# what does it mean to be "spiritual?" **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 28, 2009, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592 "2009-07-28T20:52:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592/201 "2009-08-05T21:45:05Z")
> [@CurtC](#): > > Only because you’re defining it in some weird way. If you can copy the material part of a human, and end up with another complete human, that indicates to me that the human is completely material. The same matter cannot exist in two places at once, so you are not copying the matter, you are making a facsimile using OTHER matter. > [@](#): > > But a person can’t be the abstract concept of information, because you can duplicate the material and get a new person. I don’t see how “purpose” has anything to do with this either. But you’re not copying the matter, you’re copying the pattern and superimposing it on other material. > [@](#): > > I am trying to _understand_, not to debunk, but in my efforts I may challenge you. We don’t think you’re saying that you are eliminating the material component, but we’re trying to figure out why you say there’s something _else_ besides the material, which is what you keep hinting at. It was illustrated by your description of “choice” and how it can’t be a product of neurochemistry. For all the talk about how you’re a monist instead of a dualist, your choice argument seems to place you solidly as a dualist, and I don’t understand that. I asked whether or not one could make a choice AND have everything be determined by neurochemistry. Monist in that spirit/material are not separate entities, they are one in the same. I guess sure, it’s dualistic, but not in that it’s either or, but that the spirit is a pattern and the material is medium. > [@](#): > > I grasp that you think the physical is relevant, and I don’t think I have any preconceptions about you. It’s just that some of your words seem to squarely contradict other words. I think we have common ground on a big part here - that consciousness is an emergent property of the physical brain. Let’s turn again to your idea of choice and free will (BTW, I think this is less of a thread hijack and more just thread drift). Well I don’t see it as a hijack because I am actually arguing my position on spirituality. Most everyone else just came in with their IMHO and left it at that. > [@](#): > > Great, I like that. I’m with you there. A program is deterministic, no? Again, we’ve reached the limits of the analogy. Again, as I have said the user is left out of the analogy and that’s where it falls apart. > [@](#): > > What’s that got to do with anything? A computer can have the capability to make decisions - they’re really good at that. Do they really make decisions? Or do they make calculations? Can a computer decide between two equal options? > [@](#): > > I don’t understand why you have this question. It’s just like a computer. The decision depends on lots of stuff, including inputs from multiple sources and stored internal states in the machine. A computer’s choice is just like your brain’s choice. The set of inputs and stored internal states is so vast, however, that it makes the decision process chaotic, so you can’t hope to repeat the exact same process ever, but chaotic things are still deterministic. Ok, fair enough. But give some thought to my perfectly balanced on an apex thought experiment. How does one decide to disrupt the balance? ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592/202 "2009-08-05T22:23:57Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > I asked whether or not one could make a choice AND have everything be determined by neurochemistry. > > Monist in that spirit/material are not separate entities, they are one in the same. I guess sure, it’s dualistic, but not in that it’s either or, but that the spirit is a pattern and the material is medium. Taking the two together, how could a decision made by the “spirit” _not_ be determined by the neurochemistry? Everything about the function of the spirit is determined by the neurochemistry, because it relies on the function and arrangement of that biochemistry to encode the pattern itself. > [@mswas](#): > > Again, we’ve reached the limits of the analogy. Again, as I have said the user is left out of the analogy and that’s where it falls apart. Okay, let’s put the user _into_ the analogy. The user is something _outside_ the computer and its pattern, which interacts with it only through specific data inputs. Information from the user is something that the computer reacts to based on its own, internal decision-making systems. To me, the user analogizes to the guy across the table from you. He’s interacting with you and providing input, which you react to based on your own internal cognitive mechanisms. If you propose the user is some noncorporeal thing that’s _external_ from the body, brain. and cognitive pattern, and makes decisions for them, then you’re a dualist. Though if you’ve put half the personality/memories/whatever in the body, then what condition is the spirit going to be in when your body dies? > [@mswas](#): > > Do they really make decisions? Or do they make calculations? Can a computer decide between two equal options? Not all calculations are decisions, but computers routinely choose between different courses of action based on conditional statements. (If this, do that, else do the other.) Nothing can stop you from arbitrariliy saying “computer decisions aren’t _real_ decisions”, but I’m not seeing how that can be anything other than an opinion. They assess data and based on it choose a course of action. Sounds like a decision to me. And the way a computer chooses between equal options is they make them unequal. The common way to do this is to do whichever is first in the list of options. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Bith\_Shuffle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ce73a5/32.png) [@The\_Bith\_Shuffle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Bith_Shuffle)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592/203 "2009-08-05T23:14:56Z")
To be “spiritual but not religious” is to be unwilling to accept a canonical faith but to still be willing to hold on to vapid, nebular notions of consciousness, life and death, meaning, and morality. People who are “spiritual but not religious” like to throw around new age terms and lend unjustifiable levels of credence to Eastern religions, especially Buddhism. They like to have fashionable but largely nonsensical discussions about the human condition. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592/204 "2009-08-06T14:09:49Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > The same matter cannot exist in two places at once, so you are not copying the matter, you are making a facsimile using OTHER matter. That’s what copying is! And in this case, it would be identical to the original, because atoms are atoms. > [@](#): > > Again, we’ve reached the limits of the analogy. Again, as I have said the user is left out of the analogy and that’s where it falls apart. I still don’t understand why the user is important to the analogy. As Begbert says, that’s equivalent to another person interacting with you. > [@](#): > > Do they really make decisions? Or do they make calculations? Can a computer decide between two equal options? They make decisions every bit as much as we make decisions. And what’s the difference whether you call what goes on in your head, a decision or a calculation? > [@](#): > > But give some thought to my perfectly balanced on an apex thought experiment. How does one decide to disrupt the balance? The same way a very complex computer would decide. Take a bunch of inputs and a complex internal state, and make a decision. I honestly don’t get why you think this example is troublesome for the computer analogy, it seems very straightforward that it’s equivalent. ---
**Author:** ![lekatt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lekatt/32/7269_2.png) [@lekatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lekatt)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2009, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592/205 "2009-08-07T20:43:29Z")
> [@The\_Bith\_Shuffle](#): > > To be “spiritual but not religious” is to be unwilling to accept a canonical faith but to still be willing to hold on to vapid, nebular notions of consciousness, life and death, meaning, and morality. People who are “spiritual but not religious” like to throw around new age terms and lend unjustifiable levels of credence to Eastern religions, especially Buddhism. They like to have fashionable but largely nonsensical discussions about the human condition. I always thought there was such a thing as consciousness, life and death, vapid are they? strange. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-it-mean-to-be-spiritual/504592.md?page=10)