Up until the last two centuries, the vast majority of people (philosophers, theologians and laypersons) have believed in the existence of the soul. The legacy of this view stretches from philosophers such as Socrates and Plato (who both considered the soul as the essence of a person) to Aristotle (whose virtue ethics explained morality as the character development of the soul) to theologian Augustine (who held that the soul exists in every part of the body at the same time) to medieval philosophers such as Thomas Aquinas (who developed the view of the soul as the entity that unifies, animates and makes human the body).[i] This “soul” is what gives our bodies life and is particular to each individual human. The soul is also our inner essence and is what could theoretically survive physical death to an afterlife.
For the modern enlightened thinker, the soul is just antiquated talk left over from our religious heritage that stipulated immaterial objects for things we did not understand. Even though this view (existence of the soul) has been the commonsense view across most cultures and religions, what we call the “soul” is now thought to be the brain (or unity of the brain and central nervous system). When we are stuck with a pin, we do not experience this feeling of pain in our soul, but instead it is just a series of physical events such as C-fibers firing (or electrical and chemical events) in our brain.[ii]
With the rise of empiricism (knowledge only comes by way of the five senses), the soul (as an immaterial substance) has become an unpopular view in philosophy. The main alternative to the existence of the soul is physicalism which claims that a human being is completely physical. This tendency has also influenced some Christians such as physicalist Nancey Murphy, who claims that, “science has provided a massive amount of evidence suggesting that we need not postulate the existence of an entity such as a soul or mind in order to explain life and consciousness.”[iii] On the other hand, philosopher Dallas Willard claims that accepting the existence of our soul as a substance is paramount to spiritual life.[iv]
Many questions surface regarding belief in the soul. Has science proven the soul does not exist? Is science the only place for knowledge or can other disciplines such as theology or philosophy contribute? Do the critiques against the soul hold up to analysis? I will argue that our culture has prematurely declared the death of the soul. First, I will define the different views of the soul, advocating a Thomistic substance dualism view (after philosopher Thomas Aquinas). Second, I will examine the theological knowledge from the Bible which clearly supports its existence. Third, I will provide a philosophical case for the soul using four independent arguments and also address the critiques against the soul’s existence. Fourth, I will expose the motivations (and methodology) that underlie this widespread rejection of the soul. Last, I will briefly explain why one’s view of what constitutes a person is important specifically from a Christian worldview, but more generally in its impact on ethics.
Belief in the existence of an immaterial essence called the soul is known as substance dualism. This view holds that the brain and soul are two distinct substances. The brain is a physical substance with physical properties and the soul (or mind) is a mental substance with mental properties. A substance is an entity that is particular, such as a dog or an acorn. A substance is also a continuant in that it remains the same thing through change which occurs by adding or losing properties. A property, on the other hand, does not change but is possessed by other things more basic. Examples include redness (being red), triangular and painfulness.[v] For substance dualism, the brain and the soul are different particulars with different properties, but can interact with each other – in fact can have causal relations with one another. Two main forms of dualism are Cartesian (after Rene Descartes) and Thomistic. On the Cartesian view, the mind is a substance externally related to the body (by a casual relation), and is what one thinks of in Hollywood’s depiction of the soul as an entity that could inhabit another body (or another animal for that matter). Although many of the arguments for the soul will work for either version, the view I take is the Thomistic one in which the soul is related to the body more intimately.[vi] Moreland and Rae describe this view of the soul as “a primitive (nonemergent) unity of parts, properties and capacities. The soul is diffused throughout the body and can enter into complex cause-effect interactions with that body. Our vast array of intellectual, emotional and volitional capacities differ from each other, and the soul is the primitive unity of this complex array of internal differentiations.”[vii]
Currently, the more popular view of the mind is physicalism (i.e. strict physicalism), which claims that the human being is completely physical; in that, it can be completely described by the language of physics and chemistry. For physicalism, there is just one physical substance (brain and central nervous system with a body) with physical properties possessed by that substance. On this view, when someone has a thought or experiences pain, these correspond to physical events such as certain electrical and chemical events in the brain.[viii] There are various views of the mind within physicalism (such as whether mental entities can be reduced strictly to the physical or if mental properties emerge from the physical), but due to space limitations I will restrict criticism to arguments that apply to all forms.
The physicalist view of the soul has been derived from the claim that scientific knowledge is exhaustive (scientism). This claim combined with naturalism (all that exists is physical matter and the laws that govern it) is what our culture has committed itself to and in so doing has excluded other avenues of knowledge. Scientism itself is self-refuting,[ix] but in adopting this view, other knowledge (such as theological or philosophical) is neglected. Moreland and Rae explain that “science is largely incompetent either to frame the correct questions or to provide answers. The hard sciences are at their best when they describe how physical systems work, but they are largely incompetent when settling questions about the nature of consciousness, intentionality, personal identity and agency, and related matters.”[x]
If God exists, then it shouldn’t surprise us that other immaterial entities also exist that have causal powers in the physical realm. In fact, the Bible clearly supports substance dualism. The Bible teaches that upon death we enter into an intermediate state while waiting for our resurrection body in the final state. The entity that is the person is obviously the immaterial component that can exist (at least temporarily) without a body. The Old Testament teaches that the conscious person without flesh and bone departs to God at death (Psalm 49:15) and that life after death exists in a place called Sheol where the dead are awake and aware of family (Job 3:13; Psalms 88:10-12; 115:17-18; Isaiah 38:18). The Old Testament also teaches the hope in the resurrection after death (Job 19:25-27; Psalms 73:26, Isaiah 26:14, 19; Daniel 12:2).
The New Testament is also consistent with this order starting with death. Jesus himself promised the thief on the cross that the same day he would be with him in paradise (Luke 23:42-43). This text and others affirm that Jesus understood that a person continued to exist after death. Paul insists that to be absent in the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). Paul also looks forward to the general resurrection of the dead at the end of time (1 Thessalonians 5; 2 Corinthians 5). It is evident from this small sampling of the Scriptures, that some form of substance dualism is asserted or assumed.
(I’ll continue with philosophical arguments in my next blog)
[i] J.P. Moreland, What is the Soul? Recovering Human Personhood in a Scientific Age (Norcross, Georgia: Ravi Zacharias International Ministries, 2002), 28.
[ii] Ibid., 9.
[iii] Nancey Murphy, “Human Nature: Historical, Scientific, and Religious Issues,” in Warren S. Brown, Nancey Murphy, and H. Newton Malony, Whatever Happened to the Soul? (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), 18.
[iv] Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy (San Francisco: Harper, 1998), 82.
[v] J.P. Moreland, What is the Soul? Recovering Human Personhood in a Scientific Age, 7-8.
[vi] J.P. Moreland and Scott B. Rae, Body & Soul (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 21.
[vii] Ibid., 69.
[viii] J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig, Philosophical Foundations For a Christian Worldview (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 229-31.
[ix] It is difficult to provide a detailed argument, but if science itself is the only valid source for knowledge, then how do we obtain the knowledge that this is the case? Science itself cannot do this, thus scientism is self-refuting and cannot be true.
[x] J.P. Moreland and Scott B. Rae, Body & Soul, 41.
Do we have a soul? Apparently not because there is not evidence for it. If you wish to make a positive claim for it, however, then provide not metaphysics, not logical form, not theology, certainly not Thomistic metaphysics, but evidence from reality. Without this, no matter how many words you provide linked to Aquinas, you’ve got nothing to inform your claim.
I think one’s view of the mind is also important in engaging naturalists. What is yours. Do you believe the mind to be the brain (one might use the argument from divisibility or modal argument)? Do you believe it to be an emergent property of the brain (one might mention how it is a puzzle for naturalists to give meaning to things like words without having any meaning in the physical processes in the brain)?
Furthermore, what’s the issue with Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics?
And lastly, what will you accept as evidence? You don’t subscribe to scientism, do you?
Working backwards, nobody subscribes to scientism.
The issue with metaphysics is that there’s no such thing as the ‘nature’ of something, and no agency to motion. These guys didn’t know that then. We do now.
The mind is what the brain does.
How did we come to know this? Not rationally. If “the mind is what the brain does,” then brain chemistry and processes determine what we think we “know” about anything.
So I’m guessing you think the mind is an emergent property of the brain. If so, I think it still faces rather large problems. There is the problem of intentionality. Intentionality, in the words of Dr. Edward Feser, “is that feature of a mental state in virtue of which it means, is about, represents, points to, or is directed at something, usually something beyond itself.” Your thoughts about your homework (you might be too old for this, but play along), for example, is about your homework – it means or represents your homework, and thus “points to” or is “directed at” your homework. In this way, it is like the word homework, which is about, or represents, homework in general. The word “homework,” however, as ink or graphite marks means absolutely nothing at all on its own. It requires thinking, intentional, language-using people like us to impart meaning upon it. The puzzle is that brain processes, by themselves, are devoid of any meaning. They are simply meaningless patterns of electrochemical activity that take place in your brain. Our thoughts, however, do have meaning, which allows them to impart meaning on other things (like the word “homework”). It is a mystery then, how our mindless brain processes, which are void of any meaning, can be correlated to our thoughts, which definitely have meaning. The two are conceptually in contrast to each other, which is a problem that materialism has great difficulty getting over.
Yes, ‘meaning’ is interesting, isn’t it? How does this happen? Good question.
Answering it with whatever version of divine creationism you want – i prefer the shorthand Oogity Boogity – does not enlighten us one iota. This ‘answer’ does not grant us any insight, does not produce avenues of inquiry, does not further research, does not produce any practical applications, therapies, or technologies that work. Turning to this ‘answer’ in fact answers nothing.
So, what are the alternatives?
Well, we have a pretty good understanding of the chemical, physical, and biological activities that occur in the brain. Do any of these processes – by way of changes to their normal operation – show effect in what we call mind? show effect in behaviour? show effect in perception? show effect in proscribed ‘meaning’?
Oh me, oh my.
Now the data is coming in hard and fast. In all cases, the answer is yes.
So, what is the link (what is the mechanism) between brain and mind? The short answer is the mind is what the brain does. But you border this understanding incorrectly when you define mind to be an emergent property… as if it is one thing that is a response. This is not the whole case but a part of it. The brain is a remarkable organ in that it has the physical ability to grow itself, which then causes alterations to it physical, chemical, and biological functional properties! In manner of speaking, the brain is what the mind does.
How cool is that?
Please notice, that not one shred of this ongoing and growing understanding does not come from wordsmiths, from those philosophers and metaphysicians and theologians who rely on the broken and long discredited epistemology of Aristotelian physics. Again (and at any point of honest inquiry into how reality operates) stating some version of Oogity Boogity as an ‘answer’ to these good questions doesn’t advance our understanding. At all. So why even go there? Why ever go there if you honestly wish to know anything about anything? Such assertions about Oogity Boogity are always and reliably and consistently empty of knowledge value because they never – EVER – produce any! (One might be tempted, in fact, to lend this observations more than a passing dismissal in the name of piety and use it as a clue….)
To sum up, metaphysical musings stop honest inquiry in its tracks and substitute in their place some verbiage in logical form that has no application that is of knowledge value but give us the appearance that it does.
As for how we make meaning, we know that our brains interact with our environments and we create circuitry based on what we reinforce. We know that the circuitry carries electrochemical impulses which cause physical and chemical effect in the brain and the efficacy of its function. It seems that we interpret all data – received, manipulated, and synthesized – symbolically, apply symbolic meaning to these products based on successful interactions with our environment. We build metaphorical road maps of the terrains of our environments – external and internal – based much of what works well and some of what does not. We know this is an ongoing function that never stops until the brain dies. We add to and trim circuitry all the time and that this process seems to correlate to use and not to beneficial function! Radical neurophsycial and -chemical changes to process shows up immediately in changes to ‘meaning’ so we know that the two are connected. Nowhere in any of this investigation do we find external meaning remaining constant if the brain and its processes are altered or damaged in any way, so we can presume that ‘meaning’ is product of cognitive function, but that cognitive function can be changed by reinforced use (hence the notion of ‘learning’ means.
Anyway, all of this is quite fascinating and it is early days in this journey. My point remains that the journey into gaining knowledge about the brain and what it produces comes to a premature end if at any point we fool ourselves by substituting an ‘answer’ based not on demonstrable physical and chemical and biological processes but words.
Hope you don’t mind the quoting. It helps keep me organized. I won’t be quoting everything; just the places where it seems like you are making arguments.
Tildeb: “Yes, ‘meaning’ is interesting, isn’t it? How does
this happen? Good question.
Answering it with whatever version of divine creationism you want – i prefer the shorthand Oogity Boogity – does not enlighten us one iota. This ‘answer’ does not grant us any insight, does not produce avenues of inquiry, does not further research, does not produce any practical applications, therapies, or technologies that work. Turning to this ‘answer’ in fact answers nothing.”
The first three things you claim it does not answer, I disagree with. The latter three I do agree with but ultimately find irrelevant in whether or not my answer is the truth. First, let’s turn to insight. Now a quick google search on the definition of insight brought this up: “The capacity to gain an accurate and deep intuitive understanding of a person or thing.” Determining how we can attain meaning, even if the answer is divine, does seem to very much further insight as we are able to gain a more accurate understanding of how a person can apply meaning to anything. That alone should be enough to provide an answer, even if the answer isn’t true. As far as not producing avenues of inquiry, I find this to be without a doubt, false. The answer could be as simple as discerning between what form of dualism (Cartesian, Event, Property, Hylemorphic) is the best reflection of how the soul interacts with the body. When it comes to research, I would tend agree that it probably doesn’t do much to further scientific research. When it comes to research in philosophy or theology, I would tend to disagree, whether it be learning more about how the souls “acts” after death, while separated from the body, or other things of that nature.
Tildeb: “As for how we make meaning, we know that our brains interact with our environments and we create circuitry based on what we reinforce. We know that the circuitry carries electrochemical impulses which cause physical and chemical effect in the brain and the efficacy of its function. It seems that we interpret all data – received, manipulated, and synthesized – symbolically, apply symbolic meaning to these products based on successful interactions with our environment. We build metaphorical road maps of the terrains of our environments – external and internal – based much of what works well and some of what does not. We know this is an ongoing function that never stops until the brain dies. We add to and trim circuitry all the time and that this process seems to correlate to use and not to beneficial function! Radical neurophsycial and -chemical changes to process shows up immediately in changes to ‘meaning’ so we know that the two are connected. Nowhere in any of this investigation do we find external meaning remaining constant if the brain and its processes are altered or damaged in any way, so we can presume that ‘meaning’ is product of cognitive function, but that cognitive function can be changed by reinforced use (hence the notion of ‘learning’ means.”
This I took to be the meat and potatoes of your post since it is what most directly tries to answer the problem of meaning. Unfortunately, it will require some A-T metaphysics. Now, you mentioned earlier that “natures” don’t exist, but it was not supported. In lacking time to look through all of Aquinas’ and his followers’ work, this is the placeholder definition: “Nature properly signifies that which is primitive and original, or, according to etymology, that which a thing is at birth, as opposed to that which is acquired or added from external sources.” Given the previous definition, I don’t see how nature could NOT exist. People may refuse to think or care about it, but saying it doesn’t exist seems kinda…weird. As far as motion not having agency, frankly, I’ve got no idea what this means. I’d assume you know that motion, with regards to A-T metaphysics is not moving from point A to point B but rather moving from potentiality to actuality.
Anyways, you had me up to this point: “apply symbolic
meaning to these products based on successful interactions with our
environment.”
This seems to miss the point due to the fact that regardless of how we interact with the environment, there is nothing with meaning in our brain function that apparently imparts meaning on the words we use. Even if these interactions with the environment had intrinsic meaning (which I’m not sure they do), how do these interactions make it so that meaningless processes in the mind can apply meaning to something else. It is simply adding another step to the question, but not, as far as I know, answering it.
That seemed to be the first of two arguments in that
paragraph, the second having to do with the fact that neruophysical and chemical changes also change meaning we give to things. This might be a problem for Cartesian dualism. However, hylemorphic dualism does not suffer from the same issue. As David Oderberg puts it: “For the hylemorphic dualist, on the other hand, the acceptance of a genuinely immaterial element in human nature means a greater flexibility in trying to comprehend just how human persons persist. The concept of form can be pushed heavily into service, as can the idea of the person as a compound substance, in this respect just like a material substance—namely, a substance composed of matter and form. Nevertheless, the hylemorphic dualist must avoid the disastrous fall into Cartesianism or Platonism, both of which diminish the role of the body in personhood. Once the soul is united to a body, it is the form of that body for all time, even after that body has ceased to exist. Its identity after death—and hence the identity of the person that is reduced to it—depends on its having once informed certain matter. The soul must always have a retrospective character, one that looks back on what choices it made when it actualized
that matter, and hence on what the person did of which it was once the chief part. (Again, think of the chief executive who, long after his corporation’s demise, is forever tarred with the brush of responsibility for those decisions he made—and hence his corporation made—when he was its chief constituent.) The soul has, as it were, the indelible stamp of personhood, and due to its very nature as an actualizing principle of matter it has an essential tendency or direction toward the full flowering of its capacities in matter. Whether it may also look forward to a reuniting of itself with matter is, however, beyond the scope of philosophy to answer.”
The body and the soul are intertwined on hylemorphic dualism, so if the body is affected, then it shouldn’t be surprising if things like meaning and intentionality are also effected. The Cartesian dualist, however, would likely struggle with this considering they believe the body and soul to be entirely separate entities.