How can the immaterial (Soul) affect the material (brain)

[greylorn]

Apart from the ones we decimated…

Everyone dies. G.B. will have its own turn. At the last published rate of Muslim population growth, I’d guess well before 2050.

I hope they’re not inhibited - and your ideas faithfully expressed.

Their father is overly protective, so they will learn to be fearful. Alas. The ideas were perfectly expressed.

Elitism doesn’t consist in what you have done but in your concept of the majority. The majority are often mistaken but they’re not often seriously “wrong”… The average person is not diabolical.

The average person is insufficiently intelligent to be diabolical.

The majority are almost invariably wrong. This fact is rarely recognized because the history books are written for the current majority. Ask the Austrians who voted overwhelmingly for German rule, the peasants who welcomed communist rulers in Russia, Cuba, and Venezuela. What about the U.S. southern states whose citizens died in support of human slavery? The majority of all populations are humans who refuse to admit their mistakes, because the human brain is an I’m right machine.

Your diagnosis doesn’t apply to the poorer countries.

Their demands are fewer, so the people in poor countries appear at first to be easily satisfied. Ask any American who made the mistake of marrying an Asian wife. It takes them less than two years to become more demanding and shrill than a home grown woman. Once they learn to see themselves as previously downtrodden, they become a constant source of complaining and whining, and cannot be trusted.

Humans are humans. Ordinary, greedy, untrustworthy.

I shall be naughty and ask how many countries you have lived in…

Only the U.S. I’ve spent time elsewhere, generally among the lower class of citizenry, because they treated me nicer, the preferred strategy for getting as much of my money as possible. It worked.

Your loophole for beliefs that are not determined raises the question of their origin…

I’m figuring that you reference this:

IMO for most people, physical events, particularly societal programming, determine most people’s beliefs.

and are wondering about the origin of non-programmed beliefs.

That might be a good question. The problem is that I have never met anyone who held beliefs which were not derived from someone else’s programming. I know people with strange beliefs. Where I live, some of the denizens are enamored by American Indians, and invite various tribe members for festivals and such. They are attended by pseudo-Indians who shop at supermarkets and attend a Baptist church, but come to beat tom-toms and perform phony healings and eat free vittles.

I’ve explored the thoughts of various people who claim unique beliefs, even trained two in psychic stuff. Their unique beliefs came from others, shamanism in once case, Eckankar in another.

I am the only person I know of who has actually derived unique ideas about the origin and nature of the mind, although I subsequently found that others had beaten me to it. IMO my ideas about the origin of the universe, God, and the “soul” have not been devised elsewhere, but I’m insufficiently well-read to place large monetary bets on that.

More likely I will turn out to be a somewhat innovative but largely ignored synthesizer of ideas, like the guy who thought to attach an eraser to one end of a pencil, and equally well rewarded.

Still I cannot answer your question. I have no idea how I derive ideas, and that applies to all subjects. I solve unsolvable problems. My technique is to first intend to solve them. Then I learn some things about the problem elements, and examine the failed solutions. After awhile an interesting and effective solution appears. IMO this is what the soul does. It creates information which did not previously exist, or synthesizes existing information in new ways.

You’ve done that. Everyone reading this has done that. You’ll probably have learned by now that generating ideas is the easy part.

 

[levinas12]

I’m glad you brought up the comparison with angels. So the fact that the angels can be individuated into 9 choirs does not detract from each one being a separate species.

The 9 choirs are like functional categories in human society, e.g., lawyers, doctors, engineers. When we say that John is a lawyer, or an engineer, we are not alluding to nature or species. Only when we say that John is a human being are we talking about essence.

Aquinas makes it clear that it is impossible for any two angels to share the same species (see Summa Theologica, Q 50, Art 4).

 

[FurtherSuntime]

What a fascinating post you’ve given us! So unlike the English: totally uninhibited!
I am in some respects - although I’m half Irish, thank God! I was thinking of the colonial atrocities - in Ireland and elsewhere.
Apart from the ones we decimated…
I hope they’re not inhibited - and your ideas faithfully expressed.
Elitism doesn’t consist in what you have done but in your concept of the majority. The majority are often mistaken but they’re not often seriously “wrong”… The average person is not diabolical.
Your diagnosis doesn’t apply to the poorer countries.
I shall be naughty and ask how many countries you have lived in…
It’s an old trick of mine! I used to write plays but never mastered the art of suspense. Sometimes my liking for it reveals itself in my posts.

Your loophole for beliefs that are not determined raises the question of their origin…

Don’t give up on suspense. It is an evolving tension. The tension as in music must be reasonable or presented in a believable manner. The eventual release is the communication of order.Order out of the disorder accomplished in the tension.

The appreciation is a subtle joining or relating in the dis-order of ones day to day life. Progress in survival toward order is the template which holds the magic. The connection to your audience. Human life IS passionate. The above tension in motion must be chiefly inside the perimeters of human experience. In other words the “set up” in creating suspense is an elastic band which is pulled back until it is released. If the story or set up is outside perimeter of experience…it will snap, loosing objective final release…as release is in event.

In a way we are walking copy cats. A great symphony cannot be construed out of a person who has never heard an orchestra. A great play would be construed in primary objective in referring to an experience in life. Creativity is basically divided into two parts. 1) presentation or arrangement 2) an idea which was inspired out of emotional need. Both can be developed.Emotional need is a condition which can be satisfied through expression.

Screaming for example. Now, do I need to scream right now…NO, therefore if I do scream it will be less convincing. Now, do I need to express a delightful and fanciful joy in life with glee, wonder, a feeling which almost has an aroma…NO…why ?because I am not just getting in from
an afternoon with a wonderful and accepting beautiful girl who adores me to piece’s. No need to express . A great work is the product of an experience. This explains why a writer or composer cannot…go searching for inspiration and an idea. It would be a fabrication as it is only a guess on experience.

So the best way is to forget about all of it, and let life go along until something jumps out and an idea is in need, through the natural need to express it…Also
you may require something else here in opinion. Never underestimate self. You yourself are the
ultimate end as it stands of literally 1000’s of human effort through the ages. A product which has come about through an accumulation of effort. You are the One. There is nothing you cannot do if you want and it is reasonable. I could take a kid with an IQ of 120, and turn him into one of the greatest pianists say, top 50 in the world. But I would need control over his social life and exposure because this world is not a setting which enhances creativity. When you read the lives of some in the romantic era…the ego is absolutely un believable…creating unbelievable works. A properly informed well balanced ego will constructivly expand . This is import. Our society is out to lunch on what a "real"well developed ego is

So…you ca do it…or its got to be understood that you could …if you wanted. Giving up control is a bad idea…just opinion. Opinion from a mutt with no exact heritage to talk about…1/4 Irish
1/4 Italian 1/4 French 1/4 English no priority’s …ladies first.

Problems are a matter of gathering the rules or laws and exploring what laws or rules can be
derived from those rules. When one thinks relative nature to all, relative consequence in objectives are simply results which express a required end. In short we are manipulators of
perception. Thats fair…perception is relative.A relative part of the whole reality.

 

[4Horsemen]

A proper name, e.g., John Doe, designates an individual person. We use the proper name to respond to a question about a “who” not a “what”. When we call someone a human being, we are responding to a question about a “what”, not a “who”.

The “who” is the singularity. The “what” is the universal corresponding to a nature or type (the Aristotelian form).

The “who” is at issue in existentialism. In Heidegger, for example, anxiety is over the “who”, not the “what”.

Aristotelian matter cannot be the basis of the “who” because in itself it is not actual, it is indefinite potentiality. So the individual person must have another basis. And that basis can’t be the Aristotelian form which is indifferent to the individual. So what would that basis be? A singularity. That is, a mystery.

A neat explanation. The idea of a proper name or a proper noun makes sense about a “who” instead of a “what.” It’s a similar thought to a “who” being a soldier, while a "what " would be an infantry. In English “soldier” is a simple noun, and “infantry” is collective.

I previously had read some of the existentialists but not Heidegger. I had a roommate in college who was a philosophy major and carried a thick book around with the name Heidegger facing outward.

From reading some interpretations of Aristotle’s ideas, I think he holds that knowing a thing’s potentiality is key to understanding how it can change. But the potentialities Aristotle has in mind are the ones rooted in a thing’s nature (not in our conception) as it actually exists. For example, a piece of charcoal has the potential to burn, not to fly. But it needs an outside source to actualize it, like fire.

So what you’re saying is that there is another basis for understanding a human being besides the “who” since Aristotle affirms it is not actual but has infinite potentiality. But an outside source could actualize the “who” and that souce is God. (I may not be understanding your point. )

 

[levinas12]

But an outside source could actualize the “who” and that souce is God.

Yes. A singularity cannot be understood within the categories of the system. Only God, who is also outside the system, can “explain” the “who”.

I apologize if all this sounds like Dr. Seuss.

 

[4Horsemen]

The 9 choirs are like functional categories in human society, e.g., lawyers, doctors, engineers. When we say that John is a lawyer, or an engineer, we are not alluding to nature or species. Only when we say that John is a human being are we talking about essence.

Aquinas makes it clear that it is impossible for any two angels to share the same species (see Summa Theologica, Q 50, Art 4).

I looked up the Article for Question 50 from the Summa in newadvent.com. So because angels are not composed of matter and form, St. Thomas says it’s impossible for two angels to be of one species. Then he answers all the objections. He’s very organized. It’s something I’d want to re-read, but I have a whole list of books as well. Thanks for the reference.

 

[4Horsemen]

Yes. A singularity cannot be understood within the categories of the system. Only God, who is also outside the system, can “explain” the “who”.

I apologize if all this sounds like Dr. Seuss.

No need for any apologies. It’s all heady stuff. Those who don’t believe in a personal God try to explain the “who” in one theory after another always looking for a materialistic or dualistic explanation.

 

[perro_sarnoso]

How can the soul and brain work together? If the soul is neither energy nor matter, how can it work with matter?

The Soul: which was created by God at the moment of conception, is the part of your entire being that will live for all eternity. In saecula saeculorum.

It is the part of you that “operates” your body. Not as a mere operation of a machine but, as an integral unit…completely you.

Once your body dies, your soul continues to exist for all eternity until God re-unites your body with your soul except, that it won’t be your carnal body…it will be your glorified body. Prototype of which was Jesus Resurrected. He could eat with the apostles but could appear and disappear and go thru walls etc. He didn’t eat because He was hungry, but to show the apostles how they would be some day.