[snip]
> > >
> > > 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:
In the appropriate context, Will's statements make sense.
> 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.
No. A creature's emotional capacity is not the same as a soul. Soul and
spirit have already been explained. Every person has these, and no
living creature other than humans does, and they serve certain purposes.
The above discussion of little and large souls might be useful in some
fantasy setting, so I'd say it's appropriate to the topic, whereas I
think I've strayed a bit.
> 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.
Surely those people have souls, because the soul remains with the body
till the body dies.
> 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.
There are too many errors here for me to address.
- E
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