Thoughts on the definition of Soul

[Atlas]

Soul is a term bandied about hereabouts. It usually means the Ascendant Soul or that part that goes on 'On High' after death. It is held close that a believer's faith is what makes the Soul ascendant. Incorrect faith or no faith yields a hideous result.

For unbelievers today, this idea may be derisively spelled: A$$endant Soul. For without proof of it's existence one is an a$$ to blindly accept it. The Faithful may coopt this spelling for it's directional implication on those they impose the hellish consequence. I am speaking of the Descendant Soul which long preceded it's Ascendant partner.

That was a time when, upon death, all were shades who descended into the madness of the underworld, the rule of Hades. A very few escaped this fate. But for the rest, a drink from the river Lethe and we were gone.

For me, there is as much proof of this unpleasant outcome as for the more pleasant outcome of ascension.

There is another possibility as well. The circular path of Soul. It is the Returning Soul. Passing out and then back into existence into whatever shape that Karma demands. It has, for me, a truer hypothetical underpinning in that you might be able to prove that the Dalai Lama is a reincarnation, since he is manifest in our objective reality. I can hardly imagine how that would be done, however.

Finally, there is the Transcendent Soul which operates only in the physical world and follows the corpse to the grave or gravitates toward some unknown ultimate. It arises out our awareness of objective reality through a process of: appreciation. It takes in the sunsets and the night sky and expresses itself in the poetry, art, and all the great works of man. It is unquestionably real in it's feelings and it's acts.

These are my 'definitions'. I offer them because of my innate need for a soul of high sound. Around here, I sometimes feel trapped between an idea of man with an afterlife soul or no soul at all. Self esteem is an attribute I believe is naturally selected for. For me, not having a soul strangely decreased self esteem. In the idea of the Transcendent Soul, I reclaim it and seek to promote an avenue for the increase of it in others.

Your thoughts are welcomed.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Why does having a soul make you feel better? Specifically.

~~ Paul

[Abdul Alhazred]

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
Why does having a soul make you feel better?

The soul is the individual self. No I don't think it's immortal.

If I didn't have a soul, I wouldn't be 'I'.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos
Why does having a soul make you feel better? Specifically.

~~ Paul It is as much a how as a why.

Soul is a phrase we come into contact with every day.Those with an ascendant soul let it drift past like a comforting summer wind.

If I had children, (I don't), I would want them to experience the word with a positive impact rather than waste intellectual energy in the denial of it. I wasted intellectual energy.

I don't wish anyone to think of themselves as a talking meatbag unless that is how they wish to see themselves. We are incredible beings and our language should reflect that. When it does we see ourselves differently. So I adapt language and concept for it's positve impact on my idea of myself.

[Upchurch]

This is from the dictionary, but it's my favorite and, IMHO, the best definition of "soul": music that originated in black American gospel singing, is closely related to rhythm and blues, and is characterized by intensity of feeling and earthiness

edited to add:

To answer Paul's question: Having soul makes me feel better because it stirs primal emotions that maybe you don't get to feel throughout the day.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Upchurch
This is from the dictionary, but it's my favorite and, IMHO, the best definition of "soul":
music that originated in black American gospel singing, is closely related to rhythm and blues, and is characterized by intensity of feeling and earthiness
I might have guessed it would be you who would 'improve' my definitions. I am trying to steer a different path than Lifegazer. You know this and you pick on me because you know I cannot prove my definition.;)

[Upchurch]

Originally posted by Atlas

I might have guessed it would be you who would 'improve' my definitions. Heh. Sorry.

Joking aside, I think the soul is an artificial construct used, in a variety of ways, to protect humans from certain ideas that are scary. Primarily, "what happens when we die?"

edited to add:
Stupid real life. I got a call in the middle of this post and totally lost my train of thought.

I wanted to add that we use the idea of a soul not only to protect us from scary ideas but also to help explain things like "Who am I?" and "Why am I the way I am?" Much like "God" was invented to explain aspects of the universe we humans didn't understand at the time.

[jimlintott]

Do other animals have souls too?

Could you dumb down your definition? I must confess to being completely unable to understand what you are talking about.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by jimlintott
Do other animals have souls too?

Could you dumb down your definition? I must confess to being completely unable to understand what you are talking about.
For me, the Transcendent Soul is as conceptual as it is real. To the extent an animal can appreciate the concept, it participates in it.

This is different from the Ascendent Soul of a cute little kitty cat, whose reality, I'm sure, you already know.

I originally tried to work out the concept here (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=35034&perpage=1&pagenumber=103) (I wish I knew how to identify individual posts better). I don't know if it helps though.

[neutrino_cannon]

There are some for whom speech upon any subject will be cause to remember their favorite author's words. I am so cursed.

Anywho, I was immediatly reminded once again of Carl Sagan, who did pen in The Demon Haunted World that the root of the word "spirit" is latin for air, thus the word asperate.

Is there any reason to believe that the "spirit" or soul if you want, is anything but matter? Complicated, squishy matter, but still matter.

There's a part of us wired for enjoyment. I'm actually very happy about that, else life would be a far less enjoyable experience. actually, life would be un-enjoyable. Not necessarily unbearable or pointless, just unenjoyable.

I'd have to go with the idea of a transcendant soul in some or another form here. The brain is a wonderful, wonderful thing. Whatever part of me feels good when I talk to a friend, or whatever part of John Lennon came up with music (not necessarily corresponding parts), I'd say is a good thing.

[Abdul Alhazred]

Originally posted by jimlintott
Do other animals have souls too?


While I don't believe in personal immortality at all, your soul is that which is aware of its own existence.

As for other animals, only telepathy could absolutely prove anything. So too, humans other than yourself.

As a non-solipsist who settles for plausible inference when absolute proof is not available, I make some plausible inferences:

<ul>
Other people than me have souls.

So too, most animals with a central nervous system. Mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish.

Not sure about arthropods, gastropods, cephalopods.

Not plants, microbes, annelids.

[/list]

Dinosaurs are large extinct flightless birds, so they had souls. :p

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Abdul Alhazred
...your soul is that which is aware of its own existence.
Succinctly put.
It's causing some dissonance.
I am apt to abstract it one level.
Your soul is that which is aware that it is aware of its own existence.

This pulls it back to a smaller subset.
I'm not ready to solidify it in my definition, however.
I'd hate to find out I was a speciesist deep in my soul.


Yes, it is in appreciating our awareness of our reality that Transcendent Soul arises.

A dog rolls in doo. He is aware of it. He appreciates it. But I doubt he appreciates that he is aware of it.

[Abdul Alhazred]

Originally posted by Atlas

Succinctly put.
It's causing some dissonance.
I am apt to abstract it one level.
Your soul is that which is aware that it is aware of its own existence.

This pulls it back to a smaller subset.

I'm not sure that this is a useful distinction, or a smaller subset, or even meaningful. But I have to think about it for a while. I'll try to be back.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Abdul Alhazred


I'm not sure that this is a useful distinction, or a smaller subset, or even meaningful. But I have to think about it for a while. I'll try to be back.

You caught me Abdul,

I was going to add a second edit to the effect that...

It is doubtful that a dog could have a thought like, "I know in my soul I am enjoying this roll." But behaviorally that's how he acts.

Have I reached a distinction without a difference?

I've said elsewhere that conciousness springs from concept formation which I tie directly to language - words have conceptual meaning. This is ingrained deeply. It is a point I need to revisit. I've said in this thread that the Transcendent Soul is as conceptual as it is real.

Any help on how I resolve this? Perhaps I need a different example.


Now I think again that the dog must appreciate the relative wonderfulness of today's roll. And be able to compare it to a bowl of warm dog chow to reach the essence of Transcendent Soul.

I'm getting hungry.

[jimlintott]

For me, the Transcendent Soul is as conceptual as it is real.

Sorry, you kind of lost me there. Could you explain or demonstrate how something can be as conceptual as it is real?

What about ugly kitty cats?

Aren't you people really making life over complicated? Why does it have to be more than aquiring food, a mate and a suitable environment to live in?

When I get hungry is that my soul speaking to me?

[Abdul Alhazred]

Originally posted by Atlas


You caught me Abdul,

I was going to add a second edit to the effect that...

It is doubtful that a dog could have a thought like, "I know in my soul I am enjoying this roll." But behaviorally that's how he acts.

Have I reached a distinction without a difference?


That's pretty much what I had in mind.


I've said elsewhere that conciousness springs from concept formation which I tie directly to language - words have conceptual meaning. This is ingrained deeply. It is a point I need to revisit. I've said in this thread that the Transcendent Soul is as conceptual as it is real.


I definitely reject the tie to language. Chomsky-crapola I call it, and I studied Chomsky pretty deeply in college.

As for the rest, I can find no meaning in it, but I'm ready to be enlightened if possible.


Any help on how I resolve this? Perhaps I need a different example.

I'm still at a loss, but I am thinking about it. Maybe later.

[Iacchus]

Originally posted by Atlas

Incorrect faith or no faith yields a hideous result. Actually it has less to do with faith than the life that you lead. Heck, even all you atheists believe in morals don't you? In which respect if you maintain a certain amount of consistency with what you believe -- morally that is -- then what's the big deal?

While here I think more than anything, the Golden Rule applies.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by jimlintott


Sorry, you kind of lost me there. Could you explain or demonstrate how something can be as conceptual as it is real?

What about ugly kitty cats?

Aren't you people really making life over complicated? ...

A cat is real. the word C-A-T is real. I have concepts of both the word cat and the real ugly kitty cat.

Why does it have to be more than aquiring food, a mate and a suitable environment to live in?

It doesn't. Life can be appreciated merely as the pleasures of the flesh. In that regard we do make life over complicated

But for those who enjoy pleasures of the mind, there is an enrichment to be had, or so we feel.
This may be the source of the difficulty you express. We take pleasure in thinking about why we enjoy what we enjoy, why we enjoy thinking about what we think about who we are. It not the same as the thrill of the putting green but it tells us something anyway.

[Interesting Ian]

Originally posted by neutrino_cannon


Is there any reason to believe that the "spirit" or soul if you want, is anything but matter? Complicated, squishy matter, but still matter.


Yes indeed there is. What does it mean to say that love, hope, despair, joy, intentions and all other phenomenological conscious states and experiences are simply various chemical or neural states in the brain? What does it mean to say they are one and the very same thing? Is it less ludicrous than saying an elephant is one and the very same thing as a cheese sandwich? More generally, what does it mean to say that X is really Y when there is only, at most, a correlation between X states and Y states?

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Abdul Alhazred
I definitely reject the tie to language. Chomsky-crapola I call it, and I studied Chomsky pretty deeply in college.

I know absolutely nothing of Chomsky. I think my Word/Concept union comes from something I took from Objectivism. But I couldn't swear to that. I don't know that philosophy that deeply. So if anybody knows I could use a hint.

Abdul, I added an edit to my post around the time you were posting. It extended my example.

Now I think again that the dog must appreciate the relative wonderfulness of today's roll. And be able to compare it to a bowl of warm dog chow to reach the essence of Transcendent Soul.

That is according to my definition. I am having trouble now. I didn't want to go this deep into the soul of the dog. Let's stop if you don't mind. We're sure to hit this topic again as time goes by.

[jimlintott]

The word cat and the word chat, even though they are from different languages are both nouns that describe the same thing. This soul thing you speak of is a noun but doesn't describe something as real as a cat. It only refers to a concept. Again, I ask that you demonstrate or explain how something can be as conceptual as it is real? Cats were real before humans invented language.

Your pleasures of the mind seem more like intellectual masturbation to me. You have become overly involved in the orgasmic pleasure of your own thoughts to the extent of missing the point. Why does a soul, or self awareness or id or whatever you want to call it need to be more than the innate need of food, sex and shelter?

[Atlas]

Originally posted by jimlintott
I ask that you demonstrate or explain how something can be as conceptual as it is real?
I don't know that I can to your satisfaction. Perhaps another example... Deja vu is a concept that some people have an experience of.

My concept of Transcendent Soul is something I feel I have had an experience of.

Hunger, yearning these are feeling concepts. Some people have them. I think all these feelings are real.

Why does a soul, or self awareness or id or whatever you want to call it need to be more than the innate need of food, sex and shelter?
It doesn't. I think you're asking if you can define it that way just as I 'defined' several different versions of the word above. If you find value there, cool. My post is saying that there was less value there, for me, than choosing a definition that included appreciation of sunsets, poetry, and the great things of man.

[Atlas]

Abdul Alhazred and jimlintott have shared thoughts of soul that were not addressed in my opening post. In that post I introduced my concept of Transcendent Soul by contrasting it with three other perspectives. Those perspectives were eternal soul perspectives of Ascendent, Descendent and Recurring Soul. I'm realizing now that my 'definitions' were too few.

Upchurch reminds us (above) of a likely origin for soul, to protect humans from certain ideas that are scary. Primarily, "what happens when we die?" Beyond that it helps explain things like "Who am I?" and "Why am I the way I am?" Much like "God" was invented to explain aspects of the universe we humans didn't understand

You may think of other questions that Soul addresses. I've wondered where does the soul reside. For each question your perspective of soul will provide you with a different answer. Those answers will soothe or scare or make your heart soar. That is, each of the answers will be of differing value. In this thread I am attempting to give names to the different perspectives. Furthermore, by way of full disclosure, I have said that I assign highest value to the concept I call Transcendent Soul.

It's all Subjective Reality stuff. But that's who we are (in our own mind anyway). Certainly it's not a bad thing to latch onto a word like Soul for exploration into what we think about who we are. It appears even more fluid than I originally thought and I expect that there are other perspectives I am still missing. These first two may seem strange in that they seem to exist outside of an organism. I've tried to word it so they don't but it wouldn't bother me that others believe they do; eternal soul spends more time outside the organism than inside. Anyway, here are my additional thoughts with my names for the 'definitions' of Soul.

The Gaia Soul is the poet and animist's projected overlay on the inanimate world. The 4 winds, Mt. Fuji, the spirit of the river. In tales of the land of the North, no one personifies this soul of nature better than Robert Service. The Gaia Soul is a projection of subjective reality giving life to the ordinary objects around us.

The Chimeric Soul is the projection of subjective reality giving life to the unreal world. These are the ghosts, the monsters in your closet, the demons in the form of animals, and the undead. The Chimeric Soul is a tribute to the mind's willingness to work overtime to bring to us fear out of the heart of darkness. Perhaps this projection is the anti Gaia. This is the soul everyone will say they don't believe in but knock on wood to be sure.

The Essential Soul is Life itself and indistinguishable from it. Trees and worms have it... every living thing. This is different from a projection. It is an identification with the life force and it's urges. jimlintott may have this perspective. Though he also rejects the need for an additional descriptive term for the life force like soul.

The Sentient Soul is what Abdul Alhazred described: An awareness of one's own existence. The soul is this awareness. Animals and people are (or have) sentient souls.

I'll now repeat the list from my opening post in shorthand.

The Descendent Soul is an eternal soul whose destination was Hades until Dante and Scripture made it Hell. Let me add that in some ideas of Judgement Day these collected souls are cast into the Lake of Fire which is the second death and their eternal torment comes to an end. Others believe eternal punishment lasts longer.

The Ascendent Soul is an eternal soul whose destination is heavenly for those whose Morality, Grace, and Faith blend to the satisfaction of God.

The Returning Soul is eternally reincarnated under the rule of karma which allows escape from that torment upon attaining a state of perfected soul.

The Transcendent Soul is not eternal with a known destination. It is that which apprehends, appreciates, and creates in the world around it. Like the others mentioned, it offers a conceptual perspective of the Self. It contemplates the universe and it's own place therein in self referential celebration. It is the child of human language and feelings and the father of science, philosophy, art and religion.

Thoughts, additions and corrections are welcomed.

[evildave]

"My Soul" is simply a synonym for "Me". So, asking people "What is a soul?" boils down to "How do you define yourself?" There are plenty of different answers to this.

The simplest version of "I" that I can think of would be things that are aware of their presence in the world. This makes "I think" optional for "therefore I am". Thinking the way *most* humans do it can be different and more structured than the way that most animals go about it. The fact that animals don't have a vocabulary for "I" doesn't mean that what we call "I" doesn't exist for them. It's simply less structured compared to the "I" that developed in most humans through years and decades of training, since birth.

Most people don't even realise that they were trained to be "human". Many don't even recognize that they are training their own children to be "human", and that part of that training is how to train themselves. A pity, that. I would consider self-training the most important kind of training. It's the kind that carries on no matter where a person goes, what they do, and who they meet. This definition of "human" differs, according to culture, but the human training, though different in details, occurs in all. Don't think so? Consider all the historic cultures that didn't consider (and many still don't consider) certain other humans to be "human". Once you've established that "humans" (like you) are special, and that those other talking, programmable primates are NOT "humans" (like you), it's easy to classify them among cattle, pests, etc., and start thinking about "solutions". It's very, very easy to forget that other people are humans at certain times. Especially when this part of your training is lacking, or has been trained out of you.


On "immortality" of "you"...

Compose yourself a nice long, text post and turn off the computer instead of saving it, or pressing the 'submit' button. Or, if you'd like a more "conclusive" test, blast the computer several times with a shotgun, or beat it to bits with a big hammer. ("Sacrifice" it.)

Where did your text go? The "Great Bit Bucket In The Sky"? Did you just email it to your "God"? Or did it go to a "Hell" for not having accepted a personal savior? (There is a /dev/hell for certain OS distributions; you copy or echo something to /dev/hell, and it goes nowhere....)

As far as I can tell, the state expressed by charges held in those microscopic capacitors (for 99+% of computers, it's DRAM with a much smaller SRAM cache in and/or near the CPU) simply bled out to ground state when the refresh stopped happening. Your text was simply destroyed. At least, that's what electronic theory tells me, and that's what your computer was built based on.

I have no evidence or working model for a soul "going on" in any way after the brain that apparently maintains it is destroyed. The electrical signals grow erratic and stop, the various specialised cells and structures stop working, and are irreversibly (for now) destroyed. The whole brain is just so much carrion within a short time of oxygen and nutrient enriched, filtered, low-CO2 BLOOD at a specific range of temperature stops flowing through it; a slightly longer, but finite time if it's very cold.

Just have a look at all of that *marvelous* evidence that's been collected over the centuries of scientific study of brain injuries, brain diseases and disorders, including working, healthy brains. Fairly conclusive evidence that there is a physical basis for memory, behavior, emotions, love, anger and any other property you'd care to assign to "souls" or "beings" or whatever else you'd like to call it. Most effective treatments, surgeries, etc. have been devised based on theories that treat various expressed symptoms as having a physical cause. Few effective treatments have emerged from having a "spiritual" cause. Few enough to give random chance a vigorous nod.

Let's take a nice, ultra-mystified (by our culture) emotion as an example. Would you "love" your own family if you couldn't remember or recognize them? Some strange person that you can not remember ever meeting before comes in and starts talking to you in a familiar way? Ever dealt with alzheimer and/or stroke victims? The ones that don't know their own family members? "Get AWAY from me! Who ARE you?" (At least the ones that can speak intelligibly, react to people; if not in these words, in this body language....)

Could you still "love" your "Jesus" if your brain was addled to the point that it couldn't recognize what a "Jesus" was? It wouldn't take much. Troubling issue, there. Dying without a "Jesus in your heart". At least for Christians who believe that way. Fortunately for them, they are very creative in their rationalizations. They only really have to convince themselves after all, and they're demonstrably "easy marks" on many points.