Is There a Soul?

[StAnastasia]

I have no interest or sympathy whatsoever for ID-ology, YEC-ology, or any other variation of Protestant fundamentalist-creationism, especially when adhered to by anyone claiming to be Catholic. So, don’t even get me started on this nonsense.

I organized a conference on evolution and theology in the 1990s, with a concluding panel discussion that included evolutionary biologists, cosmologists, mainstream theologians, a YEC and and IDer. By chance, the YEC was seated next to the IDer (Steven Meyer). Meyer was very uncomfortable being seated next to Gish, and kept scooting his chair away from him, as if he didn’t want his IDism to be tainted by YECism! And the YEC attacked Meyer for caving in to the scientific experts. In fact, both the YEC and the IDer got along very cordially with the evolutionary scientists and theologians – they just couldn’t stand each other!

 

[grannymh]

If it’s Catholicism it’s of an old style leave-your-brains-on-the-church-doormat variety.

Oh my goodness!
Having been the target of this sentence for months, I finally realized that this is the modern version of the spiel used by the *talking serpent".
While an organic fruit was used as the symbol of a desired object, the talking serpent was actually attacking Adam’s soul. This tricky so-and-so wasn’t appealing to Adam’s hunger or his refined sense of taste, but rather to his intellect and will.

Dang! I knew there would come a time when I would pay for napping during theology class. Here is what is in the OP.

Conceptual or abstract thought can only be a function of an immaterial soul.

and

Is the will a power or faculty of the soul?

In my humble opinion, these two quotes are the main challenges of this thread. For now, I am not so much interested in where these powers are located as in what they are exactly and how humans use them. What are examples? If one considers Adam as a valid example of a real human, use him. Or one’s neighbor as an example. If one has checked one’s brains at the door, retrieve them.

Blessings,
granny

The quest for knowledge is always challenging.

 

[StAnastasia]

What specifically are these problems that you are having?

I’ve been working with scientists all my life, and am too convinced by the cogency of the scientific account of the universe to cave in to Granny’s magical mystery tour of “Adam and Eve were our sole first parents.”

I also work with my fellow theologians, very few of whom buy into the magical mystery tour any more. Of course, most CAFers reject most of my fellow theologians as heretics who are halfway to hell anyway (I’ve been told that explicitly).

If I could only jettison evilushun and accept a 6,000 year old earth, I might be able to buy into the “all-humans-and-only-humans-have-immortal-souls” theory.

StAnastasia

 

[ricmat]

It was a review of a review of a review.

Is the author an advocate ID theory, or not?

Yes. The book is rock solid “traditional” science, however.

I should add that if the author is an ID theorist, that most likely puts him in the creationist camp, though probably seated at a different table from the YEC crowd.

The author is not a YEC’r. In terms of being “creationist”, both you and I and even StA all fall into that category, don’t we? We all believe that there was a creator.

I have no interest or sympathy whatsoever for ID-ology, YEC-ology, or any other variation of Protestant fundamentalist-creationism, especially when adhered to by anyone claiming to be Catholic. So, don’t even get me started on this nonsense.

So finding design in nature is only a Protestant-fundamentalist pursuit? It seems to me that you are extremely bigoted with regard to this particular area.

Read the book, and tell me where it is nonsense. Really. It only mentions God once or twice, in passing, not as a conclusion or a premise. So if that’s what you’re worried about, you don’t need to.

 

[ricmat]

you mean rogue

Yes.

Unfortunately, my spellchecker is not smart enough to know that rogue was the word I wanted, and not rouge.

But, that leads to an interesting speculation. I wonder if…all those stories that we’ve heard over the years about rogue elephants trampling Indian villagers to death - maybe they were actually pink elephants.

 

[TheAtheist]

I also work with my fellow theologians, very few of whom buy into the magical mystery tour any more. Of course, most CAFers reject most of my fellow theologians as heretics who are halfway to hell anyway (I’ve been told that explicitly).

If i make an aside to this question (actually i do vaguely recall engaging St.Anastasia about what people mean by Soul, but that’s for another time).

From a complete outsiders perspective, there seems to be a bit of a um… gap, between the well-read apologetic Catholic and the current crop of people who i would identify as professional theologians.

Group 1 reads their Plato, their Aristotle, their Augustine, their Thomas. Some might be a little more studious and look at the works of your Church’s Fathers or perhaps even raid the Orthodox Church’s cupboards.

Group 2 - the group you belong dear Anastasia, by definition is harder to pin down. That a theologian should be declared a heretic by the Group 1 is not surprising (In fact i believe Thomas was slapped around a bit by the Anti-Aristotlean theologians of his day), but i guess what i’m asking is:

What is the general trend(s) in modern Catholic theology? I see bits and pieces of ideas flying all over the place, but i don’t really see an overarching system or method. Its quite confusing about what propositions/premises are being asserted, and perhaps that might clear up where Group 1’s issues with “those heretical theologians”*** exactly lay.

***Although to be honest, an SJ theologian mentioned the curious case of Edward Schillebeeckx who, although a rather learned Dominican theologian, seems to have denied the very Resurrection that stands at the heart of your Church’s beliefs. :ehh:

Modern theology is truly a mysterious subject.

 

[HelenaMT]

…If I could only jettison evilushun and accept a 6,000 year old earth, I might be able to buy into the “all-humans-and-only-humans-have-immortal-souls” theory.

So what does accepting evolution say about your belief in the soul? I am trying to figure out what your take is on that-do chimps have souls, then? Did neanderthals (they did seem to acknowledge some sort of afterlife, after all)? Do some humans lack souls? What is actually your reasoning on the soul ? I am not trying to bait you, I am not at all a conventional believer. I’m just genuinely curious.

 

[StAnastasia]

So what does accepting evolution say about your belief in the soul? I am trying to figure out what your take is on that-do chimps have souls, then? Did neanderthals (they did seem to acknowledge some sort of afterlife, after all)? Do some humans lack souls? What is actually your reasoning on the soul ? I am not trying to bait you, I am not at all a conventional believer. I’m just genuinely curious.

HelenaMT, the concept of a “soul” as a quantum unit which a being either possesses completely or doesn’t possess at all seems rather quaint and incoherent to me. It’s probably a legacy of Greek body-soul dualism that has infected Christianity for a long time.

My theology is more Hebraic in character, regarding the person as a psychosomatic unity, with all that entails. My theology is evolutionary, respecting the ancient, dynamic, and evolving character of life on earth, and of any other planet in the universe on which it might evolve.

If the scientific theory of biological evolution is true – and I have no reason to believe it is not the most cogent explanation we currently have for the diversity of life on earth – it is theologically appropriate to interpret this process as God’s calling forth life from the long history of divine creation. Life on earth (and perhaps elsewhere) has evolved into increasing neurological complexity and the manifestation moral awareness, spiritual consciousness, and soul.

There are a number of problems that are addressed by an evolutionary account of "soul’ that are not easily addressed by a YEC account. But I have to return to working for the day, and will log on later.

StAnastasia

 

[StAnastasia]

IGroup 1 reads their Plato, their Aristotle, their Augustine, their Thomas. Some might be a little more studious and look at the works of your Church’s Fathers or perhaps even raid the Orthodox Church’s cupboards…

Yep – I’ve read them, studied them, and taught them, and written about them for years. I guess I belong to Group I.

 

[HelenaMT]

HelenaMT, the concept of a “soul” as a quantum unit which a being either possesses completely or doesn’t possess at all seems rather quaint and incoherent to me. It’s probably a legacy of Greek body-soul dualism that has infected Christianity for a long time.

My theology is more Hebraic in character, regarding the person as a psychosomatic unity, with all that entails. My theology is evolutionary, respecting the ancient, dynamic, and evolving character of life on earth, and of any other planet in the universe on which it might evolve.

I find it more incoherent to believe there is a part of us that survives bodily death when that part is only an intrinsic part of our living body system. Our brains are part of that psychosomatic unity, too, but when we die it rots along with the rest of the body.

Why would the soul continue if it was only a part of that same system, unless it was somehow able to remain separate? If you believe that this soul continues to exist after the body dies, how is that NOT dualistic? If you could make that make sense to me, I will be grateful.

If the scientific theory of biological evolution is true – and I have no reason to believe it is not the most cogent explanation we currently have for the diversity of life on earth – it is theologically appropriate to interpret this process as God’s calling forth life from the long history of divine creation. Life on earth (and perhaps elsewhere) has evolved into increasing neurological complexity and the manifestation moral awareness, spiritual consciousness, and soul.

There are a number of problems that are addressed by an evolutionary account of "soul’ that are not easily addressed by a YEC account. But I have to return to working for the day, and will log on later.

StAnastasia

There are many, many things not easily addressed by a YEC account. I don’t have any idea how exactly they define or believe in soul. I am, however, very curious to know what you mean by "an evolutionary account of “soul’”.

When you say “Life on earth (and perhaps elsewhere) has evolved into increasing neurological complexity and the manifestation moral awareness, spiritual consciousness, and soul,” are you saying you think the soul is a part of the evolutionary makeup of a creature? We evolved souls as our brains became more and more complex? Is the soul just a neurological by-product that stops when our brains do?

If not, what part of that evolved soul continues? Is your version of soul immortal ? And if so, what, then, is the basis for that belief?

Do you believe we are not “ensouled” by God but that each of has a soul that has become part of our other inherited characteristics, and that develops along with us throughout our lives?

 

[StAnastasia]

***Although to be honest, an SJ theologian mentioned the curious case of Edward Schillebeeckx who, although a rather learned Dominican theologian, seems to have denied the very Resurrection that stands at the heart of your Church’s beliefs.

Do you have a Schillebeeckz text for this?

 

[DysonSphere]

***Although to be honest, an SJ theologian mentioned the curious case of Edward Schillebeeckx who, although a rather learned Dominican theologian, seems to have denied the very Resurrection that stands at the heart of your Church’s beliefs. :ehh:

I thought Schillebeeckx was a heretic in the eyes of Rome.

 

[itinerant1]

Yes. The book is rock solid “traditional” science, however.

The author is not a YEC’r. In terms of being “creationist”, both you and I and even StA all fall into that category, don’t we? We all believe that there was a creator.

Your response equivocates on the word “creationism” by interchanging my use in this thread of the term to refer to a religious fundamentalism that sets its beliefs according to its own biblical literalism.

So finding design in nature is only a Protestant-fundamentalist pursuit? It seems to me that you are extremely bigoted with regard to this particular area.

This is another of your misrepresentations of what I said. To the contrary, I said “creationism” is a fundamentalist Protestant position, with some Catholic followers. You are free to trace the history and find out the facts for yourself.

Furthermore, my statements did not refer to “finding design in nature” in any sense that one may conceive, or even in some general sense, but specifically in the sense of ID theory. This is where you misrepresented, again, what I said.

The modern ID movement was spearheaded by the Protestant Phillip E. Johnson at U.C. Berkeley. From there, we can consider the relation of ID theory to the design arguments of the apologist and utilitarian William Paley.

Read the book, and tell me where it is nonsense. Really. It only mentions God once or twice, in passing, not as a conclusion or a premise. So if that’s what you’re worried about, you don’t need to.

Not quite…My concern does not at all involve whether the book mentions God. I have frequently posted in other threads my objections to ID theory as involving a distortion of the philosophical concepts of causality. ID theory conflates design and finality, ultimate and proximate causes. This is a fatal flaw. ID theory is DOA but refuses to admit the fact. Furthermore, I do not consider ID theory to be science.

You may want to label my considered views as bigoted, but that does not bother me in the slightest. The subject of this thread is the soul, and so far as ID theory has not been related to the topic of this thread I will refrain from turning the big guns on ID-ology.

For now I will just say , ID theory has not been proven. “It’s only a theory”.

 

[ricmat]

For now I will just say , ID theory has not been proven. “It’s only a theory”.

Of course it’s not proven. Science never “proves” anything (or so we are told regularly).

double

 

[StAnastasia]

Of course it’s not proven. Science never “proves” anything (or so we are told regularly).

Correct. But so far, ID hypotheses have been falsified.

 

[itinerant1]

HelenaMT, the concept of a “soul” as a quantum unit which a being either possesses completely or doesn’t possess at all seems rather quaint and incoherent to me. It’s probably a legacy of Greek body-soul dualism that has infected Christianity for a long time.

To the contrary, a concept of the soul that uses physical terms such as “quantum” is diametrically opposed to Greek body-soul dualism.

Quantum notions in regard to the soul are consistent with the Atomist tradition following Democritus and Lucretius, and finds its expression in modern times in those reductionist materialist psychologies of Watson, Skinner, and those other theories that identify the mind with brain states.

The reductionist view is consistent with the hypothesis that the human soul has evolved. However, the evolution of the soul contradicts the extreme dualism of Plato and Descartes, and the moderate dualism or moderate immaterialism of Aristotle and Aquinas.

The hypothesis that the human soul has evolved also contradicts Church doctrines that are de fide, as well as cognitive research that reveals the intellect and its activities to be radically different in kind from the cognitive abilities of non-human animals.

 

[itinerant1]

Is there anyone in this thread who believes the human mind is identical with the brain?

 

[ricmat]

Correct. But so far, ID hypotheses have been falsified.

All of them? Some of them? One or two?

I’ve got news for you. In every scientific theory, hypotheses have been falsified. Do you disagree? Would you like to hear about junk-DNA?

Is there a particular ID hypothesis that you have a special interest in?

 

[ricmat]

Is there anyone in this thread who believes the human mind is identical with the brain?

Not me. We may disagree about some “other” stuff, but I’m with you on this one.

 

[itinerant1]

All of them? Some of them? One or two?

I’ve got news for you. In every scientific theory, hypotheses have been falsified. Do you disagree? Would you like to hear about junk-DNA?

Is there a particular ID hypothesis that you have a special interest in?

Is any of this related to the thread topic?