Iacchus said:
Well, I couldn't resist staying away, not entirely anyway. 
Just a couple of things here to set things on "simmer" a bit. From the thread, God versus Evolution ...
What point would the word "mystery" serve if we had no soul? This is the soul's "quest" for meaning.
Personally, I do not believe the point of the word "mystery" is inherently reliant on the existence of a soul (the reason being that I dont believe in souls, yet I recognize the word as quite meaningful), what makes you think otherwise?
Try looking Iacchus up (spelled with one "a" by the way) in the Mysteries of Eleusis ...
From the article:
Together with Demeter and Persephone the also was a third deity, Zagreus, who figured in the mysteries of Eleusis. Initially Iacchus was the shout uttered by the faithful in the course of religious processions. Gradually the shout assumed a personality and adopted the task of leading the processions of initiates. Occasionally he was thought to be the son of Demeter, but at other times he was considered to be the reincarnation of Zagreus, a son of Persephone and Zeus.
In Iacchus, one see a shout, an inanimate object, assume life; and in Zagreus, one sees the dead regain life; both are the revelation of the Eleusian mysteries. This was as it should be since the central theme of the Eleusus mysteries centers on the abduction of Persephone into the Underworld by Hades.
I'm sure Cleopatra could tell more about the Eleusinian mysteries than I could, but I recognize the story a delightful allegory (much more straightforward than say the Bible), you next comment is rather interesting...
Or perhaps it was only the shout we have heard? or, perhaps something else, the personification of that shout? ... if in fact we have a soul that is.
A rather controversial theory, but one worth considering, is the nature of Iacchus.
Little more than 1500 BCE, the time period believed to be the origin of the Eleusian Mysteries, the cultivating of barley and wheat was quite widespread. Age barley has a tendency to grow a fungus called "ergot", this ergot a hallucinogenic substance with much in common with LSD. During the initiation ceremonies, the members of the cult of Demeter-Persephone would injest food made of barley which may have contained ergot fungus. The Ergot puts the cult members in a state of psychosis, they begin to feel as though they are becoming aware of all the mysteries of life, the senses begin meld into one another to the point where a person can literally "feel" the shimmer of beautiful flowers and quite literally "taste" beautiful music. Ergot is suspected to be connected to the Salem Witch Trial, a psychological disease called Lycanthropy, and in mild cases Generalized Delusional Disorder.
Reasonably, the shouting of "IACCHUS!" will stir a crowd, they will begin to believe wholeheartedly that this Iacchus has been personified into something living, breathing, and undeniably real. This is not an unheard of phenomena, Native Americans have personified a number of dieties in response to hallucinogenic substances.
A "soul", I'm afraid not. Its likely the ceremonies of Cults of Demeter-Persephone involved the ingestion of a substance which merely played with people's minds, a bit of a leap of reason to call that the "soul", dont you think
.
A funny story: I had a friend who used to live on a cow farm. He used to pick the mushrooms and eat them. Once, he did this with about 4 or 5 of his friends. After eating the mushrooms, they began to have the expected hallucinogenic effects. My friend says in his own words "I was just sitting there, and I felt my face just get up and start flying around the room". My friend describes that he saw the other guys in the room grabbing at the etheral face which is wafting around the room, these 5 individual people were all having the same hallucination. In reality, the hallucinations were varied though seemingly contingent... a TV was on in another room, a nature show was airing, it seems the words from the nature show had become personified.
The soul is that part of us which journeys into realms unknown, and partakes in "the adventure."
You dont need a soul to journey into the unknown
So, aside from the fact that I don't really belong to this crowd, why is it that I feel like I was never here? (something I always used to say when I got off of work).
My Psychic powers are picking up on something, you seem to have fixation with "time".
Its very to express in words, but the concept is something you understand very well. You might notice thinking to yourself "I cant believe how much time has passed, it seems like an eternity...", following by that statement is a thought regarding those who are older than yourself. The feeling is almost "paradoxial" to contemplate.
Another relationship with Time that you notice: You think to yourself about things you would say others if you were to ever have a conversation or debate with them. 6 Months later, you contemplate the same scenario, you compare yourself of "now" with yourself of 6 months ago, you are delightfully amused by how naive you used to be.
I went off on a tangent on just an unusual phrasing of words, I'll stop myself because I have no idea how accurate my little Psychic description really is, or if it in fact is remotely related to the concept you were trying to get across.
Hmm, sounds reminiscent of the song by U2 ... "Only to be with you ... Only to be with you" ... "and I still haven't found what I'm looking for" ...
So which part do you think felt like it was never here? No doubt that part which associates itself with "meaning" and is least understood.
If I remember correctly, the left side of the brain expresses thought in terms of internal monologue, the right side of the brain is completely silent but
does in fact express "thought" in terms of concepts and images. You can give a read of some of the
split-brain studies and get a feel for the significance of the two hemisphere's expressions of thought.
And yet, what else could you expect from "me?" Ever get the feeling that nobody ever listens to "you?" Actually this is where the "soul's journey" begins, when you begin to experience feelings of being alone and isolated.
I see, the Transcendentalist self-discovery. Your description above is of special significance in relation to the title of this thread.
I want to describe something to you, you should be familiar with the story called "Moby Dick". I will quickly summarize Moby Dick in few paragraphs:
The story is written by Herman Melville during a time where America was leaving behind its Contemporary Romanticism, and begining to embrace Realism. The story is symbolism and allegory from beginning to end.
Moby-Dick is narrated from the perspective of a common seafairer, named Ishmael, aboard Captain Ahab's ship, the
Pequod. The story revolves around Captain Ahab's pursuit a white whale which took off his leg in the past.
The allegory is unique: Ahab represents human edurance, the ship represents humanity, and the whale is representitive of seemingly immortal absolute evil.
Ahab seeks the spiritual reality behind experience, Ahab sought meaning in all things (including the whale), he proclaimed in his search for Truth that it "hath no confines" meaning he was unwilling to accept human limatations. (Note: By the words "human limitations", I'm not implying there exists things that cannot be understood because physical limitations of the senses, I'm referring to the human's tendency to refuse to accept that there is very little worth in seeking the answer to the question "Why?").
Ishmael on the other hand, saw things completely in another light. Life, Ismael discovers, is no voyage into uncharted waters. It offers no certainties but only the ever-changing meanings of human experience. Ishmaels vision, we must live within our understanding, come to terms with our mortality, and welcome brotherhood with our own mortals. The ultimate mysteries of existence symbolized by the white whale are elusive. Ahab believes he see Moby-Dick as a principle of absolute evil (and as a symbol of the mysteries of life, he consquently viewed life an pitilessly cruel and savage in its own right), but Ishmael observes early in the novel that the whale has no face, no expression: people read their own meanings.
The book ends in the destruction of the
Pequod and the death of Captain Ahab. Melville saw deep dangers in the transcendentalist desires to establish meaning for God, humanity, nature, and especially those things which exist beyond human sensibility.
Those who seek "meaning" and "understanding", especially
absolute "meanings" and "understandings", decieve themselves. A cynical truth, but sometimes a rock is just a rock, and a whale is just a whale. A pitiful thing Ahab sought vengeance on this "absolute evil" which in reality, as Ishmael observed, is just a dumb brute of a fish which maimed Ahab out of nothing but blind instinct.
I've brought up the point many times before about seeing "meaning", where it simply doesnt exist.
Realism wins.
Which brings up the part about the cat which has three names: 1. the name his master calls him ... 2. his scientific name, and ... 3. the name that nobody knows but the cat himself. Hmm, could that what be what they mean by, "The cat got your tongue?"
The first name is called an "adoptive" or "assigned" name.
The second name is
not a name, its a catergorization.
The third name... I'm not too sure about that. I have a lot of knowledge of cats, why I acquired this knowledge is questionable and open to speculation but that is besides the point. Cats do not usually respond to Assigned Names. We know cats are aware of their own existence, but whether they "identify" themselves is another story. Cats rely on non-lingual expressions for most communication, and the general scientific community believe cats are animals which understand the word in a highly conceptualized manner (as in, without words). In this case, cats may not call themselves by a name, they may simply recognize their own existence as a conceptualized expression of the word "me".
In fact I didn't come across it until after today when I did an Internet search. However, I will have to admit how uncannily it fits in to what I've been saying with regards to Iacchus and the soul all along, almost as if it was "meant" to be that way.