# What is the difference between life and soul? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 28, 2006, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381 "2006-07-28T11:57:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/81 "2006-08-06T23:37:25Z")
Here’s some info on those experiments, **Bam Boo Gut** > **[Was the Weight of a Human Soul Determined to Be 21 Grams?](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/weight-of-the-soul/)** > > Did a physician once attempt to measure the weight of the human soul? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2006, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/82 "2006-08-06T23:50:59Z")
According to author James Jones in _The Thin Red Line_ some things can live beyond death. Describing a (fictional) bomb raid on transport ships at Guadalcanal Jones wrote: > [@](#): > > The third [bomb] fell almost directly alongside [the transport]. An LCI was just putting off from the ship, it couldn’t have been many yards away, and the third bomb apparently landed directly on it. From that distance, probably a thousand yards or more, one faint but clearly discernable scream, high and shrill, and which actually did not reach them until after the geyser had gone up, was heard by the men on shore, cut off and followed immediately by the sound wave of the explosion. Some one nameless man’s single and instinctual protest against the taking of his life and his own bad luck at being where he was instead of somewhere else, ridiculous, pointless, but not without a certain dignity, ironically, it was not heard until he himself no longer existed. His last scream had lived longer than he had. ---
**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:** [August 7, 2006, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/83 "2006-08-07T06:03:41Z")
[QUOTE=yelimS] Well, my claim is still that “you” are nothing but your consciousness, and that the body is your tool, and a lot of people would disagree, even though (my assumption is) all but a single atom in their bodies could be changed without their self changing. [/quote] Actually, all the atoms can change without the self changing. It’s the structure, the composition of the atoms which is important, not the identity of the atoms themselves. > [@](#): > > I don’t quite see what you’re getting at, but regarding potential, have a go at my favorite Hobbes quote: Hobbes was living in the old Newtonian clockwork universe. My question really was whether there could be a brain complex enough to support C without it being C. I don’t think so myself. > [@](#): > > I think you need to read my post again. I’ve no doubts whatsoever that individual atoms, cells, people, communities, whatever, could work together, and even identify as a group, but for any single member of that group to “experience” the “thoughts” of that group, that single member must be able to receive these thoughts by itself. It doesn’t have to be able to produce them alone, only to mindlessly “watch” them. > It’s as simple as for you to be able to see a whole movie, you must see that entire movie yourself, not just being a part of a group that watches a part of it each. Thus, everything “you” experience must pass through a point. I suggest this point to be an atom (still greek), but it needn’t be material at all. A memory doesn’t produce anything, just records it. (Watching it must be part of recording). So, the memory cannot record broken into its components. I still think this is an example of a combination of things having a property the individual components do not have. It is certainly not clear that our entire brain is involved in all thoughts - so our brain as a whole does watch the entire movie, as it were, while the components only see parts. However my example does not consist of individual gates with different functions - the entire memory cell is involved in “remembering” the bit. One bit cannot be broken, so this is provably true. Maybe it is more like a scene in a movie with a bunch of actors - you don’t have a scene (considered atomic here) without all the actors, though no one actor has all the lines. > [@](#): > > By the way, do you agree with my having a seperate definition for c. in itself and the rest of the thought process? Even if they are dependant on each other (though I’m assuming they’re not really), they are different aspects of something. I agree with you here. I think that the thought process may be associated with C, but is not C., so different definitions seem reasonable. ---
**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:** [August 7, 2006, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/84 "2006-08-07T06:07:17Z")
[QUOTE=Bam Boo Gut] Wish I could remember where I read that a study had concluded the weight of the soul by weighing someone shortly before and shortly after their death. It was some doctors in the 18 hundreds I believe. Is there a dramatic change in body weight shortly after death? After my father’s death and he was laid out in the house, my mother left the window open (and it was cold, windy and raining) so that his soul could leave - not his life - that was over. Make of this what you will, I don’t have an answer, only these comments. [/QUOTE] You should check out **Spook** by Mary Roach, which is an entire book on the search for life after death, and describes the experiment on weighing the soul (and followups) in detail. Suffice to say there were problems with the methodology and it has not been reproduced. Warning: she is a skeptic. Warning 2: she is hilarious. (She also wrote Stiff about what is done with bodies, which is good too, but I liked Spook better.) ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2006, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/85 "2006-08-07T12:19:06Z")
[QUOTE=Bam Boo Gut] Wish I could remember where I read that a study had concluded the weight of the soul by weighing someone shortly before and shortly after their death. It was some doctors in the 18 hundreds I believe. Is there a dramatic change in body weight shortly after death? After my father’s death and he was laid out in the house, my mother left the window open (and it was cold, windy and raining) so that his soul could leave - not his life - that was over. Make of this what you will, I don’t have an answer, only these comments. [/QUOTE] The act of dying could burn some calories and that would explain the weight difference. What does Life weigh? Death is life leaving the body. The brain waves do not have anymore electricity and do not register. Since a soul is immaterial, how could it be weighed? Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2006, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/86 "2006-08-07T12:32:53Z")
The difference between life and a soul is that life is the mechanical portion of your being; the heart pumping, electricity coursing, blood flowing. A soul is the personality that separates us from fish and bacteria. You can have life without a soul, but you can’t have a soul without life. ---
**Author:** ![Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8c91f0/32.png) [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bam_Boo_Gut)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2006, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/87 "2006-08-07T17:28:02Z")
[QUOTE=Revtim] Here’s some info on those experiments, **Bam Boo Gut** > **[Was the Weight of a Human Soul Determined to Be 21 Grams?](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/weight-of-the-soul/)** > > Did a physician once attempt to measure the weight of the human soul? [/QUOTE] Thanks Revtim - great link! ---
**Author:** ![yelimS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/54ee81/32.png) [@yelimS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yelimS)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2006, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/88 "2006-08-07T21:23:58Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] Actually, all the atoms can change without the self changing. It’s the structure, the composition of the atoms which is important, not the identity of the atoms themselves. [/QUOTE] Not if “you” are a single atom, as I’m trying to prove (the “point” c. has to go through to be experienced at once, and not fragmentary). [QUOTE=Voyager] Hobbes was living in the old Newtonian clockwork universe. My question really was whether there could be a brain complex enough to support C without it being C. I don’t think so myself. [/QUOTE] Neither do I, as the quote by Hobbes should firmly state. [QUOTE=Voyager] A memory doesn’t produce anything, just records it. (Watching it must be part of recording). So, the memory cannot record broken into its components. I still think this is an example of a combination of things having a property the individual components do not have. [/QUOTE] Again, you’re not responding to what I wrote, but what you think I wrote. My entire point here is that you can not experience any more information than you recieve, so for ONE self/ person/ consciousness/ atom/ whatever to experience something, that ONE something has to recieve all that information by itself. YOU are that one, thus, everything you experience must pass through some single point. [QUOTE=Voyager] It is certainly not clear that our entire brain is involved in all thoughts - so our brain as a whole does watch the entire movie, as it were, while the components only see parts. However my example does not consist of individual gates with different functions - the entire memory cell is involved in “remembering” the bit. One bit cannot be broken, so this is provably true. Maybe it is more like a scene in a movie with a bunch of actors - you don’t have a scene (considered atomic here) without all the actors, though no one actor has all the lines. [/QUOTE] Completely irrelevant. I do not think our brain only handles one thought at a time or anything along those lines, I’m only trying to set up an analogy here. [QUOTE=Voyager] I agree with you here. I think that the thought process may be associated with C, but is not C., so different definitions seem reasonable. [/QUOTE] Wonderful. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2006, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/89 "2006-08-08T13:01:02Z")
[QUOTE=Kalhoun] The difference between life and a soul is that life is the mechanical portion of your being; the heart pumping, electricity coursing, blood flowing. A soul is the personality that separates us from fish and bacteria. You can have life without a soul, but you can’t have a soul without life. [/QUOTE] That is a matter of faith not fact. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2006, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/90 "2006-08-08T14:47:36Z")
[QUOTE=monavis] That is a matter of faith not fact. Monavis [/QUOTE] Well, I’m faithless. And I’m not using the word “soul” in the religious sense. I’m using it in the secular sense because I believe it has evolved into a secular term. The believers no longer own it. Which is nice. I thank James Brown. 😉 If you could provide another word for what I’m referring to, I’d be happy to adopt it. ---
**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:** [August 8, 2006, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/91 "2006-08-08T16:59:56Z")
[QUOTE=yelimS] Again, you’re not responding to what I wrote, but what you think I wrote. My entire point here is that you can not experience any more information than you recieve, so for ONE self/ person/ consciousness/ atom/ whatever to experience something, that ONE something has to recieve all that information by itself. YOU are that one, thus, everything you experience must pass through some single point. [/QUOTE] “You cannot experience any more information than you receive.” Don’t you ever daydream? We can experience things that we make up internally, that we synthesize. We create information, so I don’t agree with this at all. “YOU are that one, thus, everything you experience must pass through some single point.” What single point? Is the point the brain? If so, I agree. If it is a component of the brain, I don’t agree. No neuron or even part of the brain experiences everything. Our C, as far as I can guess, consists at least in part of parts of the brain communicating. Now, clearly not every atom of the brain experiences everything (whatever experience means) since each atom cannot physically store that much information. Is there one atom somewhere that you are referring to? If so, where? We know that removing various parts of the brain have various effects - but I know of no small chunk (of atomic size - Greek meaning) which is fatal in your sense. It’s time for you to provide some evidence. Basically, your hypothesis, as far as I can tell, is not supported by neurological research. It’s not particularly logical either. I’ve demonstrated that a group of objects can have a property that none of the objects in the group alone have. Now you demonstrate that there is a critical atomic object in the brain. ---
**Author:** ![yelimS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/54ee81/32.png) [@yelimS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yelimS)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2006, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/92 "2006-08-08T18:20:35Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] “You cannot experience any more information than you receive.” Don’t you ever daydream? We can experience things that we make up internally, that we synthesize. We create information, so I don’t agree with this at all. [/QUOTE] Look, we’ve agreed c. and “the stuff of c.” are not the same. If, now, the c. is analogous to a computer screen, and daydream, to some program running on that screen, c. needs to receive it to show it, but the computer (analogous then, to the brain), does not need to receive it, as you say. When you say c. doesn’t need to “receive” a daydream, because it makes it up itself, you’re obviously still mixing the screen and the computer (c. and brain, thoughts, “stuff of c”, what have you). [QUOTE=Voyager] “YOU are that one, thus, everything you experience must pass through some single point.” What single point? Is the point the brain? If so, I agree. If it is a component of the brain, I don’t agree. No neuron or even part of the brain experiences everything. Our C, as far as I can guess, consists at least in part of parts of the brain communicating. [/QUOTE] Let’s say you “are” your entire brain. I’ll remove a non-vital percent of that brain. You are still one “person” (or rather, “consciousness”), not 0.99% of a consciousness. Thus, if by removing parts of your brain (which happens all the time, as neurons die), your consciousness doesn’t somehow “shrink”, that c. must belong to a part of the brain that wasn’t touched, and **not the brain as a whole**. Now, before you go on saying that consciousness does indeed “shrink” when we lose bits of our brains, because our brain activity is harmed, I’ll remind you that brain activity =/= c. as per the definition we’ve now agreed upon. Think again of the screen; it shows the **same number of pixels, with the same range of colours, even if the computer is damaged (normally, which will do for the analogy)**. Even if somehow half your HD space disappears into The Void, you still have One Screen. Or, let’s try another angle: Explain how “half a consciousness” works. (Hint: by our definition, it becomes "Experiencing half of what one experiences) [QUOTE=Voyager] Now, clearly not every atom of the brain experiences everything (whatever experience means) since each atom cannot physically store that much information. Is there one atom somewhere that you are referring to? If so, where? We know that removing various parts of the brain have various effects - but I know of no small chunk (of atomic size - Greek meaning) which is fatal in your sense. It’s time for you to provide some evidence. [/QUOTE] As far as logic evidence goes, I believe all I’m expected to do is not being able to figure out a single way it could have been that would contradict my theory. And, as assumed in my previous paragraph, I’ve rather a hard time figuring out a concept of a “divisible consciousness”. If consciousness is indivisible, it might as well belong to an indivisible atom. [QUOTE=Voyager] Basically, your hypothesis, as far as I can tell, is not supported by neurological research. It’s not particularly logical either. I’ve demonstrated that a group of objects can have a property that none of the objects in the group alone have. Now you demonstrate that there is a critical atomic object in the brain. [/QUOTE] Neurological research means nothing to my hypothesis, that’s what I’ve been trying to say all the time. It’s NOT a brain hypothesis, it’s a consciousness hypothesis. Logics of assuming that consciousness can not be an emergent property above. I’ve agreed to all your demonstrations, but I’ve also held that they’re utterly irrelevant. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/93 "2006-08-09T12:09:03Z")
[QUOTE=Kalhoun] Well, I’m faithless. And I’m not using the word “soul” in the religious sense. I’m using it in the secular sense because I believe it has evolved into a secular term. The believers no longer own it. Which is nice. I thank James Brown. 😉 If you could provide another word for what I’m referring to, I’d be happy to adopt it. [/QUOTE] What makes James Brown an authority? There is no proof of a soul in human or any living thing. Soul can be anything one wants to believe it is. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/94 "2006-08-09T12:17:27Z")
[QUOTE=monavis] What makes James Brown an authority? There is no proof of a soul in human or any living thing. Soul can be anything one wants to believe it is. Monavis [/QUOTE] You obviously aren’t tracking with me. There is an essence, or personality, if you will, in human beings and other higher animals. It’s not a “thing.” It doesn’t travel out of the body, it is incapable of reconstituting itself in another living thing. That is the part of a person’s being that most people refer to as “the soul” of that person. It has nothing to do with religion. Never did (though some might like to think so). The James Brown thing was a little humor, which evidently went over your head. He is widely recognized as “The Godfather of Soul.” Get it? ---
**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:** [August 9, 2006, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/95 "2006-08-09T17:54:19Z")
[QUOTE=yelimS] Let’s say you “are” your entire brain. I’ll remove a non-vital percent of that brain. You are still one “person” (or rather, “consciousness”), not 0.99% of a consciousness. Thus, if by removing parts of your brain (which happens all the time, as neurons die), your consciousness doesn’t somehow “shrink”, that c. must belong to a part of the brain that wasn’t touched, and **not the brain as a whole**. Now, before you go on saying that consciousness does indeed “shrink” when we lose bits of our brains, because our brain activity is harmed, I’ll remind you that brain activity =/= c. as per the definition we’ve now agreed upon. Think again of the screen; it shows the **same number of pixels, with the same range of colours, even if the computer is damaged (normally, which will do for the analogy)**. Even if somehow half your HD space disappears into The Void, you still have One Screen. Or, let’s try another angle: Explain how “half a consciousness” works. (Hint: by our definition, it becomes "Experiencing half of what one experiences) [/quote] The screen analogy is particularly bad here, since the value of a screen is more or less directly proportional to the number of working pixels. There will always be a few out with no difficulty, and no one would say a screen is working if only a dozen pixels are. It is somewhere in between. However, for the brain, various aspects of C can be destroyed by damaging certain regions of the brain - for instance the recognition of faces, which certainly falls under experience. You either experience something or you don’t, but different regions of the brain control different types of experiences. That is an example of how neurology is relevant - it maps different parts of the brain to the ability to experience different things. > [@](#): > > As far as logic evidence goes, I believe all I’m expected to do is not being able to figure out a single way it could have been that would contradict my theory. And, as assumed in my previous paragraph, I’ve rather a hard time figuring out a concept of a “divisible consciousness”. If consciousness is indivisible, it might as well belong to an indivisible atom. First, I don’t agree that C is indivisible. But if the part of the brain related to C consists of many atoms, I don’t agree that even an indivisible C implies that it belongs to an atom - just as the indivisible memory cell does not imply that its components have memories. > [@](#): > > Neurological research means nothing to my hypothesis, that’s what I’ve been trying to say all the time. It’s NOT a brain hypothesis, it’s a consciousness hypothesis. Logics of assuming that consciousness can not be an emergent property above. I’ve agreed to all your demonstrations, but I’ve also held that they’re utterly irrelevant. So here we get back to the OP. Does it not being a brain hypothesis mean that C is not connected to the brain in any way? I didn’t think this was what you were saying. If it is, then removing an atom or set of atoms should also remove C. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/96 "2006-08-10T12:20:22Z")
[QUOTE=Kalhoun] You obviously aren’t tracking with me. There is an essence, or personality, if you will, in human beings and other higher animals. It’s not a “thing.” It doesn’t travel out of the body, it is incapable of reconstituting itself in another living thing. That is the part of a person’s being that most people refer to as “the soul” of that person. It has nothing to do with religion. Never did (though some might like to think so). The James Brown thing was a little humor, which evidently went over your head. He is widely recognized as “The Godfather of Soul.” Get it? [/QUOTE] It did indeed since I have no interest in soul music. Soul then would be personality as I understand your discription, and dies with the body, which in turn goes back to being the atoms etc. that was it’s make up. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/97 "2006-08-10T12:58:25Z")
[QUOTE=monavis] It did indeed since I have no interest in soul music. Soul then would be personality as I understand your discription, and dies with the body, which in turn goes back to being the atoms etc. that was it’s make up. Monavis [/QUOTE] Well, not exactly, as it was never “alive” to begin with. It just “is.” A person’s soul can disappear before the body dies. It is the result of certain electrical impulses in the brain. Many bodies do indeed function with no personality. But no personality, or soul, functions without the body. ---
**Author:** ![yelimS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/54ee81/32.png) [@yelimS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yelimS)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/98 "2006-08-10T15:01:08Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] The screen analogy is particularly bad here, since the value of a screen is more or less directly proportional to the number of working pixels. There will always be a few out with no difficulty, and no one would say a screen is working if only a dozen pixels are. It is somewhere in between. [/Quote] It’s an analogy. Analogies are by definition never perfect, but this one would work if you didn’t mess it up with irrelevant information. Normally, pixel quality is independent of computer content. I’m suggesting consciousness always IS, but can receive different input, ranging from the meaningless impulses a stone would receive, to the thoughts you are experiencing. [QUOTE=Voyager] However, for the brain, various aspects of C can be destroyed by damaging certain regions of the brain - for instance the recognition of faces, which certainly falls under experience. You either experience something or you don’t, but different regions of the brain control different types of experiences. That is an example of how neurology is relevant - it maps different parts of the brain to the ability to experience different things. [/Quote] That’s changes in the brain, and thus c. input, not c. itself. [QUOTE=Voyager] First, I don’t agree that C is indivisible. But if the part of the brain related to C consists of many atoms, I don’t agree that even an indivisible C implies that it belongs to an atom - just as the indivisible memory cell does not imply that its components have memories. [/Quote] To be short, if C isn’t indivisible, “I” is only an approximation, and should be replaced by “us”. [QUOTE=Voyager] So here we get back to the OP. Does it not being a brain hypothesis mean that C is not connected to the brain in any way? I didn’t think this was what you were saying. If it is, then removing an atom or set of atoms should also remove C. [/QUOTE] Removing most single atoms would not change (the input of) c. more than it changes the brain. We can safely agree this is utterly negligable. However, my supposition is that one of these atoms IS you. Removing it (not as ending it’s existence, but physically moving it) would not end your consciousness, it would only be removed from the meaningful input from “your” brain. ---
**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:** [August 10, 2006, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/99 "2006-08-10T16:12:01Z")
[QUOTE=yelimS] It’s an analogy. Analogies are by definition never perfect, but this one would work if you didn’t mess it up with irrelevant information. Normally, pixel quality is independent of computer content. I’m suggesting consciousness always IS, but can receive different input, ranging from the meaningless impulses a stone would receive, to the thoughts you are experiencing. [/QUOTE] Now that I didn’t get, and this explains all your other points. This I disagree with most emphatically. I see C, however you define it, as a process running in the brain. Any sort of analysis or awareness or display requires energy and a base of matter to interact with. Where is this in a rock? How can you distinguish a rock without C from a rock with C? Your concept is physically impossible, and indistinguishable from the tradition of a soul as a massless entity flitting about without the need for energy and inhabiting trees and dogs and people. I’m afraid there is nothing here at all. ---
**Author:** ![yelimS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/54ee81/32.png) [@yelimS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yelimS)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381/100 "2006-08-10T20:06:21Z")
Bolding mine [QUOTE=Voyager] Now that I didn’t get, and this explains all your other points. This I disagree with most emphatically. **I see C, however you define it,** as a process running in the brain. Any sort of analysis or awareness or display requires energy and a base of matter to interact with. Where is this in a rock? How can you distinguish a rock without C from a rock with C? [/QUOTE] How are you ever planning to understand anyone when you use your definitions to interpret a word they’ve explicitly stated they interpret otherwise? You may disagree with my definition, but I’m stealing c. because I’ve no other words to use, and I thought we’d agreed upon my definition. I’ve argued countless times why I think it is a good definition, too. By saying my definition of c. doesn’t count, you’re basically saying that you can apply any meaning you desire to what I say. When **I** say “C. is in all things”, it doesn’t mean “consciousness-by-Voyager’s-definition is in all things”, and it most definately ISN’T, it means “consciousness-by-my-definition is in all things.”. Also, by my hypothesis, you can’t distinguish a rock without c. (“potential-for-c.”) from a rock without, because _there are no rocks without c_. This isn’t some treehugger-philosophy about all life being sacred and capable of thought and feelings, it simply means that since I believe that in order for c. to be experienced, it must be experienced by one, since if it is experienced by many, it is also experienced by one+one+one, etc, and that one is by definition indivisible, and so it could not be anything other than what it is, because it hasn’t got smaller parts to define the difference between c. and not-c. I’ll repeat. You’re saying consciousness (by both of our definitions) is an emergent quality, and you defend your position in part by refering to other emergent qualities, like memory. However, you’re missing a vital point. Memory in a computer chip doesn’t exist, except as an interpretation of the state of the chip. To use an example more easy to grasp, say you bake a cake. The “cake” is only the idea people get when they experience it, in reality, it’s flour, milk, sugar, what have you, which in turn are only ideas of different molecules. They have different attributes, sure, but noone can “be” sugar, since sugar is many (atoms, both greek and chemical sense). But! You _can indeed be conscious_, **and** for many to experience something, each one of the many must experience it, while for many to build a pyramid, they need only build a part of the pyramid each. The way I see it, c. is thus principally different from everything else you might claim to be emergent properties. I thus see it as a neccesarily founding attribute, and as such, it must belong to atoms (back to greek, I’m sure you’ve guessed) [QUOTE=Voyager] Your concept is physically impossible, and indistinguishable from the tradition of a soul as a massless entity flitting about without the need for energy and inhabiting trees and dogs and people. I’m afraid there is nothing here at all. [/QUOTE] As I implied, fuck treehuggers. How’s that for a distinction? If I disagree _strongly_ with the theorists you’re confusing me with, doesn’t that imply a misunderstanding on your behalf? Keep digging, you’re not there yet. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-life-and-soul/366381.md?page=6)