In message <1170943697.967722.193680@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
"Will in New Haven" <bill.reich@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> On Feb 7, 10:43 pm, "Eric P." <eric...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > I shall now attempt to extract my mouth from my foot. Be amazed! ;)
> >
> > In article <01f9adb14e.zen44...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
> > Simon Smith <simon_smith_n...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > > In message
<ericp06-022876.15365207022...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> > > "Eric P." <eric...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> >
> > > > In article
<1170870217.425114.167...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
> > > > "psychohist" <psychoh...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> >
> > > OK:
> >
> > > --> If you have a setting where no gods exist, there's no sense in
having
> > > --> any religions in that setting, either.
> >
> > > No, I still flatly disagree.
> >
> > > Even in the absence of gods, people still have spiritual needs. True
> > > atheists are the exception even nowadays. If there are no gods, and
nobody
> > > has felt the need to invent any - which is rather unlikely IMV - a
world
> > > will still have its holy men and mystics. These will usually be
people with
> > > great wisdom and spirituality and/or who are able to attain a
suitably
> > > altered state of mind (i.e. via drugs and other means). There's also
bound
> > > to be a somewhat larger of numbers of fakers, charlatans and the
deluded.
> > > But the im****tant point is that they won't /all/ be frauds, even if
most
> > > are.
> >
> > You have a point here, one that I missed earlier. Yes, belief systems
> > can emerge among cultures even in a world where no deities exist, but
in
> > that case, no divine power can be accessed.
> >
> > Interesing that you would say people have spiritual needs even in the
> > absence of gods, because in order to have spiritual needs, one must
have
> > a spirit. In order to have a spirit, that spirit must have been placed
> > in the body. Only a creator deity can do this. Therefore, if a person
> > has spiritual needs, there must be a deity responsible...somewhere.
>
> Ah, but even absent a spirit, meat can think that it has spiritual
> needs. As long as the llittle electrical impulses go on in that wad of
> grey meat on top of the rest of it all kinds of needs can be imagined.
> So, no there does not need to be a deity somewhere. There might be
> one, no doubt, but your argument is nothing like proof. .
>
> Will in New Haven
<snip>
Yes, have to agree with Will here. I like to think that the following
definition of 'soul' works well, and is useful even for non-believers:
Soul is a measure of a creature's capacity to feel love, hatred, fear,
pain,
wonder, joy, jealousy, empathy and all other such emotions. A limited
creature, only able to feel a few of those, has a 'little' soul, while a
creature capable of the full spectrum has a 'large' soul. Creatures which
are largely mindless - such as insects or bacteria - are effectively
soulless. Dogs, cats and other mammals are capable of some of the list,
and
have small souls, and humans and other sentients cover the full range.
This also allows a useful distinction between spiritually damaged humans
and
those who are spiritually intact. A psychopath or sociopath is diminished
in
comparison to a normal human, and some mentally disabled people (note:
/some/ - it's easy to find exceptions) will be similarly limited. Note
that
in the case of, say, a brain-damaged creature unable to respond in certain
ways, we may not be able to say with certainty that it does not possess a
particular trait, only that it cannot express it. This handles things like
people in comas - they might still have a soul, but we can't tell for
sure.
Furthermore, the definition is flexible enough to encompass creatures with
greater emotional capacities than humans, and treats them accordingly. The
definition also works whether the soul is considered a supernatural
object,
or if is merely an emergent property of a creature's physical structure
and
brain. It even works for creatures that don't have brains - or,
theoretically, bodies. Finally, it provides an means to quantify a
creature's soul, because we can discern behaviour such as fear even in
non-sentients, and I feel it also encourages one to err on the side of
caution and credit all things with as much spirit as possible. Where there
is little harm in trying to frighten a creature that is incapable of fear,
it is plainly unethical to gratuitously frighten a creature that /can/ -
and
until we're sure it can't feel fear, we should work on the assumption that
it can and does.
PS Google for 'Meet the Meat' for an amusing sci-fi short story on the
improbable subject of sentient meat.
--
Simon Smith
When emailing me, please use my preferred email address, which is on my
web
site at http://www.simon-smith.org
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