I think that before you can ask where the soul comes from you have to define what a soul is?
People use the word “soul” a lot and they’re not really sure what they are referring to but it sounds spiritual so what the heck might as well use it.
The dictionary describes it as: "the immaterial part of a person; the actuating cause of an individual
Sounds like an emotion to me. People say “oh but surely there must be more to us than just our body.” Bzzzt Wrong! You can’t FACE THE TRUTH that there is not more to us than just our body and so you create a soul which comes to us when we are born and leaves us when we die. (Note: I’m personally not saying there isn’t a soul but its a common answer)
Do chimpanzees, our closest relatives, have souls? How does the soul get into us? Is it sent down from the heaven that doesn’t exist? How does it come out of us when we die? Why is there such a need for us to be more than the sum of all our parts?
If our ‘soul’ has been created by the society in which we live, it will be adaptable and change according to the way we live our life. This seems more reasonable that it being created by God, for that implies it to be a static part of a person… somewhat more purposeless.
i find the thought of utter mortality, (no soul, no afterlife, just life then death) quite comforting. i mean,
a) immortality would be boring
b) you’d get really tired and
c) wheres the comfort in thinking you go on living somewhere after you’ve died? its the end of your life. makes it more of a challenge to ‘‘make your life spectacular’’ (name the film)
on the other hand, there’re lots of goings on which can’t be explained. the ‘‘paranormal world’’ (not saying i believe in it, just saying its a theory), for example. and if it is just a theory and theres no truth to it, how can you explain all the weird happenings that … happen.
also, i’ve always wanted to know … if your ‘‘soul’’ just hangs about after you’re dead (refer to case of enfield poltergeist), whats going to happen when the earth is engulfed by the expanding sun and our world no longer exists? where do all the souls go?
if we have souls (being “higher beings”) and apes don’t, as some people believe, but you accept the idea of evolution, then at what stage from monkey–>man did we get a soul?
even tho i don’t believe in the after life, i don’t live by the moment, i don’t think we have souls, we are just a bunch of atoms that happened to fall into some sort of order a few billion years ago that started off life. and when we die thats it, you are just atoms, and thats all you will ever be. well thats just my thoughts
[This message has been edited by macca (edited 17 December 2001).]
my understanding of a soul is something which brings all our emotions together, teaches us right from wrong and our feelings towards other people… some may say our morals and our mind.
Most people would accept that they are selfish… most of what they do has some or a complete gain for themselves! So where does the feelings for other people come from? What is it that makes us feel compassion when we see a little child starving?
The dictionary definition says (as ben points out) ‘the actuating cause of a person’ the thing that makes us individual… our emotions or feelings that no-one else can see or understand.
Religious believers would say the soul lives on… the is no doubt at all the soul lives on… whether you belive it is in heaven on or the earth… THE SOUL DOES LIVE ON… it may be in your children or by what you achieved during your life… part of what made you and individual lives on in some form… something you have done WILL have affected others and consequently the soul must live on, whether it be a God given thing or a society thing.
Now personally i believe the soul is a religious gift that each person has but it is at the same time educated by society… this education in my view is bad. So in answer to the initial question a soul is both God given and society educated in my belief. And consequently it does change for each person due to their experiences however a Christian or a Muslim would have a code as to live their lives and re-educate their souls… in the bible and Koran.
So we have established that the soul is immortal, and that in my view Souls are always educated by society… the only difference would be that i believe they are God given and some do not. Yet again God and societies souls are not mutually exclusive…
(There you go richard… ps i thought you were gonna hit that girl when she niched your hat!)
Hmm...i'm not convinced that WE have established the soul is immortal. We haven't even established if the soul exists! Perhaps you have establised these things for yourself but you certainly haven't proved this to the world in your 10 line post.
I don't understand what you mean when you say the soul is "something which brings all of our emotions together." What does it mean to bring emotions together?
If our soul teaches us right from wrong why do we need scriptures such as the Bible? And why do we all have different views on what is right and what is wrong? It seems contradictory to say that your soul teaches you right from wrong and then say that the Bible teaches us morality.
Most eastern philosophers deny the existence of a permanent soul as well as many atheists. That is to say, atheists deny the existence of a soul, not that eastern philosophers deny the existence of many atheists [img]http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/ubb/wink.gif[/img].
So, there is really no evidence for a soul in the first place unless you define the soul as a group of emotions which is nothing more than...a group of emotions. If you're going to say that the soul is "something" then it just goes back to the problem of where does it come from when you are born and where does it go when you die?
[This message has been edited by ben (edited 18 December 2001).]
I don’t take words to literal. Mainly because the realm of human language can’t describe certain things. Some might think the soul is their spirit. Others it might not be. To me the soul refers to that part of me that speaks the word I. Is it my brain speaking the word I. And if so, why would my brain refer to itself as my brain when I am my brain? Make any sense. Before I knew my name, I knew who I was. Before I knew who to think the word I, I knew who I was.
If I am but energy going crazy in my brain, then that is what I am. Nothing but millions of thought. And that thought, that energy is my soul. Not something seperate from me, but actually me. If I lost all my limbs, I would still be me. I am that spark of energy in my brain, and to me that energy is the soul. Energy can’t be created nor destroyed, only transformed from one state to another. Isn’t that correct? And if so, where will my energy go?
Don’t tell me stories of heaven or hell, but it must transfer somewhere. Whether it transfers in a manner that I will be aware or not. If I cease to have thoughts after death, all that is left for time. To me the soul is nothing but energy. Just like the rest of the planet.
