# Scientific perspective on the soul **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 12, 2014, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512 "2014-03-12T04:00:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/81 "2014-03-13T15:19:35Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Hrmm.Nope. Nice try, though, but no - I disagreed with you drawing a distinction between lies and illusions, when it came to personality. That’s not “picking nits”, that’s disagreeing that it needed correcting in the first place. “Lies” covered it quite well. Yes, they are illusions, but illusions _are_ lies. Perhaps you’d agree to settle on the word “deception” as a middle? To me, a lie requires a conscious and deliberate attempt to mislead. An illusion does not. ---
**Author:** ![Frank\_Merton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Frank\_Merton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_Merton)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/82 "2014-03-13T15:19:49Z")
Oh I see, you do have it wrong. Illusions are not lies. Illusions are things you misinterpret: lies are things you tell others knowing they are false. I thought you misunderstood but it seems in fact that you do think illusion is synonymous with lie. We all suffer illusions (and even worse, delusions, which is what you may be suffering from here) and they can work to our detriment, but there is no moral fault. There is when we lie. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/83 "2014-03-13T15:27:26Z")
> [@ThisUsernameIsForbidden](#): > > Welcome to the internets [sic], where we take sentences out of context. Try emphasis mine, it is more genuine. [emphasis mine] ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/84 "2014-03-13T15:37:32Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > [emphasis **mine**] Bolding mine ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/85 "2014-03-13T15:50:42Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > There is no physical, scientific, objective, measurable, repeatable, useful evidence for the soul. It has been claimed by some that the human body loses a small amount of weight upon death, but this has pretty thoroughly been debunked. A little bit of a diversion from this very interesting discussion, but I never understood the small weight LOSS = soul meme. In most depictions, the soul is an ethereal object, rising out of the body upon death and classic near death hallucinations consist of a birds-eye view of the body from below. So, this would mean the soul is lighter than air. So wouldn’t the body GAIN a small amount of weight as the soul exits??? ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/86 "2014-03-13T16:03:00Z")
> [@mandala](#): > > Every religion I have read about (Eastern and Western) talk about every sentient organism having a ‘soul’. The Homeric Greeks didn’t really do “souls.” They had ideas about life, life-force, breath, energy, animation, drive, purpose, movement - they had _pneuma_, _psyche_, _menos_ and _thumos_ - but nothing like the (later) Western concept of a “soul.” I also believe that most Christianities, and maybe other Abrahamic religions as well, deny that animals have souls - so, no, not “every sentient organism” has a soul, according to a whole bunch of major religions. > [@mandala](#): > > But no system I know of denies the existence of the soul as the real experiencer of events, with the body literally being the garment he wears. Again, the Homeric Greeks. For them, the body really, really, _really_ mattered. The modern dichotomy between “material” and “spiritual” didn’t exist back then. A man _was_ his body. End of story. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/87 "2014-03-13T16:23:26Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > To me, a lie requires a conscious and deliberate attempt to mislead. An illusion does not. “Concious” and “deliberate” are tricky words when you’re talking about consciousness. But I _do_ see it as intentional misleading - we _know_ from actual experience that our inner narratives aren’t singular (we dialogue internally all the time) nor are they continuous (sleep, for one thing, never mind short-term discontinuous perceptions and the perception-memory gap, as Dennet points out), we know we can trick our brains in any number of ways - but we persist in the idea of the Cartesian Theatre and the singular actor, because it “feels right”. But who is doing the “feeling”? > [@Frank\_Merton](#): > > Oh I see, you do have it wrong. Illusions are not lies. Illusions are when you are deceived by your senses. That’s a lie, IMO. Not all lies are outright false statements - [lies of omission](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Lying_by_omission), for instance, are still lies. > [@](#): > > Illusions are things you misinterpret: lies are things **you tell others** knowing they are false. This bolded bit ignores the fact that it’s perfectly possible to lie _to yourself_. > [@](#): > > I thought you misunderstood but it seems in fact that you do think illusion is synonymous with lie. I said no such thing. All illusions are lies, but not all lies are illusions. > [@](#): > > We all suffer illusions (and even worse, delusions, which is what you may be suffering from here) All this is is _ad hominem_ posturing. Wonderful grasp of what it means to actually debate, you have there. > [@](#): > > and they can work to our detriment, but there is no moral fault. There is when we lie. There’s no “moral fault” in lying to yourself. _Mauvaise foi_ is to be pitied, but not judged. ---
**Author:** ![YoungKusher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3e96dc/32.png) [@YoungKusher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YoungKusher)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/88 "2014-03-13T17:25:15Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > The continuity is a lie. Dennett goes into this in some detail in _Consciousness Explained_, but basically the continuity of your state at any single point in time is an unbound lie you tell yourself, based on your memories and also your internal states - all _post hoc_. I have to agree with the others on this. Illusion would be a more appropriate word here. As they have pointed out, a lie is defined as a deliberate false statement from one person/group to another person/group. Yes you can “lie” to yourself, but I don’t think that’s what’s happening in this case. While using the word “lie” might be a more colorful way of describing the continuity of your state of mind, it really isn’t that accurate. People don’t purposely deceive themselves on this matter, I think they generally understand the continuity of consciousness to simply be a part of life. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/89 "2014-03-13T18:05:08Z")
> [@YoungKusher](#): > > I have to agree with the others on this. Illusion would be a more appropriate word here. As they have pointed out, a lie is defined as a deliberate false statement from one person/group to another person/group. Yes you can “lie” to yourself, but I don’t think that’s what’s happening in this case. The word “lie” is a deliberate (hah!) choice here, to convey the sense that, in fact, there _are_ competing agents within the mind, invested in maintaining the semblance of the holistic persona. When I say “you lie to yourself”, what I mean is “parts of you lie, cheat and steal against other parts of you, and will crawl over each other to get to be the ones who have the control to write their own narratives in memory” > [@](#): > > While using the word “lie” might be a more colorful way of describing the continuity of your state of mind, it really isn’t that accurate. People don’t purposely deceive themselves on this matter, I think they generally understand the continuity of consciousness to simply be a part of life. People _in toto_ don’t, but parts of the consciousness do it to other parts. But OK, since “lie” doesn’t seem to make any of you happy, and “deception” met with no response, how does “story” grab people? “The continuity of consciousness is a story we tell ourselves” ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/90 "2014-03-13T19:19:48Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Sure, there’s one aspect which never changes – the continuity of self-awareness. Every day, “you” are “you” and “I” am “I”. Aside from alcoholic blackouts or Hollywood-style amnesia, that part of the mind’s conscious self-awareness never changes, as far as anyone can determine. > > How’s that for a starting point? Is it acceptable to define “the soul” as that, and that alone? Why would you put them aside ? We can mechanically and deliberately shut down consciousness, this “continuation of the self”. We can bring you back from such a shut down more or less at will, too. Happens every day, all over the world : it’s called “general anesthesia”. It’s an extremely weird experience, too - I had it once for pelvic surgery and I remember lying on the table in my altogether, I remember the doc giving me a breathing mask and telling me to count down from 5 (I think I might have gotten to 3), and I remember waking up in the PACU, thoroughly confused because it felt like _no time whatsoever had passed_ between the two events. Very much unlike sleeping, where consciousness also partially shuts down but there are significant enough changes to one’s physiology overnight and the waking up process is slow and drawn out : you can “feel” yourself falling away to sleep, then you can feel yourself rebooting and everything’s fine. It’s more difficult on Mondays. You apparently don’t go through that reboot after anesthesia. I panicked for a few moments as I didn’t know where I was (thankfully a nurse immediately checked up on me), and was really puzzled by the notion that yes, the operation had taken place, there were no problems at all and now it’s five in the morning, sir. To \*my \*brain, there was a direct continuity of events. To an outside observer, not so much. Ah well, at least there was Jell-O. ---
**Author:** ![YoungKusher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3e96dc/32.png) [@YoungKusher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YoungKusher)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/91 "2014-03-13T19:37:18Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > The word “lie” is a deliberate (hah!) choice here, to convey the sense that, in fact, there _are_ competing agents within the mind, invested in maintaining the semblance of the holistic persona. When I say “you lie to yourself”, what I mean is "parts of you lie, cheat and steal against other parts of you, and will crawl over each other to get to be the ones who have the control to write their own narratives in memory"People _in toto_ don’t, but parts of the consciousness do it to other parts. True, people _in toto_ aren’t lying to themselves in regards to their understanding of their continuing state of mind. I see what you’re getting at more clearly now, but I think people would have to be educated, or at least think deeply about this matter to realize that there is no such thing as a continuity of consciousness. Only once they have realized this would it be fair, on some level, to say that they are lying to themselves. > [@](#): > > But OK, since “lie” doesn’t seem to make any of you happy, and “deception” met with no response, how does “story” grab people? “The continuity of consciousness is a story we tell ourselves” Much more agreeable term. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/92 "2014-03-13T20:17:46Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Sure, there’s one aspect which never changes – the continuity of self-awareness. Every day, “you” are “you” and “I” am “I”. Aside from alcoholic blackouts or Hollywood-style amnesia, that part of the mind’s conscious self-awareness never changes, as far as anyone can determine. > > How’s that for a starting point? Is it acceptable to define “the soul” as that, and that alone? What do you mean by “conscious self-awareness”? Who we are self aware of may change, both over time and inside a person. Which personality of someone with multiple personality disorder has the soul? What about people whose personalities change drastically due to disease or injury? ---
**Author:** ![ThisUsernameIsForbidden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b4bc9f/32.png) [@ThisUsernameIsForbidden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThisUsernameIsForbidden)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/93 "2014-03-13T20:28:43Z")
You are not listening. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/94 "2014-03-13T20:40:36Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Sure, there’s one aspect which never changes – the continuity of self-awareness. Every day, “you” are “you” and “I” am “I”. Aside from alcoholic blackouts or Hollywood-style amnesia, that part of the mind’s conscious self-awareness never changes, as far as anyone can determine. > > How’s that for a starting point? Is it acceptable to define “the soul” as that, and that alone? Not really, because the word “soul” has so much connotative baggage that this definition doesn’t address. The word “self” already exists and is a better fit for what you describe. > [@Frank\_Merton](#): > > Descartes said the soul is housed in the pituitary gland. As far as I know this has never been tested, and I can think of ways it might be. Well, people have had their pituitary surgically removed when it develops a tumor, so we could, at least, perform observational experiments on such people. Do they still fall in love? Can they create art? Can they continue to have a personal relationship with Jesus? Or…whatever? You’d think if a living person were somehow cut off from their soul, there would be some difference observed in their behavior. (But, then, if you cut out someone’s pituitary, there might be a difference in their behavior from the change in hormone production. So…) Ultimately, there can’t be a scientific test of the existence of the soul, because no one has proposed a definition of the word that carries testable properties. > [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > A little bit of a diversion from this very interesting discussion, but I never understood the small weight LOSS = soul meme. In most depictions, the soul is an ethereal object, rising out of the body upon death and classic near death hallucinations consist of a birds-eye view of the body from below. > > So, this would mean the soul is lighter than air. So wouldn’t the body GAIN a small amount of weight as the soul exits??? The idea, at least, is that if someone dies, and there is a physical change in one of the body’s properties – overall weight – that is not explained by any single material or organic change – no loss of blood, no loss of muscle mass, no loss of bone mass, no loss of any structural tissue – then the loss would have to be “immaterial” or supernatural. The reasoning is incomplete, of course. And, in any case, the effect is not observed. It’s claimed, but it is not verified or documented. It’s an Urban Legend, without any actual basis. I do like your alternative model! If the human body gained a small amount of weight at the moment of death, and there were no material explanation for it, that would be – interesting! I suppose some people would say that it was a nasty demonic entity taking possession. Your explanation would also be popular in some quarters. Science would continue to conduct experiments – one hopes not Mengelean ones. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2014, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/95 "2014-03-13T20:43:14Z")
> [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > A little bit of a diversion from this very interesting discussion, but I never understood the small weight LOSS = soul meme. In most depictions, the soul is an ethereal object, rising out of the body upon death and classic near death hallucinations consist of a birds-eye view of the body from below. > > So, this would mean the soul is lighter than air. So wouldn’t the body GAIN a small amount of weight as the soul exits??? Things lighter than air do not have negative weight. They just are lighter than the oxygen nitrogen mix in our atmosphere. So the soul escaping would still cause the body to lose weight unless it took up volume which got replaced by air. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/96 "2014-03-14T02:56:17Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > What do you mean by “conscious self-awareness”? No, what I mean is that when you wake up each morning, you are the same person perceiving the world through your eyes, ears, nose, tongue, nerves & other senses as you were the previous evening, and the evening before that, and so on since you were old enough to remember anything. Your opinions and personality and even the way you perceive the world may change over time, but it’s not like somebody else was you yesterday and another person was you the day before that. Know what I’m talking about? > [@Kobal2](#): > > I remember waking up in the PACU, thoroughly confused because it felt like _no time whatsoever had passed_ between the two events. Very much unlike sleeping, where consciousness also partially shuts down but there are significant enough changes to one’s physiology overnight and the waking up process is slow and drawn out : you can “feel” yourself falling away to sleep, then you can feel yourself rebooting and everything’s fine. It’s more difficult on Mondays. > > You apparently don’t go through that reboot after anesthesia. You didn’t dream at all under anesthesia? I dreamt a dream that seemed infinite, while it was happening. Although I did also get that “no time has passed” feeling when they shook me awake. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/97 "2014-03-14T03:23:10Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > You didn’t dream at all under anesthesia? I dreamt a dream that seemed infinite, while it was happening. Although I did also get that “no time has passed” feeling when they shook me awake. There are many ways that they administer general anesthesia and not all induce Amnesia but even if you are there is an “induction” period where you would feel like you dream…you just wouldn’t notice the next stage. This is the reason that anecdotes are not data, us humans filter and miss-construe events all the time. Heck if that didn’t happen you would always see the very physical and real visual blind spot in each of your eyes. This is just the tip of the iceberg on how the mind fills those crazy holes in your perception. This is why science requires repeatable evidence and why science is a better tool for improving the human condition than philosophy ever was. The fact that YOU never think you are not someone else and that YOU think you have unwavering self awareness does not change the fact that there are medical conditions and drugs that can block that effect and that all of these actions are observable as biological functions if not completely understood as to their method of action. There is no knowledge to be gained by introspective mind games on this subject unless those mind games result in a testable and repeatable hypothesis. Without that testable and repeatable hypothesis the introspective concept of a durable soul is nothing more than delusional wishful thinking no matter how “real” it seems to you personally. ---
**Author:** ![Frank\_Merton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Frank\_Merton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_Merton)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/98 "2014-03-14T03:43:00Z")
I tend to think what Rat Avatar above is saying is excessive and really typical of scientific thinking of maybe the early part of the twentieth century, but nowadays scientists aren’t as sure of themselves. Speculation (religion, philosophy, etc.,) can indeed lead one down the garden path if one depends on tradition or on wishful thinking, but at the same time there are some issues about which that is must about all one can do. At the very least one gets an idea of the possibilities and often can use evidence or logic to rule many ideas off the table. I wouldn’t believe something based on speculation, but then again I wouldn’t believe something based on science either. One should not believe at all. One just forms opinions of what is likely and what is not. It works better. Anecdotes are quite useful. They are valid evidence in fact. The thing is they are prone to certain kinds of error, but once one understands the types of error one can render the anecdotal evidence much more useful. It is incorrect to say science requires repeatable evidence; often the evidence is not of a repeatable sort (a meteor hitting the moon). ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/99 "2014-03-14T03:43:10Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > This is just the tip of the iceberg on how the mind fills those crazy holes in your perception. You ain’t kidding… > [@rat\_avatar](#): > > This is why science requires repeatable evidence and **why science is a better tool for improving the human condition than philosophy ever was.** Dear Mother of All Creatures Great and Small, please let’s not introduce **THAT** can of worms into this discussion!!! Oh, and by the way, [emphasis mine]. > [@rat\_avatar](#): > > There is no knowledge to be gained by introspective mind games on this subject unless those mind games result in a testable and repeatable hypothesis. > > Without that testable and repeatable hypothesis the introspective concept of a durable soul is nothing more than delusional wishful thinking no matter how “real” it seems to you personally. Well then, shouldn’t we work on that hypothesis, rather than saying, “Science hasn’t detected anyone’s soul, therefore they don’t exist, neener, neener?” ---
**Author:** ![Frank\_Merton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Frank\_Merton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_Merton)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512/100 "2014-03-14T03:46:59Z")
I wonder where the concept of soul came from. Introspection provides no evidence for it and indeed makes it clear that our minds are process not being or self. And, again, of course, there is no scientific evidence either. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scientific-perspective-on-the-soul/683512.md?page=6)