The immortality of the 'soul'

[knight66]

     I agree that many people can and therefore should do without the most obviously bogus parts. Clearly some people want/need it and many would be happy to dispense with anything that violates rationality. By presenting a united front against the atheist and defending gods and moral codes as though they were equally vital you shift attention away from internal differences to the common foe.
           

Which people need this assurance? I don't know any. So who exactly are they; or is this just a nice generalisation you can throw around?

I am not shifting attentiona anywhere; I think you are uncomfortable in having been basically caught out in false assumption, so throw sand about.

Anyway, you have the sand box to yourself now; as I am away for a week or so.

[rhomboid]

What is the difference between spirit and soul?

[Szykneij]

What is the difference between spirit and soul?

In my personal definition, they're synonymous.

[Ten thumbs]

At some point I came into existence (at least I believe so).

Basically, I'm a Unitarian.

The idea of existing for ever is dreadful. I can't think anything else that's so appalling.
Therefore I hope that at some point I'll cease to exist.

The act of existence (ie consciousness) has so far defeated all attempts at scientific explanation.

As far as I can see the universe will go on existing itself without me, or without anyone else for that matter.

[drogulus]

What is the difference between spirit and soul?

In my personal definition, they're synonymous.

     I agree. The words are applied to the highest functions of a conscious mind, and I don't see much disagreement about what those are, just about whether they are the result of the same natural processes that built everything else or not. I like to use the example of blood vessels or nerves. The way they are intertwined with everything else is an indication of a natural process rather than a created one. Souls are like that, too, they and their bodies "growed" together. The components of a soul, such as they are, would be like the binary code in a computer injected into the mind of a snail, or an English major at Suffolk Community College. It would have no meaning outside its instantiation in the body it "grow'd up" in. Some Artificial Intelligence researchers learned this the hard way, that rather than implant encyclopedias in a robot memory we'll have to learn how to grow the robots, so they can get about the business of acquiring their own souls.

[eyeresist]

People aren't wearing enough hats. 

[drogulus]

The idea of existing for ever is dreadful.

     Both ways, yes, a dreadful idea and a dreadful prospect in the unlucky event it described something. However, that unlucky we aren't.

[ibanezmonster]

The idea of existing for ever is dreadful. I can't think anything else that's so appalling.

There's one show, Baccano, that has an immortality elixir that people are desperate to have. The irony is that the people who took it ended up being punished by drowning alive forever (well, they were saved after some time, but that wasn't the intent).

[drogulus]

There's one show, Baccano, that has an immortality elixir that people are desperate to have. The irony is that the people who took it ended up being punished by drowning alive forever (well, they were saved after some time, but that wasn't the intent).

     Interesting, but I wonder what could possibly not be punishing if endured for ever. Indeed, forever is punishing enough on its own. Beauty and joy are transitory, which is tragic, of course, but most important, it's true and we all know it.

[eyeresist]

I don't understand this slightly smug-sounding mantra that immortality is bad and would be unbearable. Does existence really have a shelf-life, after which what was desirable must become anathema? If you've had enough, I'll take your extra years off you!

[drogulus]

I don't understand this slightly smug-sounding mantra that immortality is bad and would be unbearable. Does existence really have a shelf-life, after which what was desirable must become anathema? If you've had enough, I'll take your extra years off you!

     Is there anything in your experience that would lead you to believe that existence prolonged infinitely is either possible or desirable? I wouldn't confuse that with having a few extra years.

     Everything that lives must die one day, an empirical fact which also is the basis for art and philosophy. It isn't a mantra at all, but the opposite. Mantras are for eternity mongers, who need them to ward off what they prefer not to know.

[eyeresist]

Is there anything in your experience that would lead you to believe that existence prolonged infinitely is either possible or desirable? I wouldn't confuse that with having a few extra years.

     Everything that lives must die one day, an empirical fact which also is the basis for art and philosophy. It isn't a mantra at all, but the opposite. Mantras are for eternity mongers, who need them to ward off what they prefer not to know.

Is there anything IN YOUR EXPERIENCE that leads you to believe that indefinitely prolonged life is UNDESIRABLE?

Life is wonderfully interesting, even when it is horrible or boring. It's certainly more interesting than the alternative.


Mantras are for god-botherers whose retirement plans include accruing grace or karma for the afterlife. Spend it now, I say.

[drogulus]

Is there anything IN YOUR EXPERIENCE that leads you to believe that indefinitely prolonged life is UNDESIRABLE?

Life is wonderfully interesting, even when it is horrible or boring. It's certainly more interesting than the alternative.


Mantras are for god-botherers whose retirement plans include accruing grace or karma for the afterlife. Spend it now, I say.

     Yes, not only in mine though but in the life of just about everyone who observes the life cycle of those close to them and then experiences it for themselves. Life can be extended to some extent, and I'm glad. Past a certain point extension is a form of torture. The only thing worse than a life tragically shortened is one tragically prolonged.

     But that doesn't get to the heart of the matter. I think the joys of life have a utilitarian base in the life cycle and relationships of family. What gives life it's flavor is intimately related to the cycle as a whole. Death is a part of that, and though we can usefully manipulate the process to extend life it for as long as our techniques allow, we should do that only if it brings some measure of satisfaction.

     Then there's the conceptual objection, which is upstream from the practical, in the sense that if something is false it can't matter much how wonderful it would be if it were true. And eternal life is a loser at the concept level. Some pre-Socratic heavy said life is change, or everything is change, or something. I'd say that existence for entities is an island of stability in a sea of flux, unless you're a proton. Even a species is not a solid thing when looked at from a geologic scale. Human beings are a temporary arrangement and what counts for membership will necessarily be arbitrary at the edges. While one might imagine infinite existence for things as a whole (or one can try, I'm not sure one can imagine much), the way things work is the deck is constantly shuffled. All the things get changed out. That's life, that's existence, at least the part we know about. We leave the rest to Wittgenstein.

     

     STFU!

[Wanderer]

Some pre-Socratic heavy said life is change, or everything is change, or something.

Heraclitus.

Τὰ πάντα ῥεῖ καὶ οὐδὲν μένει.

[eyeresist]

Yes, not only in mine though but in the life of just about everyone who observes the life cycle of those close to them and then experiences it for themselves. Life can be extended to some extent, and I'm glad. Past a certain point extension is a form of torture. The only thing worse than a life tragically shortened is one tragically prolonged.

But that doesn't get to the heart of the matter. I think the joys of life have a utilitarian base in the life cycle and relationships of family. What gives life it's flavor is intimately related to the cycle as a whole. Death is a part of that, and though we can usefully manipulate the process to extend life it for as long as our techniques allow, we should do that only if it brings some measure of satisfaction.

Then there's the conceptual objection, which is upstream from the practical, in the sense that if something is false it can't matter much how wonderful it would be if it were true. And eternal life is a loser at the concept level. Some pre-Socratic heavy said life is change, or everything is change, or something. I'd say that existence for entities is an island of stability in a sea of flux, unless you're a proton. Even a species is not a solid thing when looked at from a geologic scale. Human beings are a temporary arrangement and what counts for membership will necessarily be arbitrary at the edges. While one might imagine infinite existence for things as a whole (or one can try, I'm not sure one can imagine much), the way things work is the deck is constantly shuffled. All the things get changed out. That's life, that's existence, at least the part we know about. We leave the rest to Wittgenstein.



STFU!

It is ironic to refer to Wittgenstein, when your own argument consists of truisms, mystifications and appeals to authority.

Your first para mentions the physical and mental pains the elderly suffer, but this is not an argument for death. The weariness of life of which the aged sometimes complain is mostly due to fatigue, not existential malaise. Would you tell someone with a headache to shoot themselves in the head? No! You'd tell them to take an aspirin. The pains of age are treatable; it is possible that with further developments they might be put off or eliminated.

Next - "the cycle of life" and "death is a part of life". Death may be inevitable for all things (unless you are religious), but the individual is certainly not morally required to welcome it, as part of some spiritual obligation. Unless you believe in Freud's postulated death wish (now generally discredited), surely it is most natural to "rage against the dying of the light".

Will life indefinitely prolonged lose its savour? I don't know - let's find out. Let's go back 200 hundred years to a time when, if you survived childhood, you could expect to die in your late 30s. What would they make of our suggestion that they could live twice that or more, that they could live to be over 100? Who of them would curse us and call us witches, and who would grasp at the chance? Now many people live for a century or more. Why not double that again? Why not? And why not keep going? At what point would you say "You've had too much life," and start rounding people up and sending them to mortality camps, where their consciousnesses will be snuffed out just as God intended. Or perhaps you postulate a point in time after which death is desired more than life, in which case problem solved - they can just kill themselves.

Last - some vague assertion about change being the one constant in the universe. It's basically a repetition of the previous argument, that seeking to avoid death goes against cosmic moral law. But there is no such law (except for the laws of thermodynamics); the universe goes on, and if you have the opportunity to see more of its unfolding, why not take it? Only a dullard would refuse.

I'm not trying to say, BTW, that literal immortality is possible (even the universe will end), or that the fact of mortality is any sort of affront to the individual or the race (it just is what it is).

[kishnevi]

It might be useful to point out that many ruminations on the "aferlife" think of it as a state which is not eternal, but aeviternal--which means, more or less, completely out of time, so that one experiences past present and future all at once, or with equal accessibility--every moment of time is present to the mind at once, and the sort of change we relate to the passing of time in our physical universe relates to another dimension which can not be described because we don't experience it in our current enfleshments.

[eyeresist]

It might be useful to point out that many ruminations on the "aferlife" think of it as a state which is not eternal, but aeviternal--which means, more or less, completely out of time, so that one experiences past present and future all at once, or with equal accessibility--every moment of time is present to the mind at once, and the sort of change we relate to the passing of time in our physical universe relates to another dimension which can not be described because we don't experience it in our current enfleshments.

I was not familiar with this word. It sounds a bit like my experience of watching the Oscars

[Elgarian]

It might be useful to point out that many ruminations on the "aferlife" think of it as a state which is not eternal, but aeviternal--which means, more or less, completely out of time, so that one experiences past present and future all at once, or with equal accessibility--every moment of time is present to the mind at once, and the sort of change we relate to the passing of time in our physical universe relates to another dimension which can not be described because we don't experience it in our current enfleshments.

If I remember rightly (correct me if I'm wrong), that's the kind of thinking pursued by J.W. Dunne in his An Experiment with Time (pub 1920s?) which I remember reading eagerly, in my teens. He ended up steering his idea mostly towards fluff and nonsense, I think - but I never quite managed to shake off the flavour of his ideas when I came to thrash my way through relativity theory a few years later. The whole issue of the nature of time is not something our imaginations can can really grapple with (at least, mine can't); the relativistic models of the universe allow us to stand outside them and regard them as mathematical abstractions. And one might regard that as a kind of analogy to your 'aeviternality', though I feel uneasy about deducing anything from that about the possible nature of our existence 'outside time'. I think that's probably where Dunne went astray.

But a thorough study of relativity certainly does shake up one's notions of the nature of time (even though I've forgotten most of it now), and makes one realise the extent to which what we see is most certainly not what we get.

[Didn't vote in the poll, by the way. Taking the question at face value, I haven't a clue. But then, I think the question may be one of those meaningless ones that looks like a real question but isn't, really.]

[mahler10th]

Honestly, what a lot of utter cobblers some of this is.  From the elements of stars we came and to the elements of stars we shall return.  In fact, we never leave the stars.  Wherever I was, say, 2 years before I was concieved...do I remember being there?  No.  That is how immortal the soul is.  When we shuffle off this mortal coil we will not exist at all.  We will be where we were 148 years ago...remember that?  No, didn't think so.  Thats because we are not immortal.  The very word immortal is a nonsense to physics.  What were our 'souls' doing when the Pyramids were being built?  Oh, we can't remember!  That'll be because our 'souls' didn't exist, just as they will not exist ten years or three billion years after our deaths.
Grim.  But thank the stars it is so.

[Willoughby earl of Itacarius]

"What were our 'souls' doing when the Pyramids were being build? "


I was building them for all the musical scores I had gathered together, I thought you knew, Geeshhh