Hawkingfan

Ok, I'll change it. Everything (yes, everything) in this universe is some form of matter (mass or energy) and gives off electromagnetic radiation. That is a scientific fact. We can detect much of the radiation. That is another scientific fact.

It is inconclusive if dark matter exists. Many physicists believe it doesn't. There are alternative explanations to its indirect evidence. Better?

So we are back to the questions--How are you so sure the soul exists? And what proof do you have that it is a form of energy?

yguy

To me, this is like saying a blind person is less conscious than a sighted one. All you're talking about here is perception of the environment. Consciousness is perception by the self of its own existence, first and foremost. I have yet to see evidence that this is a strictly neurological phenomenon. Even in an alcholic stupor, one can be aware of being in a stupor.

If free will is an outgrowth of intelligence, why is it that so many intelligent people are slaves?

This is absurd. You might as well say a Cray supercomputer is closer to free will than a Pentium.

No one has yet presented a shred of evidence that self-awareness has anything to do with intelligence. Again, there are plenty of intelligent people who have completely forgotten who they are.

Not at all, because it's a fault he could do nothing about. You can't blame him any more than you can blame a rabid dog.

All that tells us is that the end result is not easily predictable. There is no hint of any capacity on the part of the perp to mitigate damages.

Sure, but the problem is that a mindset that accepts determinism will always be vulnerable to the clever rationalizations of those who desire to act irresponsibly, as the recent history of American jurisprudence has clearly shown. Under such a paradigm, an act of pedophilia can never be wrong, only contrary to societal consenus. Anything resembling punishment for it is therefore unjust, in which case you are left the alternatives of letting such people run free or somehow forcibly modifying their behavior through brain implants or some such. Then you open the door to a Brave New World populated by soulless lumps of flesh.

Swell. How would you redefine it so as to avoid the problems I've described?

Why should that be? When you were a kid, did you think opening Christmas presents was boring because your parents knew what they were?

Hawkingfan

Even though I have not been challenged to, I'll go ahead and defend myself for calling the following a straw man:

From The Atheist Web, Logic and Fallacies page and used as an example of a straw man:

"To be an atheist, you have to believe with absolute certainty that there is no God. In order to convince yourself with absolute certainty, you must examine all the Universe and all the places where God could possibly be. Since you obviously haven't, your position is indefensible."

This could be rephrased for our use as, "To be (someone who does not believe in the soul), you have to believe with absolute certainty that there is no (soul). In order to convince yourself with absolute certainty, you must (have the ability to) examine all the Universe and all the places where (the soul) could possibly be. Since obviously (we do not have the technology to do so), your position is indefensible."

Let's compare that with what you said.

You: "Lack of evidence does not make something false."
similar to: "To be (someone who does not believe in the soul), you have to believe with absolute certainty that there is no (soul)." (lack of evidence being relatively = not absolutely certain)

You: "Perhaps at a later date, when we are more technologically advanced and have more knowledge, we could detect a soul."
similar to: "you must (have the ability to) examine all the Universe and all the places where (the soul) could possibly be."

You: "In the present, thought, we may either not yet have the ability to detect it, or we've detected it but attributed its qualities to something else"
similar to: "Since obviously (we do not have the technology to do so), your position is indefensible."

Straw man, IM very HO.

SimplyAtheistic

I have yet to see any evidence that this is a phenomenon caused by a mythical soul which men have so quickly fabricated. Then again, I have yet to see a concrete definition of a soul, so evidence to support it might be hard to find. The fact is, all evidence points toward consciousness being a mental function, and just because we are lacking in certain areas of research does not mean we need to invent this "soul", whatever it is, to explain things.

This really makes no sense. They are slaves by choice, and they think about their situation. They are told to work or die, they choose to work. If they had strictly automatic nervous reflexes, then maybe they would lack free will.

Except that a computer has a different structure than a brain. It is like comparing apples and oranges. But wait, I don't have a link to support this so I must be lying

Heh, it is funny you can continue to say there has not been a shred of evidence presented. The reality is there has been a heap of evidence presented, you just choose to reject it. And forgetting who you are has nothing to do with self-awarness, because you are still aware that you are something, you just aren't sure who.

Again, our courts don't care if he can be blamed, they care if he is a threat.

Well, we ARE soulless lumps of flesh, but thats not the problem
We have a perception of free will, and though it may have been determined by physics, we live in a world that accepts free will due to the ability to directly influence someone. That influence may have been pre-determined, but who cares? And again, our courts aren't here to determine what is wrong or evil.

Why redefine it? Justice is justice whether it is a pre-determined event or the results of a random chance.

You are missing the point, it is no less depressing, as humans won't know the future either way.
Jake

yguy

Jake, I don't know why you responded to a post directed at Lobstrosity rather than one directed at you, but I won't respond until you answer my last post to you.

Aradia

Yes. The way I'm using it, "indirectly" detecting something would be detecting something affected by something else, and attributing it to the something else.

Aradia

Much better. Thank you. Now, all we have to do is get you to rearrange some of your terms: everything in this universe is some form of *energy*. Matter is mass-energy. Massless energy is not matter. But we can work on that later.

You haven't actually read anything I wrote, did you? I don't believe that souls exist. I have no proof that it is a form of energy, except for the very obvious fact that if they do exist, they must be some form of energy, since everything that exists is one form of energy or another.

Aradia

You won't be able to, because I didn't write it as a straw man. I do not, as a rule, use logical fallacies. So let's see what's wrong with your defense, shall we?

Are you just pulling this stuff out of your ass? What I wrote above was meant to point out that you cannot use lack of evidence as proof. Argumentum ad ignorantium. It's a logical fallacy. I was talking about truth, not belief. You can believe whatever you want, just as I can. And lack of evidence does not make something true, either. If I believed in a soul, it would be just that: belief. Lack of contrary evidence would not make it true. You're losing points quickly.

Not at all. I was making a conditional statement to back up my previous statement regarding use of argumentum ad ignorantium. Nothing more.

Yet another conditional statement to show fallacious logic using argumentum ad ignorantium. You've pretty much lost any hope of being taken seriously by me, if for no other reason than the fact that you seem to have no idea what I was pointing out.

*Argumentum ad ignorantium*. Look it up. Then maybe you'll see what I was trying to point out. Or do you just like to point out logical fallacies when theists try to use them, in hopes that nobody will point out when you use them? Here it is, in a nutshell:

One cannot claim as truth that a soul does not exist, without any evidence to support such a claim. One cannot claim as truth that a soul does exist, without any evidence to support such a claim.

Aradia

You're absolutely correct. Surprise, surprise.

You have just shot down your own belief that free will doesn't exist. Make up your mind, then choose your words more carefully. Either free will exists, and we have choice, or free will doesn't exist, and we don't have choice. You can't have it both ways.

Huh. Interesting. I could've sworn you previously tried to compare brains to computers.


Also, for both Jake and yguy:

You should both probably drop the court system analogy. It has absolutely no bearing on free will, existence of a soul, or anything else being discussed in this thread. Jake will win, and yguy will lose. Period. The courts don't care about why somebody committed a crime (except in cases that would warrant incarceration in a mental institution). That isn't their job. Let's get back to talking about souls, shall we? Much more interesting than the court system.

Aradia

Since some of the posters in this thread seem to be a bit confused about my stance, I'll point it out for everyone:

1) I do not believe in souls.
2) I am not defending the existence of souls, I am defending a model for how souls could work *based on the premise* that they exist.

The subject is "What is a soul", and that is why I came to this thread. I was begging the question of existence in order to answer the question of "What is a soul". I am *not* discussing the actual existence, I am only discussing the mechanism by which a soul *could* work.

So quit trying to debate me like I'm a theist. I'm not, and I don't debate like theists.