How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Discuss any topics related to metaphysics (the philosophical study of the principles of reality) or epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge) in this forum.
BigBango
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by BigBango »

JamesOfSeattle wrote: May 13th, 2018, 6:37 pm BigB, in what sense is “meaning” preserved, what do you mean by “meaning”, and how can a neutron contribute to “meaning” at our scale?
Good question JOS!

First what do I mean by "meaning". Not "intention " or translation. It is what I value in life. What I work for, treasure or care about! It could be I care a lot about my children and their lives after I die. I should care about the whole ecosystem I am in and depend on for my sustenance. My friends I have nurtured relationships with. The smell of a particular flower or walks in the woods. Meaning in life for me has to do with my attachments. If I were Buddhist I might be attached to giving up my attachments. :} Oh the loneliness of giving up dualism and just being one with everything. (That's another thread).

This "way of life" does not have to just be given up when our bodies die. I am asserting that our soul or essence (stored values/meaning) come from before the big bang and we continue adding to that reservoir in each new life.

What part does a neutron/proton play? It just so happens that those tiny objects were once the centers of galaxies before the big Crunch Big Bang. The ancient civilizations that orbited them are as small to them as we are small to the black hole centers of our galaxy. I calculated the size of a civilizations ecosystem/solar system to be a planc volume. Much smaller than a neutron. That is a resolution just big enough to measure. Any smaller and it disappears into the quantum units like the space between the pixels on your TV.
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Felix
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Felix »

Consul: There is a consensus in natural science that abiogenesis is a purely physicochemical process.

That reminds me of Alfred Whitehead's tongue-in-cheek remark. "Scientists animated by the purpose of proving that they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study."

Never met a bare physiochemical process that gave a dam about whether it existed, let alone reproduced itself. Can there be a way without a will?
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Consul »

Felix wrote: May 17th, 2018, 5:40 amConsul: There is a consensus in natural science that abiogenesis is a purely physicochemical process.

That reminds me of Alfred Whitehead's tongue-in-cheek remark. "Scientists animated by the purpose of proving that they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study."

Never met a bare physiochemical process that gave a dam about whether it existed, let alone reproduced itself. Can there be a way without a will?
Do you believe there's a teleological psychical force involved in abiogenesis and apsychogenesis (the evolution of conscious life from nonconscious life)?
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Felix
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Felix »

Do you believe there's a teleological psychical force involved in abiogenesis and apsychogenesis (the evolution of conscious life from nonconscious life)?
Not teleological in the sense of leading to a specific end or purpose, but in the sense that it is a non-arbitrary creative process.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Consul »

Felix wrote: May 19th, 2018, 1:33 pm
Do you believe there's a teleological psychical force involved in abiogenesis and apsychogenesis (the evolution of conscious life from nonconscious life)?
Not teleological in the sense of leading to a specific end or purpose, but in the sense that it is a non-arbitrary creative process.
Evolutionary non-arbitrariness or non-randomness doesn't require teleological forces.

"Evolution by selection, then, is a combination of randomness and lawfulness. There is first a “random” (or “indifferent”) process—the occurrence of mutations that generate an array of genetic variants, both good and bad (in the mouse example, a variety of new coat colors); and then a “lawful” process—natural selection—that orders this variation, keeping the good and winnowing the bad (on the dunes, light-color genes increase at the expense of dark-color ones).

This brings up what is surely the most widespread misunderstanding about Darwinism: the idea that, in evolution, “everything happens by chance” (also stated as “everything happens by accident”). This common claim is flatly wrong. No evolutionist—and certainly not Darwin—ever argued that natural selection is based on chance. Quite the opposite. Could a completely random process alone make the hammering woodpecker, the tricky bee orchid, or the camouflaged katydids and beach mice? Of course not. If suddenly evolution was forced to depend on random mutations alone, species would quickly degenerate and go extinct. Chance alone cannot explain the marvelous fit between individuals and their environment.

And it doesn’t. True, the raw materials for evolution—the variations between individuals—are indeed produced by chance mutations. These mutations occur willy-nilly, regardless of whether they are good or bad for the individual. But it is the filtering of that variation by natural selection that produces adaptations, and natural selection is manifestly not random. It is a powerful molding force, accumulating genes that have a greater chance of being passed on than others, and in so doing making individuals ever better able to cope with their environment. It is, then, the unique combination of mutation and selection—chance and lawfulness—that tells us how organisms become adapted. Richard Dawkins provided the most concise definition of natural selection: it is “the non-random survival of random variants.”"


(Coyne, Jerry A. Why Evolution is True. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. pp. 129-30)
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Felix »

Consul: Evolutionary non-arbitrariness or non-randomness doesn't require teleological forces.
But it requires the "powerful molding force" of natural selection, a mindless and aimless non-teleological process that somehow miraculously lead to increasing complexity? How very remarkable!
Richard Dawkins provided the most concise definition of natural selection: it is “the non-random survival of random variants.”
And coincidentally, it's also a concise definition of the man's thinking processes.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Wayne92587 »

Moon Madness!
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Sy Borg
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Sy Borg »

Felix wrote: May 20th, 2018, 5:15 am
Consul: Evolutionary non-arbitrariness or non-randomness doesn't require teleological forces.
But it requires the "powerful molding force" of natural selection, a mindless and aimless non-teleological process that somehow miraculously lead to increasing complexity? How very remarkable!
Fractal emergence creating complexity from simplicity, initially driven by dark energy in the quantum foam seems less remarkable to me than as the idea of a disembodied intelligence creating it. No matter which way one considers the nature of reality, it all seems rather implausible :) Yet amongst at least one those implausible notions is at least a grain of truth.

Consider the growth of a mouse. It moves from relative simplicity to far greater complexity, and without teleology. The mouse does not have a purpose to grow; it simply responds to unbidden emotional states such as hunger, fear, curiosity, the sexual urge and anger, and the net result of those inherited and conditioned responses is very often growth and reproduction.

The universe in general seems rather like that. It just grows and develops according to the limitations set in its conception/initial state, its responses driven by the laws of physics rather than emotions or thought - at until the emergence of emotions and intelligence (which may yet be game-changers on galactic sales in the far future).
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Felix »

Does the term teleology imply a creator? I didn't think it did, only creative intent, which can be impersonal and ambiguous.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Sy Borg »

Sorry, I wasn't sure where you were coming from. I still reckon you imply a tad too much purpose, though. For there to be purpose there must be a system yet the early universe was utterly chaotic, yet to systematise.
At some point it was too hot and dense to even have nuclei, and at some even earlier point than that, the Universe was too energetic to even have individual protons and neutrons! Back when the Universe was a tiny fraction of a second old, all we had was a sea of quarks, gluons, leptons, antileptons and ultra-hot radiation, swirling around in the primordial soup of the Early Universe!
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

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Duckrabbit wrote: April 5th, 2018, 4:57 pm What does a soul without a body do? If my body dies but my soul lives on, does it perceive things in the physical world? Does it linger where my body has died or does it travel? As it no longer inhabits a body it does not have access to eyes, ears, nose, tongue, or nerves. Is it therefore blind and deaf? Or are there other, non physical ways of sensing the world? How would they work? People often say of someone who has died that they are "looking down" on their loved ones? If this is not to be taken literally, how is it to be taken? What could figuratively looking down be? We generally know, I think, what figurative uses of words are meant to connote, but here - what?

I realize (and don't deny) there is a note of sarcasm to the above, but my point and my questions are at least somewhat sincere. There are those who are not necessarily religious who believe that the body and mind have separate existences, which operate on their own and could each potentially carry on without the other. But what is a mind without a body? A common answer is to describe it as an awareness or a consciousness. But is not awareness determined by sensing, and is not sensing facilitated by sense organs? Does one need to be embodied first for some period of time before one can exist as an awareness without the body? Does the awareness have to first learn through the sense organs and the functioning of the brain what it is to be aware, before it can live on its own? How does it continue to be aware - that is continue to be an awareness in anything but name - without the body (including brain)? Does it live on memories? Can memories be generated without a brain? How? Does calling it "consciousness" change anything? Would not such consciousness still require at least an apprenticeship in a body?

Such questions are not to be shoved off as trite and immaterial (pardon the pun). If a mind cannot exist, function, operate, without a body, what is the point in saying they are separate, that they exist on different plains? Why even talk about them as both needing to be accounted for? Why this need to bifurcate? We can talk of the mind causing the body to act. But why put it that way when we could just say that a person decides to act?
It is important that the mind/ soul / awareness (without religious connotation) makes extranatural interpretation of stimuli. A stone is pushed and heated and hammered and talked to; but it does not feel the heat, the pressure, the pain, the pleasure.

The mind is an additional survival tool, if you like, which gives guidance (via evolutionary development of the mind) to what is pleasing and what is painful; and thus the animal or organism is better aided in finding survival-positive stances, positions, actions, and milieu. But the mind is not a simple reactive entity; it, like you, OP, said, it gives guidance. It makes the man-animal-whatever move, it act as a motivator.

I think the bifurcation model is important, because it makes thinkers realize that with some complexity, a new type of movement of material is created. A stone responds to physical laws, while humans, chimpanzees, even amoeba, respond to the pleasure principle. (Pleasure principle: always try to find the most pleasurable stance in any situation, and create movement and displacement to effect it.) This would be unimaginable without a mind.

There are times when the mind is not a functional part of the body. For instance when you lose consciousness. Some insist that their minds have literally left their bodies, for instance, during and operation, and they literally looked down on the operating table on their own bodies as doctors worked on them.

These accounts of out-of-body experiences are easily debunked as soon as any details are questioned which can't be verified by anything but memory, for instance, how many in the operating room were left-handed, or was there much blood or little on the floor, or how many different beeps were audible emitted by machines in the room.

So while the body and mind are inseparable, if you assume the evolutionary development of the mind, the body can still operate on its own, while, as evidence to the contrary is not extant, and as the OP so brilliantly pointed it out, mind hasn't been observed to exist without a body.

Can we say that therefore it is impossible for the mind to exist without a body? Well, the OP's point is that the mind relies on its existence on the body, the mind does not only use the body as a host. Because the mind would be unable to experience itself without physical stimulation.

This I reject. Because the mind has extranatural abilities, that the matter does not, and it is possible to experience the extranatural feelings without bodily stimuluses awakening them. Such as memories can serve as happiness-creators, or daydreams about the future, or thoughts that are revelations to the mind. The mind uses images of physical reality, but it does not use the immediately occurring stimuli of the physical reality.

In summation, the mind is able to summon up its own stimuli to act on, and while it needs a connection to a body to experience stimulation in order to experience its own self, once it has been done, the mind can act independently of the body, while I believe at the same time the mind relies on the body for its very existence.

Once the body is gone, conceivably the mind can go on functioning, with some of the functions but not with all of them, that were there during the life of the body that the mind had been connected to. But this has no evidence, has never been experienced or accounted for in our reality. Thus, it is believable, but nothing more than that.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Wayne92587 »

The Soul is not born of cause and effect, is not mortal, is a creation, and as such does not die in the same manner in which the Flesh Body dies.

When the Flesh Body Dies, the Soul, the innate, inner, motion, the passion of the Soul, of the Flesh body, simply fades away, returns to the Darkness of the Great Void.

Man's Soul is Created in the Image, the likeness of the Immortal Spirit of God; is boundless.

The existence or non-existence of the Immortal Spirit, Passion, of God is boundless; Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle does not apply to to the Immortal Spirit of God, nor to Soul of Mankind.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

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Wayne92587 wrote: May 23rd, 2018, 12:41 pm The Soul is not born of cause and effect, is not mortal, is a creation, and as such does not die in the same manner in which the Flesh Body dies.

When the Flesh Body Dies, the Soul, the innate, inner, motion, the passion of the Soul, of the Flesh body, simply fades away, returns to the Darkness of the Great Void.

Man's Soul is Created in the Image, the likeness of the Immortal Spirit of God; is boundless.

The existence or non-existence of the Immortal Spirit, Passion, of God is boundless; Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle does not apply to to the Immortal Spirit of God, nor to Soul of Mankind.
can you cite any references to these claims? what do you base your opinion on? There must be some source document that you got this out of, Wayne.
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Wayne92587 »

-1-:
The mind is an additional survival tool, if you like, which gives guidance (via evolutionary development of the mind.
Wayne;
In your post yesterday at 6:48 P.M.? any references to these claims? what do you base your opinion on? There must be some source document that you got this out of, Wayne.
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Eve, the Wisdom of the Rational Mind was created to be Adam's, Mankind's Helpmate.

Though, I walk through the Valley of Shadows and Death, where thinly veiled shadowy Figures of Illusion in the darkest corners of my mind, I fear not Evil, I have not Illusions of Reality for mine helpmate, Eve, thy Rational Mind art with me.

When first born I remained in the Darkness for a Time;

Not being fully awake, conscious, when first Born, I knows nothing of Self.

It was as though I had not been born of the Evolutionary Process, cause and effect that i was Un-caused, that I had been born Bare, incomplete, not been born fully Dressed, that I had been born Bare-Ass-Naked, without specification, boundless.

Who am I, why am I Here, What is my Purpose, I know that I am alive, exist, what the hell am I to do know that I am Here.

Man’s first sign of Consciousness, wisdom, came when he was ask and answer the Question Who am I.

God ask of Adam, who told you told you, that you were naked and Adam answered, saying Me, Me, myself and I, I surmised that I had been born less than a Human Being, that I had been born less than a mere animal, without specification, that I was born Free, boundless, that I had an animating Spirit within my Flesh, the seed of Life, the Immoral Spirit of God within, I surmised that I was born of God, that I was the Sun of the Living God, That I was a reality, Reality as it exists in the Light of Day, The Sun being the Light unto the World, the World of Reality as seen in the Light of Day.

I then said to Me, Myself and I;

I am, I am that I am.

The fact that I exist means that I do not need a reason, an excuse, a purpose for my existence, it was however an accident.

The fact that I exist, and I do exist.

I, as a Humane Being, am the Son of the Living God, I am that I am.

Three Times Great, Hermes Trismegistus, Lord of the Abraham's Ring.

Ye, Amen! Ra
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Re: How does a disembodied soul/mind/consciousness operate?

Post by Wayne92587 »

Mankind's Helpmate, Eve! The Soul, Wisdom, Consciousness, is a creation, born of the Evolutionary Process, the experience Born of Cause and Effect, is an Affect.
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