No, really what is it? It doesn't do any thinking for you, the brain is solely responsible for that. That's why when you get brain damaged, you get stupid, the soul doesnt step in and take over. So, when you die and your soul goes wherever the hell you plan on going, What part of you goes and what is left behind? (and by "you" I mean your psyche)

the soul, from what i remember, (i may be wrong) is the breath of life that God breathed into man.. and it came from the bible... that pretty much explains why the soul never "steps in and takes over" http://www.gospelpreceptor.com/Robinso1.htm

that tells you some of what you asked, from a christian's perspective. but i really dont know much else, sorry bud.

Edit:http://www.wedie.org/afterlife.htm there's another link that might help you figure this out

[This message has been edited by Whatshername (edited 01-31-2004).]

The idea is, when you're alive your and bound by your bodies limits. If you cut an arm off you'll be limited to the use of one arm. If you cut your legs off, you'll have to live without walking. And if you get bashed in the head and half your brain is trurned to mush, thats soemthing you have to live with. The key word there being 'LIVE'. When you die uyou escape the bounds of your body. Your physical self is no longer in operation, so the 'soul' is what is left.

I guess you can think of it as an energy. It is you. Your soul knows what you know, has experienced what you've experienced, and has seen what you've seen. When you die, your body is no longer of use to your soul. It can no longer use your body to get around the physical world and experience it, so it escapes the body and enters the astral world [not that I know this is what happens when you die, its simply one of many possibilities].

You sould doesn't 'take over' when something happens to you [brain dammage for example] because it has bound itself to the limits of your body in order to experience the physical world. Its all or nothign when it comes to this. If you want to 'live' you have to 'live' by the limits of your body, and theres no way around it.

The soul is your container, it establishes the system for you to experience that which you wish to experience. It makes all possible possibilities as fact that happened, and tells you to choose the one that you would like to view in this form of space-time.

Riddle me this:

How can one tell the difference between a reality where souls exist and one where they do not?

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

Riddle me this:

How can one tell the difference between a reality where souls exist and one where they do not?

Answer: That reality wouldn't exist so in essence you couldn't really tell. As you have no experience measuring non-existance, when you exist.

Maybe I shouldn't be so existential?

quote:Originally posted by ilbastardoh:

Answer: That reality wouldn't exist



Or would it?

quote:

so in essence you couldn't really tell.



Yeah. Makes you wonder where the idea came from if there is nothing of substance to indicate the existence of a soul at all, doesn't it?

quote:

As you have no experience measuring non-existance, when you exist.



Yeah but this is not about the existence of the individual, but rather the existence of souls and if they are required to be a sentient being.

Obviously they are not required if they don't exist.

[This message has been edited by Dark_Magneto (edited 02-02-2004).]

quote:Originally posted by Dark_Magneto:

Or would it?



so in essence you couldn't really tell.



Yeah. Makes you wonder where the idea came from if there is nothing of substance to indicate the existence of a soul at all, doesn't it?

quote:

As you have no experience measuring non-existance, when you exist.



Yeah but this is not about the existence of the individual, but rather the existence of souls and if they are required to be a sentient being.

Obviously they are not required if they don't exist.

[This message has been edited by Dark_Magneto (edited 02-02-2004).]

This all depends on philosophical points of view. Determinists don't believe in a spirit because they don't believe in free choice. Existentialists do believe in a spirit because they believe your personal world is a making of your choice. In a way both are right and wrong, depending on your viewpoint. If you look at the world through individual experiences then you very much are in control, yet if you look at the world through the time that passes then ultimately an entire lifetime is measured as one occurance, and therefore no deviation from that occurance can logically occur.

To quote Obi-wan "..you'll find that a lot of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our point of view."

Experiment with Astral Projection if you have trouble believing in the idea of a soul. Though don't be surprised if you don't get anywhere with a skeptical attitude [not like you'd get instant results anyway].

quote:Originally posted by ilbastardoh:

This all depends on philosophical points of view. Determinists don't believe in a spirit because they don't believe in free choice. Existentialists do believe in a spirit because they believe your personal world is a making of your choice. In a way both are right and wrong, depending on your viewpoint.

i understand the soul to be just that... one's point of view.

quote:Originally posted by SEN D-F:

Experiment with Astral Projection if you have trouble believing in the idea of a soul. Though don't be surprised if you don't get anywhere with a skeptical attitude [not like you'd get instant results anyway].

I prefer magnetic stimulation of the sections of the brain responsible for religious/out-of-body experiences.

It's much easier to do and doesn't require a great deal of meditation, focus, or training. Manually stimulating your own brain is much more complicated and time-consuming. I just go in the lab for a quickie and I'm out in 45 minutes and taking care of affairs on the itinerary.

when you hear stevie ray vaughan pull some crazy ass shit that no man could do...

thats not him playin

thats his soul

soul is the little bit of God that people have

The soul is a low level energy field. Since all matter has energy (E=MC2) all things have a "soul". A sentient soul is something a little different. A rock is made up of matter, but you've never seen a rock make a choice....or maybe it chooses to sit there and not move, who knows what motivates rocks... anyway, a sentient soul is able to make choices and affect outcomes on other "souls". When a body suffers brain damage, the sentient part of the soul is released, but since matter, and hence energy remains, there is still a soul there. When a body dies altogether, the energy departs the body gradually. The first thing noticed is the cooling of the skin (loss of thermal energy) Its a gradual process that never quite stops because the matter/energy are recycled infinitely as the body decomposes. So, does the "sentient" soul go to heaven? The higher, more organized energies are capable of mingling with similar higher energies and even recognizing energies they have met before. Heaven? Could be. Does the soul stay in heaven? Nah, its recycled too. It comes back and is reunited with matter in another form, rock, tree, human, whatever. The energy goes in one big circle, so remember, what goes around, comes around. Evil in this life is carried beyond...and also, for that matter, is good.

quote:Originally posted by afrodeeziak87:

when you hear stevie ray vaughan pull some crazy ass shit that no man could do...

thats not him playin

thats his soul

soul is the little bit of God that people have

Yeah man, soul is where you zone out for a few minutes, do something absolutely amazing without trying, and then suddenly think to yourself "What the fuck did I just do?"

You question is one with an answer none of mankind could give you a concrete answer on.

No man knows for sure. But I think Men should be studied because life starts in us.

If not the whole answer, part of the answer definately resides in Men.

I think your soul is what makes you different from everyone else. It just carries the essence of who you are. Meaning your personality, what you knew, everything that makes you, you. Everything that biology has no effect on. Which is very little, because our emotions are caused by bodily chemicals.

It's obvious that if my belief of what a soul is, is true. Then all life forms don't have souls.

Microbial life, does not have brains, so personality does not apply to them. But they do indeed live. So whatever a soul is, it shouldn't be confused with what makes us live.

quote:Originally posted by ---Beany---:

Yeah man, soul is where you zone out for a few minutes, do something absolutely amazing without trying, and then suddenly think to yourself "What the fuck did I just do?"

No, that's called the subconcious. It's when you practice for somthing and you get so good at it that your body is able to do it automatically. Like touchtyping, fluently speaking a language, or being Jimmy Page. Footballers (English ones) don't think about what they're doing, which is why a lot of intelligent people are crap at sports; they think about it too much.

A soul is what the people that established religions all those years ago used to explain the way that humans (and in the case of some religions, animals) seem to have some spark of life that can't be controlled by simple physical biology. In more englightened times, we know how really fantastic the brain is and that this apparent spark of life is a result of it's complex and highly developed network of tiny, tiny neurons. There are those that still cling desperately to the idea of a soul, because they're afraid to admit that life has no meaning, and some try to describe it in scientific terms as an "energy field". Where the hell did this idea of "energy" as some mystical thing come from? Is that saying that if you keep me warm after I die, my soul is still present? Do power plants have a soul? If I break the solar panel on my calculator am I a murderer?

Your wrong! I like my soul! its real!!

A really good link on the soul and mind and it's relation to matter. The soul is the brain and nothing more: Here's the proof! (http://www.abarnett.demon.co.uk/atheism/brain.html)

quote:Originally posted by Diokhan:

No, really what is it? It doesn't do any thinking for you, the brain is solely responsible for that. That's why when you get brain damaged, you get stupid, the soul doesnt step in and take over. So, when you die and your soul goes wherever the hell you plan on going, What part of you goes and what is left behind? (and by "you" I mean your psyche)

"Some look at the soul as amazing,

some describe soul as amazing, and

some hear of soul as amazing,

while others,

even after hearing about soul,

cannot understand soul at all"

Bhagavad-gita 2.29

"It's a very simple matter. There is an active principle which makes the body move; when it is absent, the body no longer moves. So the real question is,

"What is the active principle?"

(Srila Prabhupada)

Namaste http://www.totse.com/bbs/smile.gif (http://www.totse.com/bbs/smile.gif)

'soul' is nothing more than an interchangable word for 'personality'