Hate Makes the Soul

Here's a premise for a sci-fi movie about robots and personhood.

Philosophical premise: what if souls emerge from the combination of all human personality traits (love, empathy, curiosity, etc.)  So when all the conditions for human personhood appear in a being (human, robot, animal, etc.) then that being counts/is a person.

The plot: computer programmers create a robot that has all the positive human attributes and personality traits (love, empathy, curiosity, etc.) and expect that upon reboot, their creation will "come to life."  To their great dismay, the robot indeed becomes operational, but does not display any "spark of life," personality, or humaness.  Simply put, there is just something missing.

Through some accident (like a programmer makes the mistake of working on the program while extremely frustrated with office politics) other, negative, human attributes get injected into the robot's program.  Now, when rebooted, the robot stands a little looser, looks from face to face, interrupts -- in other words the robot displays humanity and is somehow, maybe inexplicably, clearly and thoroughly alive.

As a subplot, it becomes equally clear (or is at least suggessted) that one or more of the programmers, or administrators, or scientists (or someone) demonstrates that he/she/they are not quite human because they do not display the full range of human personality (maybe they are missing a "bad" human quality).

The author could also introduce lab chimps or something to hint at questions about animal personhood too.

???

River of Death

After thinking about life after death, I immediately think of the Old Kingdom book series by Garth Nix. In this particular series, it follows the life of two different necromancers and their journey to fight evil brought on by death itself. These two woman, Sabriel and Lirael venture into the world of the dead a variety of different times. In this story, the world of the dead is described by a vast river, where you have to pass through nine different gates in order to go deeper and deeper into death, much like Dante's description of the nine gates of hell in Dante's Inferno. Great willpower is essential in order to resist the pull deeper into the death, mentally and physically. Only Abhorsens and Necromancers can easily pass through the gates and dead cannot do so unless they are extremely powerful. This is how I imagine death.

The afterlife is often described as a river. In Greek mythology, you must pass through the river styx in order to descend into Hades. There is also the mention of the River of Forgetfulness,where you drink from the river and forget your past life so that you can start a new life.

I, myself, am not much of a religious person, but I do believe every person does have a spirit/soul. To me, the body is just a temporary vessel to protect your soul from deteriorating, but as you age, your body begins to weaken to the point of death. However, once your body dies, your soul lives on and passes into this "so-called" world of the dead. I am quite curious on the idea of reincarnation, therefore this whole idea of water cleansing your soul and causing you to forget your past life so that you can start over again definitely sparks my imagination. This idea also seems very peaceful. Water has a very calming effect on me and the idea of the land of the dead being a vast river sort of eases the anxiety of my thoughts on the afterlife.

Image Credits:
http://kalafudra.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/sabriel_by_iribel.jpg
http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/00984/images/riverstyx.jpg
http://ule-w-ritgen.de/pix/pictures/aquilasuite/LETHE--RIVER-OF-OBLIVION-2.jpg

Mind or Soul?

When John asked us in class which we would rather choose to save (mind or soul), I immediately thought mind because it's what makes me... well, me. Your brain does all these weird funky things and your mind is there to interpret and experience it all.
So if someone else's brain goes into a new body, I'd feel like that person is now the person whose brain is inside the body.
But what is soul? I left class puzzled and wondering about this. The more I thought about it, the more confused I got. I thought about how if your mind makes you who you are, then what exactly is your soul there for? Do we even have souls? Well the next thought that came to mind was ghosts. If we don't have souls then what are ghosts?? Souls have to exist, because ghosts are (or at least this is what I believe) the souls of people who have passed away. Souls are that spirit and essence of a person once their functioning minds are no longer here on Earth.

But wait, I'm still confused.

What role does your soul play when you're still alive then? Is it just the idea or essence of us as individuals and it just magically pops out once we die? Is it in us right now even though we can't really prove that it's there?
Or am I just thinking way too much?

pic: http://www.dreamstime.com/human-mind-image1208909

Souls are like Dust Bunnies

Nothing major, nothing thought about, just there sitting under your bed....or somewhere in your mass of organs and goo. Unless you're a clean freak, then you probably think about them all the time.

I personally don't really believe in "the soul." It's a nice thought, having something that can continue to go on after you rot out of existence, but I think we really just try to find ways to make us feel better about death. I've accepted that once I die I'm gone, there will be no more anything, and when that happens I won't care because I won't be there; I won't be anything.

There are some people that will never accept that, or have that "unfinished business" they talk about in Casper. I am a believer in ghosts, which may sound contradictory to my past statement of not believing in souls, but I don't think ghosts are souls because in my mind souls don't exist! So what are ghosts? Maybe they're memories and minds left behind? But who really knows.

Either way, it is in my opinion that there is no great something more lodged somewhere between my liver and kidney that will one day explode from my body as a little ball of shimmering light.

On that optimistic note, live long and prosper!

picture source: http://cache.io9.com/assets/resources/2007/10/Star%20Trek%20TOS.jpg

Mind Body And Soul

Are the mind and body separate or one? This is a question that people have been trying to answer for years. Plato thought of the mind and body as separate with the soul going on after death. This is considered dualism. Rene Descartes is famously quoted for saying “Cogito ergo sum” which translates to “I think therefore I am”. This quote is only meant to prove that the mind exists, it has nothing to do with proving that ones own body exists.

Materialist philosophers believe that the mind is not separate from the body. Rather they believe that the mind is produced by physiological functions of the brain. Neuroscientists would most likely agree with this. Research shows that what we regard as mind and consciousness is actually a side effect of synaptic functioning. This goes against Descartes famous quote. Instead they would see it as “I am therefore I think”.

So what is the brain? The brain is very unique. It’s the only “organ” that serves no clear function. It makes you breath but it’s not part of the respitory system. It also controls blood pressure and circulation but its not part of the circulatory system. What the brain essentially does is govern the body in that its functions are largely regulatory. It gathers information about the environment, information about the body, and the information about the good and bad consequences of interactions between the two.

So the concept of body has no meaning without the brain. The brain reads the state of the body and makes fine adjustments while also reading the environment around you and directs the body in reacting to it. This process continually reshapes the brain by making new connections. Doing almost anything generates new links among neurons which changes the brain. Essentially our brain has evolved to constantly adapt in order for us to survive as a species. This constant change of our brains explains why our memory can be faulty at times. This is because the brain that does the remembering of a memory is not the same brain that formed the initial memory. In order for the old memory to make sense in the current brain, the memory has to be updated.

So if two people were to switch minds they would essentially be switching brains. So if Don Lynch ended up putting my brain in another persons body and you ignored the obvious visual change would I still be the same person? I personally believe I would. However, I feel I wouldn’t be the same for long due to the fact that the brain is constantly changing and that the body has an effect on the way the brain changes.

So depending on your own personal views the definition of mind, body, and soul are different. I personally take on a materialistic view. I would define mind as a result of synaptic functioning going on in the brain and body as the physical matter that makes up my body which includes the brain.

As far as defining soul I honestly couldn’t tell you because I haven’t made up my mind on if we have souls or not and most likely never will. I feel the definition of soul has been highly influenced by religion and I consider myself an agnostic. Karl Marx said “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.” His view of why religion not only existed but was so popular was because it was a way to give comfort to people who were unhappy. If people couldn’t find comfort in this life, religion told them that it was ok because they would find true happiness in the next life. And it’s the soul that is believed to exit the body and carry on after a person’s death.