Is our mind part of our soul?

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dizzy_dave

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I’m not really sure how to word this. Is our mind part of our soul? I mean the part of us that thinks and reasons, when the body and soul part at death how will I think after my death. Does that make sense?
Will I know what I know now? (I know I’ll know more after death than I do now).
 
I am doing this from memory, so don’t count on all the details. Essentially the soul incorporates the Judgment, conceptualization, imagination, and Common Sense. I am not sure how much of the memory is in the soul and how much in the physical brain. They obtain their (name removed by moderator)ut through the bodily senses and use the brain for data processing.

One presumes that after death, and before reunification with the body, God supplies the (name removed by moderator)ut and maybe the memories, but that is just my guess.
 
Our souls have an intellect and a will. I guess the mind falls under the intellect part.
 
Yes, what we call our mind is also called our intellect, and is one of the faculties possessed by our soul, (the other being free will.)

Intellect, or mind, being a faculty of our soul, is spiritual, not material, so it does survive the death of the body. (Death being the separation of the body and soul.) Because our mind is not material, it is capable of, in effect–sucking all the matter out sensory (name removed by moderator)ut in order to form “ideas” or generalizations. Mind is not a product of one’s brain.

Imagination and memory, on the other hand do partake of physicality; sensory (name removed by moderator)ut and the human brain do play a large part in how they operate.
 
Can we glean any insight on this from Christ’s teachings that in heaven we will no longer be married or given in marriage?
 
Catholic tradition does teach that the mind is immaterial and eternal. It was created at conception, and lasts to eternity.

Many people find this hard to swallow. Isn’t the mind just the brain?

Well, the mind uses the brain just like a tornado uses water in the lake to form a waterspout. Form gets embedded in matter but it is not synonymous with the matter.

The mind is qualitatively different than faculties that depend totally on physiology. Here are a couple of proofs:
  1. All material faculties can be impaired by excess of their proper object; too much loud noise damages the ear, too much of a solar eclipse will make you blind; etc. But too much understanding has never been known to damage, let alone destroy, a mind.
  2. WIth all other sense faculties, an objective stimulus causes a certain objective response in the material substratum. A flash of light triggers perception of light, a sound triggers perception of sound. The connection is deterministic, all other things being equal;
but in the case of the mind, two people can have the exact same stimulus placed in front of them, and one of them will “get” the insight, the other won’t. Insight is not caused in anything like the way sensation is caused. It can’t be forced to trigger by physical laws.
 
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adnauseum:
but in the case of the mind, two people can have the exact same stimulus placed in front of them, and one of them will “get” the insight, the other won’t. Insight is not caused in anything like the way sensation is caused. It can’t be forced to trigger by physical laws.
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Another thing I found interesting is the idea that people normally perceive that they are experiencing the world outside of themselves with their sensory perceptions. Really your view of the world is all in your head. Electrical signals come in from transducers, and the entire image is whipped up inside your mind. So this is the way that the mind sees itself, but even though its perceptions give ideas about things outside the brain the entire perception process is within.

Alan
 
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dizzy_dave:
I’m not really sure how to word this. Is our mind part of our soul? I mean the part of us that thinks and reasons, when the body and soul part at death how will I think after my death. Does that make sense?
Will I know what I know now? (I know I’ll know more after death than I do now).
Click to expand...
I think I understand what you’re asking. I’m not a philosopher or a theologian, but I’ll give this question a shot just the same. The Church says all will be revealed at the end of time. That means that you will know all there is to know- everything you know now, and everything else.

If you define the mind as the human thought processes, then the mind is not part of the soul. Thought processes are affected by earthly conditions (opportunities for learning, and the physical development of the brain). The soul is perfect or imperfect due to sin only. The mind is always imperfect. It’s ability to function relies on the ability of the body to function. Until the souls are reunited with their ressurected, glorified, perfect bodies (although we do not know what perfect is- we cannot understand what we have not seen ourselves) at the end of the age.

Some people’s minds may not work the way they should, but that certainly does not mean their soul is less perfect than anyone else’s soul. I doubt people with Alzheimer’s, some other form of dimentia, the mentally retarded, or anyone else with an impaired mind have less perfect souls than those with no mental impairment. Often, these people are among the most faithful people you’ll ever meet. Further, intelligence can often cause the loss of the soul. If you think you can think everything through, and find all the answers, your soul may be lost- because you will not find the most important answers without simple, childlike faith.

Things like selfishness and wrath do involve thought processes, but they also involve a decision that is not based on what you see as logical at the moment- whether to do right or wrong. If someone insults you, it makes sense to respond accordingly and insult them back- or ignore them, and affirm your hatred for them in your heart. Doing so would still be a sin though- even though you may think it is a logical response. These things are matters of the soul, and affect it’s eternal state after the body is dead.
 
Dave, Great question!
But I’m a simple man with a simple mind so I’d wonder how Jimmy Akin would answer this question on CA Live? :hmmm:
 
I think the conscious mind is the soul. Or am I wrong? I recall hearing years ago that the actual ‘mind’ portion of the brain is still a mystery. I think the brain is the nerve center of the body but when we die the mind or soul continues to exist. If I were standing ground zero at a nuclear detonation I would not feel a thing yet I would still be standing there in it. I also think that once we are free from the flesh things must certainly feel much different. But who can be sure until we get there?

-D
 
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dizzy_dave:
I’m not really sure how to word this. Is our mind part of our soul? I mean the part of us that thinks and reasons, when the body and soul part at death how will I think after my death. Does that make sense?
Will I know what I know now? (I know I’ll know more after death than I do now).
Click to expand...
I’m not a psychophysiologist. I don’t really know.

But, I think a human being is one. One person.

The End (of breif thread hi-jack)
 
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Darrel:
I think the conscious mind is the soul. Or am I wrong?
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You are right. The mind is an aspect of the spiritual soul.

That is why angels, who have no bodies, but do have intellect and will, have been described as “minds without bodies.”

When we die, our soul and intellect (mind) continues to exist without our bodies.

Angels’ minds are designed to know things by direct intuition.

Unlike angels, our minds do not work that way. All knowledge must come first through the senses and be integrated by the brain, while the mind abstracts from that sensory (name removed by moderator)ut to be able to know universals and perform abstract thought.

But the brain is a tool of the intellect, not the other way around. The mind is still there, even without sensory (name removed by moderator)ut.

Because of our mind, we are able not just to know, but to know that we know. Not just to be conscious, but to be consious of our consciousness.
 
The soul is the irreducable immaterial principal that allows us to be conscious of our Self. In this sense, the mind is part of the soul. But as for memory, imagination, reasoning, thinking etc…these are a great deal controlled as a physical outplay of matter in the brain.

In heaven, we will have the beatific vision…we will not “think” or “remember” as it were…we will just be Conscious of God…and Will his glory for all eternity. If we have any memory or personal ideas they will be taken from the beatific vision or Infused by God or angels.
 
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