Is one monozygotic twin a human individual even after separation?
Why should there be a soul before there is a brain, which is necessary for the physical part of what Genesis calls a “soul”?
The question rests on an unnecessary complicating assumption.
Physical science cannot test whether there is an external non-physical soul affecting the output of a computer. If such exists, then it has to convey its decisions to the physical structure of the computer at some point. There is no scientific way to determine whether the first physically detectable changes in the computer, signaling the start of a decision are promptings from a dualistic independent spirit versus purely electrical processes.
Causal connections are measurable, and the causal connection to the material states can be established in an if and only if relationship which makes any imagined non-physical cause extraneous to the point of meaninglessness. There is a point at which excuses render the idea completely disconnected from reality.
I would say that most people who defend the existence of a rational soul are attached to the Catholic dogma(?)
And in in my opinion evolution is sufficient to explain the emergence of intelligence, intellect and morality.
This ar
This argument from St Roymond is fundamentally flawed…
If only a single generation of biblical author were being considered, yes that argument could be valid…however, the fact is, when it comes to creation, noahs flood, and.sodom/gomorah, multiple writers across more than a thousand years wrote the exact same statements about those events.
Moses in about 1300 BC
Christ in about 30 AD
and Peter 64-67 AD
Your arggument there is absolute nonsense and the timeline of biblical authorship proves its utterly false.
I dont know why you continue to spin this tripe…the weight of internal biblical evidence against it is such that continuing to push it is a dilusion
Physical science can test whether the typing of letters on my computer correlates to my actions at the keyboard. But it cannot test whether a change occurring in the computer is caused purely by material causes such as quantum fluctuations, or whether some external non-physical soul is acting on the computer.
Of course, that is no proof that such a soul is acting on computers, or on brains. But the science does not disprove the idea of such a soul. Whether or not such exists would need to be tested using other information. Personally, I suspect that our souls have greater connection to our bodies than a strictly dualistic view would advocate.
If a completely dualistic-type soul exists, and actually bothers to involve itself in answering the questions in a neuropsychology experiment rather than leaving the brain on autopilot, then brain scans could detect the electrochemical responses to that decision being transferred by said soul to the brain.
If a decision is purely the product of material factors such as brain chemistry, then brain scans could detect the electrochemical responses to that decision being triggered by said chemical state in the brain. One can gain plenty of useful information by simply focusing on the physical processes and not considering the possibility of a soul. But claiming that this disproves the soul, as some have done in neuropsychology, is naively incompetent bad reasoning.
That is my opinion also.
Plato’s philosophical ideas, particularly those concerning the soul’s pre-existence and eternity, and the concept of a spiritual realm, significantly influenced early Christian thought, including Catholic dogma , though often through the lens of Neoplatonism (Wikipedia on Platonism)
What then? Do we have to agree with Plato because of this? I don’t think so. I prefer the teaching of Paul in the Bible on this matter.
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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