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The soul

OrderOfTheCaelifera

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Break an egg, leave it out for a day and try to get it back together again. If you can't, it doesn't mean that it has a soul. We're very complicated eggs.

That must be one gigantic egg to be able to compare it to the human body.
Why not compare a recently fertilized human egg within a uterus to whatever egg you're referring to?

So you've broken your egg, left it out for a day & can't put Humpty the egg back together again.
Suzy Jane was recently impregnated, she's late for work one morning & driving her vehicle erratically which causes her to crash the vehicle she's driving. During that crash her abdomen impacts the steering wheel violently, causing irreparable damage to her fertilized egg within her uterus. That "broken egg" will likely end up in the toilet next month without her ever being aware that she was pregnant.

IMO there's very little difference between the destruction of the two eggs except that the egg in your scenario is likely the type fertilized externally & human eggs are fertilized internally but it's a better comparison rather than a seed of life vs a fully grown body.

Just saying "Apples to Apples" rather than apples to watermelons.
 

Totenkindly

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renaiziphonts

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Perhaps a better comparison to the soul, would be a consciousness. Instead of the "irreparable egg" think of the flow of electricity through your neurons.This electrical current is the continuing flow of your thoughts and while your brain has a burnt in pattern that is your personality and your memories and who you are to others, but the flow of electricity is your consciousness. You are only aware because it flows constantly back and fourth. The moment it stops who you are right now is gone. If you were to die, you would be gone to your self.
Perhaps I can pop a new spark into your brain and return the personality and memories, and you would be returned to us, but the new you would only have a copy of the consciousness.

That is generally considered a scientific fact. Maybe there is more than just the spark that is your consciousness. In my opinion the electric current and your soul are the two energies that make you you to yourself.
 

Totenkindly

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Perhaps a better comparison to the soul, would be a consciousness. Instead of the "irreparable egg" think of the flow of electricity through your neurons.This electrical current is the continuing flow of your thoughts and while your brain has a burnt in pattern that is your personality and your memories and who you are to others, but the flow of electricity is your consciousness. You are only aware because it flows constantly back and fourth. The moment it stops who you are right now is gone. If you were to die, you would be gone to your self.
Perhaps I can pop a new spark into your brain and return the personality and memories, and you would be returned to us, but the new you would only have a copy of the consciousness.

That is generally considered a scientific fact. Maybe there is more than just the spark that is your consciousness. In my opinion the electric current and your soul are the two energies that make you you to yourself.


It's an interesting idea.

How does sleep work in context of this?
(That was the first thing that came to mind.)
 

renaiziphonts

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It's an interesting idea.

How does sleep work in context of this?
(That was the first thing that came to mind.)
Sleep isn't the loss of consciousness, it is the loss of communication with the body. It's a good question though, Freud and Jung both took a lot of effort to answer that one, because loss of total consciousness defied several sleep studies that they had completed.
 

jixmixfix

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The soul and the consciousness are both holding the same role, in some cases. Perhaps there isn't a soul, but the human body could not be turned back on. The moment we are brain dead, the electrical synapses of our brain cease to exist, and even if a new set took it's place with the exact same encoded knowledge, you would be gone.
A better way of thinking of this, is if I made a robot that thought and acted and looked just like you, and you died, would you live on as that robot, or would the robot just mimic you?

I, however, do believe in the soul. Not sure about a god, and I don't need proof. It just makes sense.

This is a good point and what I'm been trying to get at, thanks for sharing.
 

jixmixfix

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I'd respectfully disagree regarding souls being a theological construct that can't be scientifically proven.
When I went through my questioning religion phase I occasionally pondered similar ideas. I eventually decided that the soul was biological rather than spiritual, it's the combining of the energy within the sperm & egg which leads to the creation of the soul.
IMO souls are biological reality that could be proven were science to combine an egg/sperm within an artificial womb & carefully observe the instant the combined energy sparked the creation of new life.
I think that after the energy from the parental donors is combined & a new DNA map is determined, there's a spark of life that selects coding to become biological software. The soul is that "life force" that snaps into existence an instant prior to the initialization of cellular division.
I think that every living thing complex enough to have DNA must also have a soul.

Why does it have to be combining the sperm and the egg, both can be alive in their own right both can contain a soul. The sperm has a tail that needs to find it's way into the ovum.
 

OrderOfTheCaelifera

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Please quantify this "energy of combining the sperm and egg."
I'm not a research biologist or geneticist, but how difficult could it be to determine the number of calories within both sperm & ova? Biologist could then convert the known combined calories to kW-h & figure an average.


Please quantify this "spark of life" and/or "life force that snaps into existence." Where does it come from? What is it? Why does it come into existence? How do we detect it?
As I suggested above, biologists could measure the caloric content of both sperm/ova & convert the known calories to kW-h. I've no idea how much energy to subtract due to both consumption while the combined donor DNA is arranged into a new 3-dimensional digital blueprint for the new life & the energy required to select a biological software program that initiates cellular division likely within the first day or two.
There has to be sufficient energy to power cellular division for at least a week because there's likely no energy transfer from the mother's body to the fertilized ova until after it attaches to the uterus.



There was talk of a "death code" being embodied in the cell and once it gets triggered, cell death occurs.

Of course, death can occur for other kinds of reasons as well on the large scale.

Death code sounds like something out of Blade Runner.
Wouldn't a death code require energy in order to function?
If not wouldn't that violate the laws of nature (no free lunch type of thing)?

I think that I'll stick to my guns on this one, that upon death the life force no longer enables cellular division & that causes the body to begin decaying. Unless you're alluding there's residual energy remaining with the body which enables cellular activity after death, I don't get how a death code would function.
 

renaiziphonts

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I'm not a research biologist or geneticist, but how difficult could it be to determine the number of calories within both sperm & ova? Biologist could then convert the known combined calories to kW-h & figure an average.



As I suggested above, biologists could measure the caloric content of both sperm/ova & convert the known calories to kW-h. I've no idea how much energy to subtract due to both consumption while the combined donor DNA is arranged into a new 3-dimensional digital blueprint for the new life & the energy required to select a biological software program that initiates cellular division likely within the first day or two.
There has to be sufficient energy to power cellular division for at least a week because there's likely no energy transfer from the mother's body to the fertilized ova until after it attaches to the uterus.





Death code sounds like something out of Blade Runner.
Wouldn't a death code require energy in order to function?
If not wouldn't that violate the laws of nature (no free lunch type of thing)?

I think that I'll stick to my guns on this one, that upon death the life force no longer enables cellular division & that causes the body to begin decaying. Unless you're alluding there's residual energy remaining with the body which enables cellular activity after death, I don't get how a death code would function.
As far as death codes go, there is a strain on the end of chromosomes called a telomere. It's like the aglet on the end of a shoelace: It holds it togather. Each time a cell devides, it cuts the telomere in half. Eventually there just isn't enough telomere in your body to hold all the chromosomes together. A death code is a misconceptions. It's more like simply running out of glue and having to through the rest of your glitter on the floor in defeat.
 

OrderOfTheCaelifera

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The soul and the consciousness are both holding the same role, in some cases.
I disagree with that opinion. For your viewpoint to be plausible we'd need to accept that the fertilized ova is consciously aware prior to the initialization of cellular division & then for the week+ prior to the ova attaching to the uterus wall.
I just don't see conscious awareness prior to DNA coding being mapped out or coding having been selected to assemble biological software.
IMHO the new life becomes consciously aware sometime after the brain sufficiently develops.

Perhaps there isn't a soul, but the human body could not be turned back on. The moment we are brain dead, the electrical synapses of our brain cease to exist, and even if a new set took it's place with the exact same encoded knowledge, you would be gone.

If there isn't a soul, then what enables cellular division while an individual is brain dead (consciously unaware) & on artificial life support?
 

renaiziphonts

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I disagree with that opinion. For your viewpoint to be plausible we'd need to accept that the fertilized ova is consciously aware prior to the initialization of cellular division & then for the week+ prior to the ova attaching to the uterus wall.
I just don't see conscious awareness prior to DNA coding being mapped out or coding having been selected to assemble biological software.
IMHO the new life becomes consciously aware sometime after the brain sufficiently develops.

I have been thinking recently, though on a slight tangent, if the first electrical signal in a fetus' newly developed brain was sent through the umbilical cord from the mother, than would the child's consciousness just be an extension of the mother's. Would it be a fraction of it? There are a lot of interesting stories about parents or children "sensing" some catastrophy of their parent's. Could the soul and that first spark come togather? I hate to say that electricity would be the soul though. It seems too simple, and the soul, from my tenuous understanding, is much more potent than a brainwave could be.

If there isn't a soul, then what enables cellular division while an individual is brain dead (consciously unaware) & on artificial life support?
I apologize for the misnomer there. I meant when there is no longer electrical activity, not comatose!
 

OrderOfTheCaelifera

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Why does it have to be combining the sperm and the egg
IMO it's the melding of the parental donors DNA that creates the new 3-dimensional digital code & enables a biological software program to begin building new life's body.
Sperm by itself can't create a new DNA code & neither can the ova. Each by itself is little more than wasted energy, but combining the two just right can create the building blocks of new life.


both can be alive in their own right both can contain a soul.
I'd disagree because within a womb neither can sustain itself without the other, "Mother Nature" has seen fit to require that they need one another in order to survive.
The donor ova & sperm by themselves don't contain a soul but rather they contain half the genetic coding that when combined may create a new soul that's capable of arranging coding into biological software to build new life.
 

OrderOfTheCaelifera

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I have been thinking recently, though on a slight tangent, if the first electrical signal in a fetus' newly developed brain was sent through the umbilical cord from the mother, than would the child's consciousness just be an extension of the mother's. Would it be a fraction of it? There are a lot of interesting stories about parents or children "sensing" some catastrophe of their parent's. Could the soul and that first spark come together? I hate to say that electricity would be the soul though. It seems too simple, and the soul, from my tenuous understanding, is much more potent than a brainwave could be.
"Could the soul and that first spark come together?" The fertilized ova has been undergoing cellular division for over a week before it even attaches to the wall of the uterus. Something, some energy source has to select a unique 3-dimensional digital code from the donor materials, then organize code to create a biological software program that will build the new life's body by means of cellular division.

"if the first electrical signal in a fetus' newly developed brain was sent through the umbilical cord from the mother, than would the child's consciousness just be an extension of the mother's?"
Sure why not, I could buy that being the case. I've no problem recognizing the mother/child connection is much deeper than that between the father/child.
Also I don't consider that the soul is required to be consciously aware, but rather it's the first spark of life (biological as opposed to mystical). My perspective eliminated the need that souls be a magical entity guided into the embryo by divine angels on a mission from God. Separating biology from religion was akin to lifting a burdening fog from my mind & allowed everything to fit together quite nicely.


I apologize for the misnomer there. I meant when there is no longer electrical activity, not comatose!
No problemo, it's all good.
This type stuff used to intrigue me in my younger days but there were so many aspects to consider that I'd end up tangled in a spiderweb of tangential considerations & lost in a sticky maze of dead end speculation.
 

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If by soul you mean consciousness, I agree with Sartre that the soul is nothingness, which means that there isn't really anything to bring back except the content of consciousness, including, in normal humans, a body, environment, and stream of thought with a history engraved on them (e.g. the rust on iron). To bring back a person partly entails reconstituting a sufficient number of those things which carry evidence of the person's identity in them to make the resulting configuration of existence a coherent continuation of their life. That alone isn't enough, of course. If I were to build a clone of myself and put him on a clone of this world and at the same moment destroy myself, I would not suddenly be seeing the world through his eyes (except in the shallow sense that I see the world through everyone's eyes). My story would continue on through the fragments of my destroyed body and its environment, which would not carry any personally meaningful sense of my previous self in them. My body would need to be put back together or otherwise tied causally to such an environment in such a way as would allow me to pick up my previous life where I left off. It could be done if we had the necessary technology and a psychological rather than purely physical understanding of the causal ties connecting a living person to a corpse to whatever it might proceed to become after that. That's rather difficult to do, as there isn't any clear center of consciousness like a functioning brain left. When a person's body decays, it's as though their consciousness undergoes fission after fission; which child should be resurrected? All of them or any of them would seem to be the answer, except "any of them" would be a frightening prospect for *you,* whichever bit of what used to be you is the one you're carrying along as your body. It would be a very difficult lottery to win.

I imagine if you were to fragment yourself in just the right way--for example, if they were to slice your brain in half at just the right location and during just the right instant of thought--the results would be very interesting indeed, provided both halves of the self could be preserved. Which one would have priority as a causal continuation? If the answer were both, then instantaneous communication between two places any distance apart would be possible. This might be happening on a very tiny level whenever little causal streams split off from a person, such as when a limb is severed. If so, the situation of decay might be the scattering of little seeds of consciousness, not diminished or cut off from each other but only rarified; and eventually some of them might simultaneously take root and sprout in far-apart places. Except I imagine the consciousness would experience these places as being somewhat in proximity to each other. There might be a consciousness that, when it claps its hands, is very quickly and easily sending a signal from what would look to us like one end of the cosmos to the other.
 
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