if it turns out that souls exist, and there is no functional difference between them existing and them not (as seems to be the case), then the conclusion is still correct.



Adjudicate!

 

[Belz...]

You folks are so predictably incestuous.

...what?

…and for those whose understanding of elementary logic has yet to progress beyond first grade…”I haven’t found one yet” is not equivalent to “none exist.”

Actually, it is. For anyone who understands science, that is.

It is trivially easy to demonstrate that there is purpose in this universe.

This might be the first time that you and I are in complete agreement.




Adjudicate!

 

[skeptichaggis]

Sorry. Wrong..............unless you trot out some makey uppie nonsense about there being no imperial evidence for anything at all, including our existence. Science works like this: you make the case for the existence of something, you prove it. Until then, there is no such thing as a soul.

Well said.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

You guys really have to learn the difference between the claim that something exists and that I know what it is beside that it exists. They are not the same.

So a Boltzmann brain, it is. Please give evidence/the actual probability between being in a reality that is as it appears to be or whether you are a Boltzmann brain. You can't because you will run into Agrippa's Trilemma.

 

[annnnoid]

The scientific method removes that, dealing in incontravertable facts alone.

The word is ‘incontrovertible’ first of all. Second of all, your claim is not even wrong. There are countless areas that science explores that involve vast uncertainties (the very opposite of 'incontrovertible')…and it is trivially easy to locate them. Science, by it's very definition, is the practice of probablility's ...not 'incontrovertability's.'

…and thirdly….the ‘scientific method’ (since you all seem ignorant of the fact), is based on the idea of empirical evidence. Science has yet to produce anything remotely resembling an empirical definition for either the word ‘self’ or the word ‘conscious’. There are no repeatable standards of experimentation for either quantity. Nothing remotely resembling an objective or precise metric by which to systematically adjudicate or quantify either phenomenon (what are the units by which ‘self’ is measured…or ‘consciousness’…let me know when you find them). Science doesn't have the slightest capacity to directly adjudicate the area where these phenomenon (assuming they even are differentiated phenomenon) occur (subjective experience). And…not least of all…there is absolutely no clear idea how either one is produced by whatever-it-is that produces them.

It is epistemologically contradictory to pretend that empirical claims can be made about quantities ('self'...'conscious'...'soul') that have no empirical definitions.

…which…since you all seem so ignorant of your very own science (science is an epistemology…in case you don’t know that either)…is exactly what you all keep doing!

Ah yes. I forgot. You're from the school of "nothing really exists".

Sorry MikeG…it was your argument. I was merely identifying the contradictions of your own argument. If this is unpleasant to you then perhaps you should examine your own arguments before they become your own arguments.

Well said.

I’m afraid I would have to qualify your compliment. It is ‘well said’ if you have yet to graduate from elementary school. But then again…even for someone in elementary school there are still rather glaring deficiencies. For example…the word ‘imperial’. Blatantly silly even by elementary school standards!

 

[Jodie]

Hum .... You cannot define what this this soul thingy is and yet think it is not flammable?

You seem to be on shaky ground Jodie.

If you say so, but I think I have a point about the maintenance of a brain dead body, it can't be done for any great length of time. If a "soul", or whatever term you want to use to describe a life force, didn't exist then you should be able to maintain a body until it dies from the natural aging process.

 

[annnnoid]

If you say so, but I think I have a point about the maintenance of a brain dead body, it can't be done for any great length of time. If a "soul", or whatever term you want to use to describe a life force, didn't exist then you should be able to maintain a body until it dies from the natural aging process.

That's an interesting point....that a 'lifeless' body cannot be maintained indefinitely. What is the difference between 'lifeless' and 'comatose'? Have not 'comatose' bodies been maintained for indefinite periods of time?