What exactly is the soul?

[Blue_Horizon]

It is also based on Objectivity, careful to avoid subjective thinking. Based on what is outside the mind, which unites thought to reality. After all what makes a thing true, what we think or what we experience, the criterion of all our knowledge which should affect our thinking and not visa-versa. There are universal principles that never change, and neither does their source. Are these principles sensed or are they comprehended from what is experienced? It is interesting to note that even Albert Einstein in his essays “In My Later Years” was actually arriving to the concepts of the three degrees of abstraction already referred to by St. Thomas. As I see it, St.Thomas is logical, and consistent with the truth, and the Catholic Church picked a winner to explain what is and what isn’t regarding reason and Faith.

What can be more subjective than “picking a winner”?

If a" winner" is the “best” of equally logical contending philosophic explanations, none of which contradict faith, then best does seem somewhat in the eye of the beholder.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

You are welcome to your opinion but hurling insults against historic and reasoned arguments only displays your prejudice, it does not provide an opposing argument…

Of these four only #3 is a function strictly of the brain. Opinion is divided on # 2. However it is the opinion of Aquinas that the soul retains primary memories such as ideas and concepts. I personally think it retains all types of memories. It is difficult to see how a material substance could retain memories of any type.

Insulting the opinion of others is against the rules. Besides the men who pioneered these arguments were anything but ignorant. It is too bad we don’t have their like today.

But of course men have known since early Old Testament times that men have a rational soul. It was recorded in the Book of Genesis. You can try to disprove the story of Genesis but people have been trying to do that since the 17th century and haven’t succeeded yet.

That’s an awful lot of bluster without a lot of substance. I wouldn’t be insulting the Ancient Greeks if I said they were ignorant of how earthquakes worked, I would be stating a fact. The fact that they thought Poseidon caused earthquakes is not evidence to the contrary. They didn’t know what we know about earthquakes and then add the Poseidon theory on top for fun, they built the Poseidon theory to fill in their lack of knowledge about earthquakes.

I think the soul is the same way. People had no idea how the body was “animated,” even to this day we don’t have a complete picture. The fact that people created the idea of a soul to explain the body’s “animation” doesn’t mean people actually know how the body is animated any more than believing the idea of Poseidon means people understand earthquakes.

The early Greek philosophers, especially Aristotle, and Thomas Aquinas and those following him were well aware that the soul used the brain, that does not mean that the brain is the source of immaterial activities such as reasoning, remembering, willing.

And of course immaterial activities are halted or impared by accidents or disease. But the soul still possesses immaterial powers. But since it depends on the brain to function properly, any damage to the brain will limit the display of those powers. The powers are still present but they cannot act.

It is no argument against the immaterial powers of the soul that we can " see " the brain react to intellectual activity. The soul depends on the body, including the brain, and the body and the brain depend on the soul. In fact the soul directs all the bodies activities, not merely its intellectual activities.

You must realize what you’re doing here, right? You’re stripping the soul of any and all explanatory power. You’re trying to salvage the concept of Poseidon by saying “Well, Poseidon works with tectonic plates! He won’t violate the rules of tectonic plates with his actions. But he still totally exists and has a life and powers beyond tectonic plates.”

Essentially you are admitting that we might come up with a perfect physical description of the body without ever referencing a soul. But this admission is identical to admitting that we have no extra-religious evidence for a soul at all! Just like with tectonic plates, once we have a complete picture, there is no room left for Poseidon. We could still add him on, but we have no reason to do so.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . best does seem somewhat in the eye of the beholder.

what unites the two?
beholder and the beheld,
a fathomless chasm?

 

[Aloysium]

. . . Essentially you are admitting that we might come up with a perfect physical description of the body without ever referencing a soul. But this admission is identical to admitting that we have no extra-religious evidence for a soul at all! Just like with tectonic plates, once we have a complete picture, there is no room left for Poseidon. We could still add him on, but we have no reason to do so.

when I understand
tectonic plates, how they work,
there are no more why’s

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Neither philosophy nor science can contradict tines of faith. The fact is that God can hardly pass judgement over us if we cannot remember our past acts. What would be the point of that?

Thank you for you enlightened and charitable response.

Linus2nd

Linus brain only memory does not appear to logically necessitate, like 1+1=2, that there is no human afterlife, nor that the nature of our afterlife cannot still be determined by our virtue in this life.

Even Buddhism holds that future destiny is linked to what we do, not by what we remember, due to the causal “wake” that propels us forward even when this earthly vessel halts. Karma is what it is called, and it doesn’t need subjective memory to operate.

Do you regard Buddhism as provably illogical on this point as well?

But, as I say, even at the level of faith, I am not aware of any infallible Church teaching such as you claim requiring personal recall as a condition of sin guilt and hence valid judgement. Quite the opposite.

We are “judged” by the book of Life, as Buddhism also confirms, are we not.
This book will surely “remind” us and it can hardly be gainsayed if from God.

Or as Ian Paisley might put, memories will be supplied .

 

[Blue_Horizon]

That’s an awful lot of bluster without a lot of substance. I wouldn’t be insulting the Ancient Greeks if I said they were ignorant of how earthquakes worked, I would be stating a fact. The fact that they thought Poseidon caused earthquakes is not evidence to the contrary. They didn’t know what we know about earthquakes and then add the Poseidon theory on top for fun, they built the Poseidon theory to fill in their lack of knowledge about earthquakes.

I think the soul is the same way. People had no idea how the body was “animated,” even to this day we don’t have a complete picture. The fact that people created the idea of a soul to explain the body’s “animation” doesn’t mean people actually know how the body is animated any more than believing the idea of Poseidon means people understand earthquakes.You must realize what you’re doing here, right? You’re stripping the soul of any and all explanatory power. You’re trying to salvage the concept of Poseidon by saying “Well, Poseidon works with tectonic plates! He won’t violate the rules of tectonic plates with his actions. But he still totally exists and has a life and powers beyond tectonic plates.”

Essentially you are admitting that we might come up with a perfect physical description of the body without ever referencing a soul. But this admission is identical to admitting that we have no extra-religious evidence for a soul at all! Just like with tectonic plates, once we have a complete picture, there is no room left for Poseidon. We could still add him on, but we have no reason to do so.

Yes I find much agreement with these insights.

Linus, do note that JK, unlike many materialists who also raise these valid enough observations, is not condemning faith as well.
All that is being observed is that an ancient philosophic argument once used to support articles of faith…can now be better critiqued by its own discipline and found wanting in a way not previously recognised. If faith is true then there should be better philosophic arguments out there to so prove… If indeed this is a question that philosophy can prove either way.

You may well be doing philosophy a disservice, and your own intelligence, by anxiously allowing your faith to fetter you to failing philosophic tradition… believing philosophic tradition is as infallible as Catholic faith tradition.

And in fettering faith to possibly outmoded philosophy forms do you not run the risk of disservice to future intelligent Catholics because they will see the philosophic silliness even if you may not and even if you are unwilling to explore
new directions.

And if you believe there can be no other Catholic philosophic explanations on these points… well I do not believe that is philosophically demonstrable… and such rigid and closed thinking will lead you to error even in truths of faith… such as I believe you are making above ref personal memory and Judgement.

 

[ynotzap]

What can be more subjective than “picking a winner”?

If a" winner" is the “best” of equally logical contending philosophic explanations, none of which contradict faith, then best does seem somewhat in the eye of the beholder.

You have to be objective to spot a winner, not guessing, but intelligently evaluating winning qualities in the subject. In the case of St.Thomas, a brilliant mind, a pure and saintly life, (qualities needed for attaining the truth), and a closeness to the Truth, and to be more objective in the choice, so regarded by other great thinkers, and not just by ones’ personal opinion, and also by the Church itself.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

That’s an awful lot of bluster without a lot of substance. I wouldn’t be insulting the Ancient Greeks if I said they were ignorant of how earthquakes worked, I would be stating a fact. The fact that they thought Poseidon caused earthquakes is not evidence to the contrary. They didn’t know what we know about earthquakes and then add the Poseidon theory on top for fun, they built the Poseidon theory to fill in their lack of knowledge about earthquakes.

I think the soul is the same way. People had no idea how the body was “animated,” even to this day we don’t have a complete picture. The fact that people created the idea of a soul to explain the body’s “animation” doesn’t mean people actually know how the body is animated any more than believing the idea of Poseidon means people understand earthquakes.You must realize what you’re doing here, right? You’re stripping the soul of any and all explanatory power. You’re trying to salvage the concept of Poseidon by saying “Well, Poseidon works with tectonic plates! He won’t violate the rules of tectonic plates with his actions. But he still totally exists and has a life and powers beyond tectonic plates.”

Essentially you are admitting that we might come up with a perfect physical description of the body without ever referencing a soul. But this admission is identical to admitting that we have no extra-religious evidence for a soul at all! Just like with tectonic plates, once we have a complete picture, there is no room left for Poseidon. We could still add him on, but we have no reason to do so.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

That’s an awful lot of bluster without a lot of substance. I wouldn’t be insulting the Ancient Greeks if I said they were ignorant of how earthquakes worked, I would be stating a fact. The fact that they thought Poseidon caused earthquakes is not evidence to the contrary. They didn’t know what we know about earthquakes and then add the Poseidon theory on top for fun, they built the Poseidon theory to fill in their lack of knowledge about earthquakes.

The fact that you disagree with them doesn’t make them ignorant. They and their Christian and Muslim and Jewish commentators were some of the most intelligent men who ever existed. We are not talking about earthquakes we are talking about the explanation for the existence of immaterial activities that take place in a material substance,

People had no idea how the body was “animated,” even to this day we don’t have a complete picture. The fact that people created the idea of a soul to explain the body’s “animation” doesn’t mean people actually know how the body is animated any more than believing the idea of Poseidon means people understand earthquakes.

Have you ever read On the Soul by Aristotle and Aquinas’ commentary on it? You will see that it is very tight reasoning. Aristotle didn’t believe many of the myths of the Greeks and their poets, so he cannot be found guilty by association. You seem bent on using the illogic of insults to make a point. Even if Aristotle or Aquinas swallowed some myth like Poseidon, it would not follow that their logical explanation of the soul was likewise deficient. I do suppose you are capable of following that?

You must realize what you’re doing here, right? You’re stripping the soul of any and all explanatory power. You’re trying to salvage the concept of Poseidon by saying “Well, Poseidon works with tectonic plates! He won’t violate the rules of tectonic plates with his actions. But he still totally exists and has a life and powers beyond tectonic plates.”

My dear Kappa, can’t you get beyond insults? That doesn’t make anyone inclined to agree with you. Your problem is that you are a doctrinaire materialist and can’t afford to admit anything exists outside material reality. Do you seriously believe that thoughts, memories, and willful acts are the product of neuron synapsis and chemical interactions. I would say that anyone who believed that was perfectly capable of believing that Poseidon caused earthquakes. See, the ball can be tossed right back. You might be intereseted in an article by Peter Kreeft in Strange Notions, he pretty well demolishes materialism
strangenotions.com/how-to-prove-that-transcendentalism-is-true/

Essentially you are admitting that we might come up with a perfect physical description of the body without ever referencing a soul. But this admission is identical to admitting that we have no extra-religious evidence for a soul at all! Just like with tectonic plates, once we have a complete picture, there is no room left for Poseidon. We could still add him on, but we have no reason to do so.

Well, the Greeks dreamed up Poseidon, I suppose today’s materialists are perfectly capable of dreaming up an equally mythical explanation. But they would be perfectly wrong, just as the Greeks. God has Revealed who we are, persons with a material body animated by a spiritual soul. Did God lie?

Cheers
Linus2nd

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Yes I find much agreement with these insights.

Linus, do note that JK, unlike many materialists who also raise these valid enough observations, is not condemning faith as well.

Duely noted

All that is being observed is that an ancient philosophic argument once used to support articles of faith…can now be better critiqued by its own discipline and found wanting in a way not previously recognised.

And what article of faith was Aristotle defending? I have not noticed any better philosophical argument than that offered by Aquinas and those who followed him. So what discipline are you alluding to?.

If faith is true then there should be better philosophic arguments out there to so prove… If indeed this is a question that philosophy can prove either way.

I don’t see anything wrong with the argument.

You may well be doing philosophy a disservice, and your own intelligence, by anxiously allowing your faith to fetter you to failing philosophic tradition… believing philosophic tradition is as infallible as Catholic faith tradition.

I don’t believe that Aquinas’ teaching on the soul is infallible, I think it is true.

And in fettering faith to possibly outmoded philosophy forms do you not run the risk of disservice to future intelligent Catholics because they will see the philosophic silliness even if you may not and even if you are unwilling to explore
new directions.

What I find silly is that neuron and synapsis activity would account for the immaterial activities of man. No, I do not share your fear.

And if you believe there can be no other Catholic philosophic explanations on these points… well I do not believe that is philosophically demonstrable… and such rigid and closed thinking will lead you to error even in truths of faith… such as I believe you are making above ref personal memory and Judgement.

All the Church teaches is that man has a spiritual soul that is the form of man ( CCC, 362-365 ). It is the soul, which God " breathed " into the human body which makes him the image of god. And how are we the image of God? This Aquinas explains is our abliity to think, remember, and will. What is not demonstrable is that the brain is the cause of man’s immaterial activities. If that were true, what would be the function of the soul which the Church calls the form of man?

Linus2nd

 

[Blue_Horizon]

You have to be objective to spot a winner, not guessing, but intelligently evaluating winning qualities in the subject. In the case of St.Thomas, a brilliant mind, a pure and saintly life, (qualities needed for attaining the truth), and a closeness to the Truth, and to be more objective in the choice, so regarded by other great thinkers, and not just by ones’ personal opinion, and also by the Church itself.

The difficulty with your personal view is that it appears non-falsifiable.
That is, anyone who may disagree with your “winning” 'truth" that Aquinas is 100% brilliant and “correct” philosophically (whatever that means) OR is somehow guaranteed so by the alleged fact he is 100% pure in both mind and heart…you would of course assume as ungodly and unCatholic and therefore cannot possibly be correct despite the critical reflections of wise and sincere persons on some of his stances in the 900 yrs since.

It would seem your non-falsifiable claim is based on a mistaken application of logic to the real world. Such thinking here appears tautological, little better than opining “I bet that nephew over there has an uncle.” Sure the truth is certain in its elegant inner logic. But whether that male you are pointing too is in fact a nephew…well that is a very subjective judgement call isn’t it .

This sort of circular reasoning cannot be discussed by others, just as failed prophets of doom create all manner of new excuses to explain why their prophetic dates never come true.

I am more interested in discussing alternative views to those that have been unintelligently parroted for the last 900 years as if Aquinas or Aristotle would never have changed their allegedly “timeless truths” in the light of 900 yrs worth of advances in thought and knowledge of both philosophy and creation since their time.
Why is it people think the great thinkers of the past are unquestionably more wise and more knowledgeable on every point than generations 1000s of years later .

As far as I understand things the Church is not infallible when it comes to philosophic propositions inferred by reason from observation of how creation operates - including geo-centrism.

So unless you can come up with a real-world approach to these sorts of issues which accepts there may be multiple valid views on the matter I, and other sensible people here, probably won’t be able to take this with you any further.

 

[wmw]

I tend to think it could go either way. The Brain could have quite a bit of memory stored in it or the soul could bring them with it.

What I’m thinking is the the Soul without a body is quite incomplete and would be quite in shock without it. It would seem to me necessary to provide a soft landing for a soul just separated from his or her body. If the heavenly existence is without a body proper then some sort of spiritual simulated body must provide this support for the soul in heaven.

Whether this has a necessity to provide the memories of the body is what you all are debating. So, it hardly seems to be much of a big deal. God can bring what memories you need to the party or your soul can bring them along.

 

[JuanFlorencio]

It seems pretty clear to me that the soul is transparently a “God of the Gaps” kind of construct. Historically, we had no idea how the body did things like:

1. Reasoned
2. Stored memories
3. Processed sensory (name removed by moderator)ut
4. Made choices

Moreover, these activities seemed too far removed from other phenomenon that they must occupy an entirely different metaphysical category. It was out of this ignorance that the concept of a soul arose.

However, now we have actual evidence that casts doubt on the necessity of postulating a spiritual source for those sorts of activities. Specifically, brain damage can impair all of those activities and we can selectively affect different processes by manipulating the brain in certain ways. In addition, whenever someone exhibits impairment in those abilities and we look at their brain, we find damage that explains the impairment. On top of that, we can “see” our brain doing things like processing (name removed by moderator)ut, remembering things, and reasoning with technologies like MRI.

This isn’t “proof there is no soul!” but it does suggest that we can reasonably hypothesize that the brain is actually responsible for those things, i.e. we don’t need to invoke a soul to get a complete explanation for them. I personally believe that the case for the “brain only” hypothesis will only get stronger as our understanding of the brain improves.

Certainly, people like Aristotle did not have an MRI equipment in his laboratory; so, he could not “see” the doings of the brain; but he was able to see other parts of the human body, like the faces of people, and how they moved it to convey their thoughts. He knew that if you press your eyes you see “fire”, or that if you approach real fire to your neighbor’s hand he will react immediately, crying (probably he knew also that by doing this you can impair the reasoning ability of your neighbor, at least momentarily). In my opinion, he knew quite a lot about our organism (however, these last days I am less and less inclined to study him; I don’t know why…); but he certainly did not “see” the activity of the human brain through an MRI apparatus.

Now that we have those apparatuses (well, I don’t have one really… As a matter of fact, I have never seen any), surely you can explain how the brain actually produces a theory (a kind of “God of the gaps”, as you say) about how the brain produces theories; and you can show us how this actually happens, don’t you? Perhaps you can even show us how a theory, once it has been produced in a brain, can be removed from it. I am very much interested on those findings. Why don’t you tell us about them? Because we can see, like Aristotle, parts of the body which are accessible to the many, but seeing the brain is a privilege of the few.

Perhaps “logics” has been already explained (logically, of course) as certain brain microstructure, but we don’t know yet. Wow!

What is the appearance of reasonings “seen” by means of an MRI equipment, JapanesseKappa?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Quote:
Originally Posted by JapaneseKappa View Post
That’s an awful lot of bluster without a lot of substance. I wouldn’t be insulting the Ancient Greeks if I said they were ignorant of how earthquakes worked, I would be stating a fact. The fact that they thought Poseidon caused earthquakes is not evidence to the contrary. They didn’t know what we know about earthquakes and then add the Poseidon theory on top for fun, they built the Poseidon theory to fill in their lack of knowledge about earthquakes.

Linus some common-sense observations…

The words “ignorant” (as opposed to “stupid”) and “very wise” are not contradictory. Therefore I see no reason to get worked up and erroneously assume JK is in bad faith and “bent on using the logic of insults”.
I suggest the indiscipline is actually coming from yourself - I know you well enough to observe you routinely get worked up when people do not agree either with your very traditional views nor see any longer the brilliance in the same old ably repeated (but seeming irrelevant) traditional “reasons” which were offered by the ancients in ignorance of todays progress in thought and science.

We dare to suggest that should these very wise men be alive today they would not be so confident in all their conclusions of the past and would probably deride their faithful “scribes” of today who well present their past writings yet fail to philosophise as brilliantly as they on new material today of which they were ignorant.

JK well shows the inductive philosophic approach that Aristotle and others of old took to the “physics” of their time. Their reasoning based on their limited empirical data was indeed tight, but only as tight as the breadth of their empirical data.

People such as yourself, and many other “Catholic” philosophers, appear so shackled by “Faith” and an excessive respect for the ancients that these very philosophers seem to stop you from philosophising as they did.

Instead of allowing the empirical/sensible (including new knowledge) to test inherited philosophic conclusions their very “metaphysics” has assumed the same unquestioning “facticity” as the happenings of the sensible world.

This is no longer the sort of philosophising that the ancients, esp Aristotle, were known to be wise for. It is but a neo-Platonism whereby Poseidon has become as much a fact as earthquakes themselves.

Sure, you don’t believe in Poseidon, but only it seems because the conclusion is not compatible with Catholicism.
Yet this etherealising style of philosophising leads you to fight to the death any suggestion at all that memory may be more comprehensively explained by a corporeal organ, let alone nowadays being much more likely given better understanding of the complexity of the sensible creation.

It is very clear to many that in terms of philosophising…the inference that Poseidon or Thor is responsible for earthquakes or lightning or the soul for memory (which like earthquakes and lightning was thought inexplicable by material processes) is all the same and it is a valid way of philosophising.

However such philosophising is falsifiable - but yours is not, which is why we conclude you are not really philosophising like Aristotle or even Aquinas.

To say they were “ignorant” (regarding the complexity and unaided organising capacity inherent in the sensible universe without needing to invoke substantial spiritual principles or extra powers of the soul) compared to Man today is perfectly acceptable and true.

We do not say they were not very wise, they were.
Which is why we believe if they lived to day they would have been wise enough to see their sensible assumptions may be in need of correction.

That you would think we were insulting you or Aristotle or Aquinas shows just how different your way of “philosophising” is from ours - if not the ancients as well.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I tend to think it could go either way. The Brain could have quite a bit of memory stored in it or the soul could bring them with it.

What I’m thinking is the the Soul without a body is quite incomplete and would be quite in shock without it. It would seem to me necessary to provide a soft landing for a soul just separated from his or her body. If the heavenly existence is without a body proper then some sort of spiritual simulated body must provide this support for the soul in heaven.

Whether this has a necessity to provide the memories of the body is what you all are debating. So, it hardly seems to be much of a big deal. God can bring what memories you need to the party or your soul can bring them along.

Now this is what I call real philosophising - and still faithful, and even well congruent, with Catholic Faith

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Certainly, people like Aristotle did not have an MRI equipment in his laboratory; so, he could not “see” the doings of the brain; but he was able to see other parts of the human body, like the faces of people, and how they moved it to convey their thoughts. He knew that if you press your eyes you see “fire”, or that if you approach real fire to your neighbor’s hand he will react immediately, crying (probably he knew also that by doing this you can impair the reasoning ability of your neighbor, at least momentarily). In my opinion, he knew quite a lot about our organism (however, these last days I am less and less inclined to study him; I don’t know why…); but he certainly did not “see” the activity of the human brain through an MRI apparatus.

Now that we have those apparatuses (well, I don’t have one really… As a matter of fact, I have never seen any), surely you can explain how the brain actually produces a theory (a kind of “God of the gaps”, as you say) about how the brain produces theories; and you can show us how this actually happens, don’t you? Perhaps you can even show us how a theory, once it has been produced in a brain, can be removed from it. I am very much interested on those findings. Why don’t you tell us about them? Because we can see, like Aristotle, parts of the body which are accessible to the many, but seeing the brain is a privilege of the few.

Perhaps “logics” has been already explained (logically, of course) as certain brain microstructure, but we don’t know yet. Wow!

What is the appearance of reasonings “seen” by means of an MRI equipment, JapanesseKappa?

If explanatory capacity is the criterion of the best models of truth how does invoking a spiritual power of the soul called “memory” lead us to better answer the question of “how”
that you just aimed at those who study the corporeal organ?

All it does is remove the question to a deeper level that is even more mysterious.
Sure “religion” pretends to explain the “spiritual”, yet that is not a matter of philosophy at all but of faith.

The question is begged just as much is it not?
So your approach appears inconclusive in gain-saying the “failure” of science to fully answer the question “how” - for it condemns the “soul” approach at the same time.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

What is not demonstrable is that the brain is the cause of man’s immaterial activities.
Linus2nd

This is your best point - sorry for not responding to the others, life is short.

First up there seems no compelling philosophic necessity to assume memory must be an “immaterial activity” as was likely the case in Aristotle’s time. Anatomy back then could not find evidence of a material structure in the brain that held sensible memories.

Nobody here has said that the memory-as-organ proponents have fully proved their hypothesis (nor do we think the memory-as-power-of-the-soul proponents fully proven their side either, especially in the light of modern science).

We simply have two hypotheses, both of which do not appear convincingly provable or disprovable. Neither does it seem that the former can be convincingly shown to oppose Catholic faith - though the classical materialist explanation of this hypothesis would clearly be opposed to the Faith.

what would be the function of the soul which the Church calls the form of man?

I haven’t thought too deeply about how we would have to modify our understanding of the soul to accommodate the memory-as-organ hypothesis if it were true. I don’t see it as particularly problematic.

Obviously we would have to re-address Aquinas’s take on the higher “intellective powers” of the soul and relegate memory to something taken care of by the usual base properties that even animal soul’s possess (natural unity,nutrition, growth).

Its is possible that the intellective powers may have to suffer the same fate and that we accept that human intellect is not qualitatively different from an animal’s “material” vis aestimativa.

 

[JuanFlorencio]

If explanatory capacity is the criterion of the best models of truth how does invoking a spiritual power of the soul called “memory” lead us to better answer the question of “how”
that you just aimed at those who study the corporeal organ?

All it does is remove the question to a deeper level that is even more mysterious.
Sure “religion” pretends to explain the “spiritual”, yet that is not a matter of philosophy at all but of faith.

The question is begged just as much is it not?
So your approach appears inconclusive in gain-saying the “failure” of science to fully answer the question “how” - for it condemns the “soul” approach at the same time.

Is “how” a bad question? What are the kind of questions that the MRI apparatus allow you to answer?

I would like to know JK’s insight. May be he can answer my first question. When I read his post it seemed very promising to me.

 

[ynotzap]

The difficulty with your personal view is that it appears non-falsifiable.

Wise choice is stating it “appears”
Blue Horizon:

That is, anyone who may disagree with your “winning” 'truth" that Aquinas is 100% brilliant and “correct” philosophically (whatever that means) OR is somehow guaranteed so by the alleged fact he is 100% pure in both mind and heart…you would of course assume as ungodly and unCatholic and therefore cannot possibly be correct despite the critical reflections of wise and sincere persons on some of his stances in the 900 yrs since.

I don’t know if you read some of my post, although I think your have. If you remember i never attribute to any man the quality of infallibility. I do attribute to myself and any man that quality, passive infallibility if he is in harmony with Church teaching on morals, and apostolic traditions. No, I don’t believe St.Thomas or any one is else is infallible. Me thinks perhaps you assume too much, and you are not arguing with me, but with some interpretation you have assigned to me in your own mind. Who is being subjective?

“I bet that nephew over there has an uncle.”

Sure the truth is certain in its elegant inner logic. But whether that male you are pointing too is in fact a nephew…well that is a very subjective judgement call isn’t it .

My logic as applied to the real world is not tautological, repetitive, although I find myself repeating many time because the same questions are proposed by new members. The word you should be using is “ontological”, we are dealing with the ultimate causes and effect in the real world aren’t we? I am doing my best not to make subjective calls, and if it “appears” that way, you must understand that I try to avoid being self-righteous, but that doesn’t mean I succeeded.
Blue Horizon:

This sort of circular reasoning cannot be discussed by others, just as failed prophets of doom create all manner of new excuses to explain why their prophetic dates never come true.

Did you ever consider what you call circular reasoning,is because that’s the way you see it, but that’s not the way it is?
Blue Horizon:

I am more interested in discussing alternative views to those that have been unintelligently parroted for the last 900 years as if Aquinas or Aristotle would never have changed their allegedly “timeless truths” in the light of 900 yrs worth of advances in thought and knowledge of both philosophy and creation since their time.
Why is it people think the great thinkers of the past are unquestionably more wise and more knowledgeable on every point than generations 1000s of years later .

Unintelligently parroted? It goes either way with humans, are you saying that it was never parroted intelligently many time? Why does it seem to some that the wisdom of the ages has not latched on to some ultimate truths, and that these truths do not change with time, or discoveries. The object of appetency for the human mind has always been for truth, even a liar doesn’t want to be lied to. Ultimate truths are timeless. Is there possibly some skepticism on your part about this acquisition? Show me some of these thoughts and advancements is knowledge. I agree, scientifically, we have advanced in the material, empirical realm (earth bound) but have we advanced in morality, behavior, in civility, individually, and universally? And if we haven’t, do you suppose that perhaps people do not know they have a spiritual soul, destined to exist beyond physical life? As I said many times, many are earth bound and can see no further than the physical world around them, because men have not trancended to the spiritual realities.
Blue Horizon:

As far as I understand things the Church is not infallible when it comes to philosophic propositions inferred by reason from observation of how creation operates - including geo-centrism.

I have never heard or read that claim by the Church, nor do I think she does, but I do know that she acknowledges and uses the teachings of St.Thomas his findings, in expounding doctrine. eg. the doctrine of Transubstantiation, she acknowledges his synthesis of reason with faith, and proving the existence of God by the Cosmological arguments, and they are back up by objective rationalization based on the realities observed in the universe.
Blue Horizon:

So unless you can come up with a real-world approach to these sorts of issues which accepts there may be multiple valid views on the matter I, and other sensible people here, probably won’t be able to take this with you any further.

Wether you agree or disagree as other’s might has no bearing on my changing of my convictions unless you can prove me wrong. I do believe I have a solid real-world approach, but of course that doesn’t make it so, so show me where I may be wrong, or better yet ,where I’m wrong. But know this, if I have said, or will say something contradictory to Church teaching regarding faith and moral, I submit to her in obedience. My faith takes precedence over my reason.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

This is your best point - sorry for not responding to the others, life is short.

First up there seems no compelling philosophic necessity to assume memory must be an “immaterial activity” as was likely the case in Aristotle’s time. Anatomy back then could not find evidence of a material structure in the brain that held sensible memories.

Nobody here has said that the memory-as-organ proponents have fully proved their hypothesis (nor do we think the memory-as-power-of-the-soul proponents fully proven their side either, especially in the light of modern science).

We simply have two hypotheses, both of which do not appear convincingly provable or disprovable. Neither does it seem that the former can be convincingly shown to oppose Catholic faith - though the classical materialist explanation of this hypothesis would clearly be opposed to the Faith.

I haven’t thought too deeply about how we would have to modify our understanding of the soul to accommodate the memory-as-organ hypothesis if it were true. I don’t see it as particularly problematic.

Obviously we would have to re-address Aquinas’s take on the higher “intellective powers” of the soul and relegate memory to something taken care of by the usual base properties that even animal soul’s possess (natural unity,nutrition, growth).

Its is possible that the intellective powers may have to suffer the same fate and that we accept that human intellect is not qualitatively different from an animal’s “material” vis aestimativa.

Much better. Aquinas uses memory, fantasy, imagination univically. I don’t see how memory can be a material act. Real cars do not run around in my memory. What does run around in my memory is an image or cars which are moving. Therefore memory cannot be caused by a material organ like the brain. Since memory is an immaterial act, it must be caused by an immaterial power and an immaterial power must reside in an immaterial form, the soul. Therefore the soul retains a memory of man’s past acts after death. I agree that this is purely speculative.

According to Aquinas, the human soul possesses all the spiritual powers of lower life forms such as non-rational animals, and plants. So it possesses a power equivalent to the estimative power of the animal soul. Aquinas, following Aristotle, places this power in human imagination or memory.

Linus2nd