Thoughts on the soul

Why AI Approaches to Cognition Won't Work for Consciousness PaoloV

Am I more than my Brain? What relationship is there between our soul and mind?  If we are more than just our brain where does the soul fit in? If we are more than our brain, how do we handle those with mental disorders What does Christianity have to say about mental health struggles? Why do we struggle with depression?  Why did God let Job suffer so much? Do we have free will?    PaoloV

S1:E5 | Consciousness | Sharon Dirckx | Genexis 2019 Am I Just My Brain?  RZIM Am I just my brain?  Interview AM I just my brain?  Book   PaoloV

@ Ed George

Given that I have identical twin daughters

Do you consider your daughters "meat-robots"? Truthfreedom

EG, absent a soul, you have no reality as a unified person, no credible rationality that transcends GIGO, no true duty under moral government [which would be delusional] and no basis for taking your mouth-noises seriously. In short, you are trying to defend self referential absurdity. KF kairosfocus

@89 Ed George

Since the entire concept of a”soul” is little more than a thought experiment, I don’t see anything unusual about mine.

Well, according to materialism, "you" do not exist. You are an illusion. Lol. Truthfreedom

F/N: an online book on the soul http://www.san.beck.org/Soul-Contents.html and a discussion at psychology today https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/biocentrism/201112/does-the-soul-exist-evidence-says-yes not an endorsement, just to open up thought. KF kairosfocus

The entire concept of "Ed George" is little more than a thought experiment. ET

KF

one may ponder a discussion here http://jimmyakin.com/2006/08/identical_twins.html with a forum type discussion here https://forums.catholic.com/t/when-do-identical-twins-get-their-souls/7586/2 .

Thanks for this research. Several ideas proposed there. Some better than others. This comment was interesting:

Dr. Jerome Lejeune cited evidence that the embryo prior to twinning was already programmed to split. In his view, therefore, the body was a two-embryo body even before the split when it was only one.

No reference was provided, and I don't know what Dr. Lejeune is referring to but it's possible that there is some, as yet undetected, marker for an embryo destined to split and that prior to that, the embryo is pre-planned with both souls which end up driving the embryonic spit itself. Silver Asiatic

F/N: Like unto this, Plato in The Laws Bk X:

Ath. . . . when one thing changes another, and that another, of such will there be any primary changing element? How can a thing which is moved by another ever be the beginning of change? Impossible. But when the self-moved changes other, and that again other, and thus thousands upon tens of thousands of bodies are set in motion, must not the beginning of all this motion be the change of the self-moving principle? . . . . self-motion being the origin of all motions, and the first which arises among things at rest as well as among things in motion, is the eldest and mightiest principle of change, and that which is changed by another and yet moves other is second. [[ . . . .] Ath. If we were to see this power existing in any earthy, watery, or fiery substance, simple or compound-how should we describe it? Cle. You mean to ask whether we should call such a self-moving power life? Ath. I do. Cle. Certainly we should. Ath. And when we see soul in anything, must we not do the same-must we not admit that this is life? [[ . . . . ] Cle. You mean to say that the essence which is defined as the self-moved is the same with that which has the name soul? Ath. Yes; and if this is true, do we still maintain that there is anything wanting in the proof that the soul is the first origin and moving power of all that is, or has become, or will be, and their contraries, when she has been clearly shown to be the source of change and motion in all things? Cle. Certainly not; the soul as being the source of motion, has been most satisfactorily shown to be the oldest of all things. Ath. And is not that motion which is produced in another, by reason of another, but never has any self-moving power at all, being in truth the change of an inanimate body, to be reckoned second, or by any lower number which you may prefer? Cle. Exactly. Ath. Then we are right, and speak the most perfect and absolute truth, when we say that the soul is prior to the body, and that the body is second and comes afterwards, and is born to obey the soul, which is the ruler? [[ . . . . ] Ath. If, my friend, we say that the whole path and movement of heaven, and of all that is therein, is by nature akin to the movement and revolution and calculation of mind, and proceeds by kindred laws, then, as is plain, we must say that the best soul takes care of the world and guides it along the good path. [[Plato here explicitly sets up an inference to design (by a good soul) from the intelligible order of the cosmos.]

Notice, antecedent to Biblical theism as an aspect of Greek Culture and as part of a response to evolutionary materialism in that culture. KF kairosfocus

F/N: For those interested in the matter of twins one may do a web search to see places where such a discussion is germane and focal rather than largely distractive. I do note, a twin speaks here https://www.lisaleonard.com/blog/thoughts/finding-beauty/identical-twins-unique-souls and one may ponder a discussion here http://jimmyakin.com/2006/08/identical_twins.html with a forum type discussion here https://forums.catholic.com/t/when-do-identical-twins-get-their-souls/7586/2 . The focal issue here is different -- as is manifest in the OP; first, what stems from ensoulment, second, the significance of attempted reductionism. KF PS: As a reminder, J C Wright:

Men have souls [–> that which gives us self-moved, responsible, rational freedom]. Once one accepts that premise, one must accept the conclusions that follow from it: creatures with souls are not evolved from slime, since spirit, being simple and eternal, cannot be brought into being by matter, which is compound, subject to change and decay, nor brought into being by any blind natural process; therefore, instead, spirit must be created in a divine image, with the faculties of reason and conscience and creativity. Living spirits like man hence are responsible each man for his own action, hence by right are worthy of the fruits each man of his own labor. Since this right comes not from the state, it should not in justice be abrogated by the state, for the right to property is sacrosanct, and, by the same logic, so too are all rights to life and liberty and to the freedom of the conscience. [–> I add, echoing the US DoI of 1776: the state enters, with the consent of the governed, as a common means to safeguard the civil peace of justice; that due balance of rights, freedoms and duties in community which cannot be reliably pursued otherwise — in which context, it has a legitimate power of moderate, prudent taxation as a cost-effective means to fund the defence and reasonable enhancement of the common good.] Nor can a created being overstep the authority created into him by his creator, that is, Man cannot play God; which means he cannot slay innocent children in the womb nor murder the sick and elderly and useless gobblers of bread, nor breed men like dogsbreeders breeding dogs, nor commit suicide oneself, not even the slow suicide of addiction to self-destructive substances and ideas. If man is created by divinity, it is not in his choice to demean and trample the image of God in himself nor his neighbor: modesty, honesty, humility, patience, prudence and temperance become sacrosanct. Even such seemingly unrelated matters, such as the low dirt of modern speech, the crass ugliness of modern art, the vainglorious ignorance of modern schooling, become offenses against this divine image seen in man . . . . If men have souls, what does skin hue matter?

kairosfocus

EG

No, it is to deny a God.

Materialism denies more than just God. It denies all immaterial entities. So, it denies the soul, which is the defining component of a human person.

We would still have a human nature just as my cat has a cat nature and marble has a marble nature.

As its nature, a cat is an animal. So, it has an "animal nature" -- in that aspect, it shares the same nature as all other animals. But humans have a distinctly different nature. "Man is a rational animal" is the classic definition. That's why humans are regarded differently than animals. We have a rational soul that gives us different responsibilities. By theology we know that we have the responsibility to care for others. The rational soul is immaterial. We can see this from our moral decision-making. We can freely make choices, and we can be held accountable for what evil we do, and we can act with courage and wisdom and virtue also. That freedom to choose actions comes from our immaterial soul. Otherwise, if everything we did was determined by physical processes, we would have no responsibility for our actions. Squirrels just act the way squirrels do. They can't choose evil or good. We are different because we have the rational power to choose, and that freedom comes from an immaterial source that goes beyond physical processes.

I don’t show respect to other humans because of an immortal “soul”. I show respect because I would like to have respect shown to me. That’s not going to happen if I am always acting like ET.

If we took that strictly, then the only humans you would show respect to are those that you think you will get a response of respect back from them. I would think you'd communicate your respect for many people who can't pay you back. In other words, is somewhat of a spiritual approach to the question. I'm guessing, but some people think of it like karma. "If I do random good deeds, then someone will do one for me". But even that makes human exchange entirely a transaction - quid pro quo. But we do good things for people when they don't even know we're doing it. They can't pay us back. That kind of respect we show is because we honor the person, as a human being. Because the person can freely respond with appreciation is an indication of their soul. But in the end it's a much greater respect if we know the person was created by God and the person is loved and respected by God Himself. Then we know we have a greater responsibility. Silver Asiatic

EG, you keep dodging the central issue. Duly noted. KF PS: Reppert, again, shows the problem of reducing rationality [ground-consequent inference on insight into logic of being] to a computational substrate [cause-effect chains driven by signals, systems organisation and programming]:

. . . let us suppose that brain state A [--> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief [--> concious, perceptual state or disposition] that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.

The effect of such a reduction is to break down credibility of warrant, you are only making signs intended to manipulate us, and there is no governing duty to truth, right reason, prudence, fairness or justice. The door to utterly cynical deceit and nihilistic will to power lies open. In short, the attempt to reduce rational, responsible freedom to dynamic-stochastic causal process on a computational substrate reduces even that argument to utterly discredited absurdity AND opens the door to utter, deceitful nihilism. Actually, it is worse. It implies there is just an accident of molecular organisation and linked wiring, there is no actual agent there, personhood becomes grand delusion. Evolutionary materialistic scientism and its fellow travellers are utterly, irretrievably self referentially absurd and self-falsifying. kairosfocus

TF

Do you want to assign a soul to a thougth experiment?

Since the entire concept of a”soul” is little more than a thought experiment, I don’t see anything unusual about mine. Ed George

Ed George

But seriously, if I were to clone myself...

But it is not possible to clone "yourself". It can not happen, so it does not matter. Real humans are real. Do you want to assign a soul to a thougth experiment? Truthfreedom

At 36 Ed George claimed:

"You can claim that the “soul” is independent of this (the brain), but you have yet to provide any compelling evidence for it. The best you have is NDE, which can be reproduced chemically."

As usual for Ed, that claim is false. Moreover, as usual, a reference is missing from Ed's claim. Perhaps he heard it from another atheist and is just mindlessly repeating what he heard (like he does so many other things). But anyways, the claim is false. Besides there being many lines of evidence supporting the reality of the soul rather than just NDE's, NDEs, specifically the most salient features of NDEs, cannot be reproduced chemically. Again, Ed's claim is false. PERIOD!

Near-Death Experiences and DMT - Steve Taylor Ph.D. - Oct 12, 2018 A neurological explanation of NDEs remains elusive. Excerpt: Another theory is that NDEs are related to psychedelic chemicals that are naturally produced by the brain. This theory was apparently boosted recently with the release of a paper called "DMT Models the Near-Death Experience" by a team of UK researchers associated with the Psychedelic Research Group at Imperial College London. (In case you don't know, DMT - short for dimethyltryptamine - is a hallucinogenic, similar to LSD and magic mushrooms.) Aiming to study the apparent similarities between the psychedelic substance and NDEs, the researchers gave both DMT and a placebo to 13 participants, then asked them to complete a scale of the characteristics of NDEs. The results were reported as showing significant overlap between the two types of experience. As the researchers concluded, "Results revealed significant increases in phenomenological features associated with the NDE, following DMT administration compared to placebo." This appears to be true, but on closer inspection, the findings of the paper still fall far short of establishing any strong connection between DMT and NDEs. Of the 16 items in the NDE scale used in the study, nine items showed a high degree of crossover. These included an ‘unearthly environment,’ a sense of peace, heightened senses, harmony/unity, altered time perception, feelings of joy, bright light, and so on. However, all nine of these characteristics are generally associated with spiritual or mystical experiences, rather than just NDEs. It is well known that NDEs have a strong spiritual or mystical element to them, which is partly why they have such a powerful life-changing effect. But NDEs are not just spiritual experiences. And significantly, the seven items in this study with the least crossover between NDEs and DMT were those which differentiate NDEs from standard spiritual experiences. For example, three of the most salient characteristics of NDEs are a feeling of reaching a ‘border/point of no return,’ ‘encountering deceased/religious spirits,’ and a life review. In this study, these were amongst the least reported in DMT experiences. In other words, what this study seems to indicate is a relationship between DMT experiences and spiritual or mystical experiences. Since we already know that NDEs contain some of the same elements of spiritual experiences, it is not surprising that there is some relationship between NDEs and DMT experiences. In view of this, there is no reason to jump to the conclusion that NDEs are associated with DMT. Other researchers—such as Rick Strassman—have suggested that NDEs may be caused by the release of DMT when a person is close to death or in the process of dying. However, there is no evidence that large amounts of DMT are released close to death. It is not even certain that DMT is produced in the human body (although it has been found in the pineal gland of rats). The After-Effects of NDEs But perhaps one of the strongest arguments against any connection between NDEs and DMT is their after-effects. As I describe in my new book, Spiritual Science, in the great majority of cases, NDEs are powerfully transformative experiences. After them, a person's values and attitude toward life are completely transformed. People often become less materialistic and more altruistic, less self-oriented and more compassionate. They often feel a new sense of purpose, and their relationships become more authentic and intimate. They report becoming more sensitive to beauty and more appreciative of everyday things. They also typically report a loss of the fear of death. It’s remarkable that one single experience can have such a profound, long-lasting, transformational effect. This is illustrated by research showing that people who have near-death experiences following suicide attempts very rarely attempt suicide again. This is in stark contrast to the normal pattern—in fact, a previous suicide attempt is usually the strongest predictor of actual suicide. This is one of the strongest arguments against the idea that NDEs are a brain-generated hallucination. Dreams and hallucinations do not generally have transformational after-effects. They are usually quickly forgotten, with a clear sense that they were delusional experiences, less authentic and reliable than ordinary consciousness. (In contrast, with NDEs there is a clear sense that the experience is more real and authentic than normal consciousness.) And this applies to DMT experiences, too. There is no doubt that psychedelic experiences such as DMT can sometimes be transformative to some degree. For some, they provide a glimpse of a more expansive and intense reality which makes them realize that their normal view of the world is limited. They may lead to a new interest in spirituality. However, DMT experiences are certainly not transformational to anything like the same degree as NDEs. In a 2012 paper in the Journal of Near-Death Studies, Dr. Michael Potts examined the similarities between NDEs and DMT and also concluded that salient features of NDEs are absent (such as traveling through a tunnel into a transcendent realm or the subsequent reporting of events witnessed during the experience). But most notably, in Potts’ view, DMT lacked the powerful transformative after-effects of NDEs. He concluded that in NDEs permanent change is the rule rather than the exception, whereas it is the exception rather than the rule with DMT. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/out-the-darkness/201810/near-death-experiences-and-dmt Steve Taylor, Ph.D. is a senior lecturer in psychology at Leeds Beckett University, UK.

Of related interest, over at Mind Matters, they recently had a series of podcasts where they discussed the evidence for NDEs:

WALTER BRADLEY: DON’T GO TOWARDS THE LIGHT? https://mindmatters.ai/podcast/ep56/ WALTER BRADLEY: EXPERIENCES OF HEAVEN? https://mindmatters.ai/podcast/ep57/ WALTER BRADLEY: BIBLICAL ACCOUNTS OF NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES https://mindmatters.ai/podcast/ep59/

bornagain77

Science says that life begins @ conception. And all life conceived by humans will be a HUMAN life. You have to be a desperate douche to say otherwise. Enter "Ed George" ET

Acartia Eddie:

It seems to me that the most parsimonious explanation is that the “soul”, as most people think of it, doesn’t exist and that our consciousness (the closest we come to a “soul”) is the outcome of brain development and is gone when we die.

Then it shouldn't be any problem to demonstrate that the brain can come about via purely materialistic processes. Yet you cannot. YOU don't have anything beyond your denials and nay-saying. ET

We wouldn't have human nature without a soul. There cannot be a human without a soul.

A “soul”, which if imparted at conception means that each of my daughters only has half a “soul”.

Only in your very limited mind, anyway.

I show respect because I would like to have respect shown to me.

All evidence to the contrary, of course ET

TF

What should those “scientists” copy then? Looks

That would be much better than cloning ET’s looks. :) But seriously, if I were to clone myself, not beyond the realm of possibility, do you think the clone would have a consciousness, a personality, a self, a “soul”? After all, this clone is being created from the nucleus of one of my somatic cells (one of millions) and a denucleated oocyte. Ed George

@80 Ed George Ed, it was you who suggested that you "could" clone "yourself".

And what about the not impossible possibility that I decide to clone myself?

But: - If you do not know what this "yourself" is (and it is not DNA). - How are you going to clone it? What should those "scientists" copy then? Looks impossible to me. Truthfreedom

SA

The denial of the soul is a denial of human nature, and that’s the materialist explanation.

No, it is to deny a God. We would still have a human nature just as my cat has a cat nature and marble has a marble nature.

It’s because humans have an immortal soul that we want to show respect for human life, even for infants before they are born.

I don’t show respect to other humans because of an immortal “soul”. I show respect because I would like to have respect shown to me. That’s not going to happen if I am always acting like ET. :) Ed George

TF

Ed, what is “yourself”? Certainly not “your” DNA, since: homocigotic twins = same DNA but different “selves”.

I Agree. But what do you mean by ”selves”? Different consciousness and different personalities? Given that I have identical twin daughters I can attest to the different personalities. But I think it is more likely that these differences are the result of differences in brain development and personal experiences than some ill defined “soul”. A “soul”, which if imparted at conception means that each of my daughters only has half a “soul”. Ed George

EG

This would mean that God knows in advance that conception will result in identical twins. Obviously not impossible. But we also know that IVF results in a higher percentage of monozygotic twins. Did God know that this would happen.

Yes, God knows this and would design in advance the souls that will be actualized by matter (bodies). The creation of souls is done in the divine realm - the creation of immaterial essences that will ultimately live on after physical death of the body. So, God has a plan for them.

Or what about the not impossible possibility that I decide to clone myself? Does that mean that I currently have two “souls”. And what if I decide to make 1000 clones of myself (again, not impossible)? Does that mean that I currently have 1001 “souls”?

As we said before, with an unnatural act like cloning, God would have to create some sort of moment of ensoulment. You would not have two souls - the soul is your identity. But a close of you would have a separate identity.

It seems to me that the most parsimonious explanation is that the “soul”, as most people think of it, doesn’t exist and that our consciousness (the closest we come to a “soul”) is the outcome of brain development and is gone when we die.

The denial of the soul is a denial of human nature, and that's the materialist explanation. Since we're talking about the creation of an immaterial essence by God, a lot of the problem would be solved by theology, as it was in the past upon decisions about the humanity of people from cultures previously unknown. It's how decisions on care for animals are reached, and why we can treat animals differently from humans. But we also have evidence that we are able to grasp universals. These cannot be the product of the human mind because they would exist even if humans went out of existence. The forms of logic or geometric formulations - we can grasp and communicate these. This indicates that we share an immaterial essence. The rational power itself can hold, compare and calculate immaterial entities. This tells us that we do possess a soul. A materialist, emergent idea doesn't work for this idea. In a godless view, humanity does not have a sacred quality and we would have no reason to reverence it at all. It's because humans have an immortal soul that we want to show respect for human life, even for infants before they are born. Silver Asiatic

@ 77 Ed George

Or what about the not impossible possibility that I decide to clone myself?

Ed, what is "yourself"? Certainly not "your" DNA, since: homocigotic twins = same DNA but different "selves". Truthfreedom

SA

Two souls can share the same physical space.

With respect, this sounds more like special pleading than a reasonable explanation. Much like BA77’s use of quantum mechanics to explain everything. This would mean that God knows in advance that conception will result in identical twins. Obviously not impossible. But we also know that IVF results in a higher percentage of monozygotic twins. Did God know that this would happen. Or what about the not impossible possibility that I decide to clone myself? Does that mean that I currently have two “souls”. And what if I decide to make 1000 clones of myself (again, not impossible)? Does that mean that I currently have 1001 “souls”? It seems to me that the most parsimonious explanation is that the “soul”, as most people think of it, doesn’t exist and that our consciousness (the closest we come to a “soul”) is the outcome of brain development and is gone when we die. Ed George

PS: Again, predictably, you studiously avoid the force of what Haldane put on the table:

"It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms. In order to escape from this necessity of sawing away the branch on which I am sitting, so to speak, I am compelled to believe that mind is not wholly conditioned by matter.” ["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209. Cf. here on (and esp here) on the self-refutation by self-falsifying self referential incoherence and on linked amorality.]

Likewise, Reppert, building on C S Lewis:

. . . let us suppose that brain state A [--> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief [--> concious, perceptual state or disposition] that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.

kairosfocus

EG, I have pointed to some of those assumptions, e.g. by asking you to demonstrate a case. Follow up the issues, starting with why legal issues and moral ones arise that did not with say Dolly the sheep. Going beyond, this serves as a distractor from a more relevant case: we know that human life begins at conception, and there is utterly no GOOD reason to infer that the whole human being is not present from the outset; as long as that is reasonable, then we have full duties to the unborn child, in all justice; i.e. he or she manifestly has rights, starting with life. Further to this, even that is somewhat distractive as the focal issue is that we are living souls; such ensoulment is what allows us to be truly rational, responsible and free. Undermine that and self-referential absurdity applies; you have just undercut the credibility of reason by reduction to computation, thus, your own argument. Indeed, if evolutionary materialism were true, there is no rationality and no morally governed responsibility, as there is no significant freedom, we would reduce to being collections of atoms driven by blind chance and/or mechanical necessity. KF kairosfocus

Sev, you would be well advised to re-study the accurate history. Try here for a start. KF kairosfocus

Two souls can share the same physical space. Silver Asiatic

SA

How do we know that for a “fact”?

Identical twins. Ed George

EG

If the unique immortal “soul”, that you believe is the essence of what makes us human, exists, we know for a fact that it can’t be imparted at conception.

How do we know that for a "fact"? Silver Asiatic

KF

EG, you again build in many loaded assumptions. KF

These aren’t loaded assumptions (whatever that means), they are questions critical to the rights of the fetus. If the unique immortal “soul”, that you believe is the essence of what makes us human, exists, we know for a fact that it can’t be imparted at conception. That means that the fertilized egg does not have the one critical factor that makes it human. And if it doesn’t have this, it can’t have the objective right to life that you believe it does. The question then becomes, at what stage of pregnancy is the “soul” imparted on the fetus? Only by answering this can you objectively argue that any abortion conducted past that stage is murder. Ed George

as to Seversky's drive by post:

The fact that we are created beings, as the founding fathers of America themselves noted, is a blatantly obvious self-evident truth. Sev: It was apparently also blatantly obvious to the Founding Fathers that slaves, women and the poor had not been endowed by their Creator with these unalienable rights.

Hmm, an atheist appealing to objective morality, which can only be grounded in God, to try to deny the 'self evident truth' that we are created beings? Too funny, Too bad the irony is lost on Seversky

Moreover,, it is on pain of self-induced insanity that one denies this self-evident truth that we are created beings. As Jay Homnick noted, “Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident…you have essentially lost your mind.” Sev: I suppose we should not be surprised that the editor of The American Spectator should believe, like Paleyists, that highly complex organisms were created de novo out of nothing – something no evolutionist believes.

So what? Who cares what evolutionists believe? The question is what can evolutionists, via empirical science, prove?

Indeed, even leading Darwinists themselves have admitted that life ‘appears’ to be designed, Sev: The Sun appears to go around the Earth. That appearance does not make it true.

Actually, the 'truth' is far different than what you, and most everyone else, believes:

November 2019 - despite the fact that virtually everyone, including the vast majority of Christians, hold that the Copernican Principle is unquestionably true, the fact of the matter is that the Copernican Principle is now empirically shown, (via quantum mechanics and general relativity, etc..), to be a false assumption. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/so-then-maybe-we-are-privileged-observers/#comment-688855

as to

In fact, it has now been demonstrated that belief in design is the default, i.e. ‘knee jerk’, assumption of atheists themselves, Sev: Possibly because children learn from intelligent agents – their parents, who have survived long enough to raise them – about the behavior of other intelligent agents – the rest of their social group.

Well actually,

Out of the mouths of babes - Do children believe (in God) because they're told to by adults? The evidence suggests otherwise - Justin Barrett - 2008 Excerpt: • Children tend to see natural objects as designed or purposeful in ways that go beyond what their parents teach, as Deborah Kelemen has demonstrated. Rivers exist so that we can go fishing on them, and birds are here to look pretty. • Children doubt that impersonal processes can create order or purpose. Studies with children show that they expect that someone not something is behind natural order. No wonder that Margaret Evans found that children younger than 10 favoured creationist accounts of the origins of animals over evolutionary accounts even when their parents and teachers endorsed evolution. Authorities' testimony didn't carry enough weight to over-ride a natural tendency. • Children know humans are not behind the order so the idea of a creating god (or gods) makes sense to them. Children just need adults to specify which one. • Experimental evidence, including cross-cultural studies, suggests that three-year-olds attribute super, god-like qualities to lots of different beings. Super-power, super-knowledge and super-perception seem to be default assumptions. Children then have to learn that mother is fallible, and dad is not all powerful, and that people will die. So children may be particularly receptive to the idea of a super creator-god. It fits their predilections. • Recent research by Paul Bloom, Jesse Bering, and Emma Cohen suggests that children may also be predisposed to believe in a soul that persists beyond death. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2008/nov/25/religion-children-god-belief

as to

As the following video shows, atheists have to mentally work suppressing their “knee jerk” design inference! Sev: Yes, it takes more mental effort to think critically about what others tell you. It’s much easier just to take it at face value.

Trouble is that atheists are not 'thinking critically' about design, they are 'rationalizing away design' with superficial and false excuses. (Much like you are trying to do right now)

It is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature and biology, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, suppress their innate design intuition. Sev: No, we subject our “innate design intuition” to critical evaluation rather than just settling for “Goddidit”.

Fair enough, skepticism is part and parcel of empirical science. Trouble for dogmatic atheists, as Barry Arrington pointed out a few years ago, is that dogmatic atheists are never skeptical of Darwinian evolution itself. Even a modest amount of skepticism of Darwinian evolution by Darwinists would be enough to overturn their belief in Darwinian evolution. But alas, the theory is blindly believed to be true by Darwinists no matter what the evidence says to the contrary.

Yet, although Dawkins may believe that “the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design”, the fact of the matter is that no one has ever demonstrated that natural selection has the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming “appearance of design”. Sev: No one has run – or is likely to run in the foreseeable future – an experiment long enough to demonstrate whether or not natural selection alone can produce the highly complex organisms we see now. The nearest to such research is Richard Lenski’s Long Term Evolutionary Experiment in which the number of generations now is roughly equivalent to over 1,200,000 years of human evolution. Except that the evolution of life on Earth took billions of years and the E. coli bacterium is not exactly equivalent to a human being.

There are many lines of evidence that establish that Darwinian processes are grossly inadequate to explain the overwhelming 'appearance of design"

Darwin vs. Microbes (Where’s the substantiating evidence for Darwinian evolution?) - video https://youtu.be/ntxc4X9Zt-I

As to

In fact, it has now been empirically demonstrated that natural selection does NOT have the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming ‘appearance of design’. Sev: No, it hasn’t.

Yes! It Has!

Man procreates, and may someday even clone his own body by putting his own DNA in an egg. But Souls are created by God alone. That may be your belief but it is not science by a long chalk. You cannot demonstrate the existence of something called the “soul” empirically and if you look at just the Wikipedia entry for “soul” you will see that there is not even a coherent or consistent definition of such an entity.

Funny, You claim that "You cannot demonstrate the existence of something called the “soul” empirically" and yet that is precisely what has been done. Namely, it is now empirically demonstrated that man has a ubiquitous transcendent, i.e. beyond space and time, component to his being, i.e. a 'soul', that is not reducible to materialistic explanations and which is capable of living past the death of our material bodies., (i.e. the most basic definition off a soul that you can have!)

Darwinian Materialism vs. Quantum Biology – Part II - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSig2CsjKbg

As to

Nor does your equivalent of the “luminiferous aether” – quantum mechanics – help. But if you’re actually interested in what QM says, here is a basic primer.

Actually, it might greatly behoove you to learn a little bit about quantum mechanics, and how it correlates with fundamental, defining, attributes of the immaterial mind, before you try to delude yourself into falsely believing that you have the slightest clue what quantum mechanics actually entails:

How Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness Correlate - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f0hL3Nrdas

bornagain77

Acartia Eddie:

And if this were done, would the clone have a “soul”?

If it doesn't it doesn't have a chance @ being alive. ET

Earth to seversky- You cannot demonstrate anything via materialistic processes. Natural selection has proven to be impotent with respect to creating the diversity of life. It doesn't have a chance of producing eukaryotes from given starting populations of prokaryotes. You have to be a total desperate denialist to think that nature can produce codes and the components and systems to carry them out. YOU don't even know how to test such a concept. That is how intellectually bankrupt your position is. ET

Bornagain77 @ 65

The fact that we are created beings, as the founding fathers of America themselves noted, is a blatantly obvious self-evident truth.

It was apparently also blatantly obvious to the Founding Fathers that slaves, women and the poor had not been endowed by their Creator with these unalienable rights.

Moreover,, it is on pain of self-induced insanity that one denies this self-evident truth that we are created beings. As Jay Homnick noted, “Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident…you have essentially lost your mind.”

I suppose we should not be surprised that the editor of The American Spectator should believe, like Paleyists, that highly complex organisms were created de novo out of nothing - something no evolutionist believes.

Indeed, even leading Darwinists themselves have admitted that life ‘appears’ to be designed,

The Sun appears to go around the Earth. That appearance does not make it true.

In fact, it has now been demonstrated that belief in design is the default, i.e. ‘knee jerk’, assumption of atheists themselves,

Possibly because children learn from intelligent agents - their parents, who have survived long enough to raise them - about the behavior of other intelligent agents - the rest of their social group.

As the following video shows, atheists have to mentally work suppressing their “knee jerk” design inference!

Yes, it takes more mental effort to think critically about what others tell you. It's much easier just to take it at face value.

It is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature and biology, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, suppress their innate design intuition.

No, we subject our "innate design intuition" to critical evaluation rather than just settling for "Goddidit".

Yet, although Dawkins may believe that “the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design”, the fact of the matter is that no one has ever demonstrated that natural selection has the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming “appearance of design”.

No one has run - or is likely to run in the foreseeable future - an experiment long enough to demonstrate whether or not natural selection alone can produce the highly complex organisms we see now. The nearest to such research is Richard Lenski's Long Term Evolutionary Experiment in which the number of generations now is roughly equivalent to over 1,200,000 years of human evolution. Except that the evolution of life on Earth took billions of years and the E. coli bacterium is not exactly equivalent to a human being.

In fact, it has now been empirically demonstrated that natural selection does NOT have the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming ‘appearance of design’.

No, it hasn't.

Man procreates, and may someday even clone his own body by putting his own DNA in an egg. But Souls are created by God alone.

That may be your belief but it is not science by a long chalk. You cannot demonstrate the existence of something called the "soul" empirically and if you look at just the Wikipedia entry for "soul" you will see that there is not even a coherent or consistent definition of such an entity. Nor does your equivalent of the "luminiferous aether" - quantum mechanics - help. But if you're actually interested in what QM says, here is a basic primer. Seversky

At 50 Ed George stated,

"Ignoring the fact that nobody has demonstrated that we are created beings,,,,"

The fact that we are created beings, as the founding fathers of America themselves noted, is a blatantly obvious self-evident truth.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” - Thomas Jefferson

Moreover,, it is on pain of self-induced insanity that one denies this self-evident truth that we are created beings. As Jay Homnick noted, "Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident...you have essentially lost your mind."

"It is not enough to say that design is a more likely scenario to explain a world full of well-designed things. Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident...you have essentially lost your mind." - Jay Homnick - senior editor of The American Spectator - 2005

Indeed, even leading Darwinists themselves have admitted that life 'appears' to be designed,

"Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose" - Richard Dawkins - "The Blind Watchmaker" - 1986 - page 1 "Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved." - Francis Crick - What Mad Pursuit - pg. 138 - 1990 http://darwinianfundamentalism.blogspot.com/2013/11/biologists-must-constantly-keep-in-mind.html

And as Louise Lerner from the University of Chicago, who has a degree in Anthropology/Biology, recently stated in this article from physorg,,,

Surprise discovery shakes up our understanding of gene expression - Louise Lerner - JANUARY 22, 2020 Excerpt: The human body is among the most complex pieces of machinery to exist. Every time you so much as scratch your nose, you're using more intricate engineering than any rocket ship or supercomputer ever designed. https://phys.org/news/2020-01-discovery-gene.html

In fact, it has now been demonstrated that belief in design is the default, i.e. 'knee jerk', assumption of atheists themselves,

Richard Dawkins take heed: Even atheists instinctively believe in a creator says study - Mary Papenfuss - June 12, 2015 Excerpt: Three studies at Boston University found that even among atheists, the "knee jerk" reaction to natural phenomenon is the belief that they're purposefully designed by some intelligence, according to a report on the research in Cognition entitled the "Divided Mind of a disbeliever." The findings "suggest that there is a deeply rooted natural tendency to view nature as designed," writes a research team led by Elisa Järnefelt of Newman University. They also provide evidence that, in the researchers' words, "religious non-belief is cognitively effortful." Researchers attempted to plug into the automatic or "default" human brain by showing subjects images of natural landscapes and things made by human beings, then requiring lightning-fast responses to the question on whether "any being purposefully made the thing in the picture," notes Pacific-Standard. "Religious participants' baseline tendency to endorse nature as purposefully created was higher" than that of atheists, the study found. But non-religious participants "increasingly defaulted to understanding natural phenomena as purposefully made" when "they did not have time to censor their thinking," wrote the researchers. The results suggest that "the tendency to construe both living and non-living nature as intentionally made derives from automatic cognitive processes, not just practised explicit beliefs," the report concluded. The results were similar even among subjects from Finland, where atheism is not a controversial issue as it can be in the US. "Design-based intuitions run deep," the researchers conclude, "persisting even in those with no explicit religious commitment and, indeed, even among those with an active aversion to them." http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/richard-dawkins-take-heed-even-atheists-instinctively-believe-creator-says-study-1505712

As the following video shows, atheists have to mentally work suppressing their “knee jerk” design inference!

Is Atheism a Delusion? - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ii-bsrHB0o

It is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature and biology, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, suppress their innate design intuition. The means by which Darwinian atheists suppress their innate design inference is by telling themselves 'just so stories' with the illusory and impotent 'Designer substitute' of natural selection. As Richard Dawkins himself states, "the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design,,,"

"Yet the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design as if by a master watchmaker, impress us with the illusion of design and planning." Richard Dawkins - "The Blind Watchmaker" - 1986 - page 21

Yet, although Dawkins may believe that "the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design", the fact of the matter is that no one has ever demonstrated that natural selection has the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming "appearance of design".

“the uncritical acceptance of natural selection as an explanatory force for all aspects of biodiversity (without any direct evidence) is not much different than invoking an intelligent designer” Michael Lynch – The Origins of Genome Architecture, p 368 “The Third Way” – James Shapiro, Denis Noble, and etc.. etc..,,, excerpt: “some Neo-Darwinists have elevated Natural Selection into a unique creative force that solves all the difficult evolutionary problems without a real empirical basis.” http://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/

In fact, it has now been empirically demonstrated that natural selection does NOT have the capacity within itself to produce the overwhelming 'appearance of design'. Specifically, the argument that Dr. Behe made in his book "The Edge of Evolution" has now been empirically verified, As Dr. Behe states in the following video, "This is not an argument anymore that Darwinism cannot make complex functional systems; it is an observation that it does not."

Michael Behe - Observed (1 in 10^20) Edge of Evolution - video - Lecture delivered in April 2015 at Colorado School of Mines 25:56 minute quote - "This is not an argument anymore that Darwinism cannot make complex functional systems; it is an observation that it does not." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9svV8wNUqvA

Thus since Darwinian processes are now demonstrated to be grossly inadequate as to explaining the overwhelming 'appearance of deign', then, as Richard Sternberg explains, "if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.”

“Darwinism provided an explanation for the appearance of design, and argued that there is no Designer — or, if you will, the designer is natural selection. If that’s out of the way — if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.” Richard Sternberg – Living Waters documentary Whale Evolution vs. Population Genetics – Richard Sternberg and Paul Nelson – (excerpt from Living Waters video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0csd3M4bc0Q

At 50 Ed George goes on to state,

"this (i.e. the fact that an idea must precede a created entity) means that the “soul” must exist before conception. Fair enough. Does this mean that if I were to clone myself, something that is well within modern capabilities, that my clone would lack a “soul”?"

I have no clue what Ed George is trying to get at here. Does Ed George somehow believe that identical twins are the same soul? If so, that is simply a preposterous belief on his part. Man procreates, and may someday even clone his own body by putting his own DNA in an egg. But Souls are created by God alone. As to how souls are actualized into the human body during embryological development by God, I touched upon that set of facts in posts 5 and 6. Specifically, via advances in quantum biology and quantum information theory, it is now found that an 'observer', who is outside space and time itself, (i.e. GOD), is necessary in order to give us an adequate causal account for exactly why the human body is being raised, during embryological development, to a state that is even further out of thermodynamic equilibrium than the fertilized egg itself is.,,, i.e. On the order of around 30 trillion times the information content of a single fertile egg, i.e. per post 5, "about 300 trillion times the information content contained within the books of all the largest libraries in the world." As should be needless to say, that is a tremendous amount of 'immaterial' information that is coming into the developing embryo, (from outside space-time itself), in order to raise the developing embryo to a state that is tremendously out of thermodynamic equilibrium. Darwinists simply have no hope, especially within their reductive materialistic framework, of ever explaining where this tremendous amount of immaterial information is coming from:

John 1:1-4 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

Thus in conclusion, contrary to what Ed George may want to believe beforehand, i.e. "nobody has demonstrated that we are created beings,,,,", the fact of the matter is that it IS now demonstrated that we are indeed created beings. It would have been more proper for Ed George to say that their is no scientific evidence that he himself, as a die-hard atheist, will personally ever accept as to demonstrating that we are created beings. But alas, empirical science itself could care less what Ed George wants to believe beforehand. I myself could care less what Ed George wants to believe beforehand, especially if it disagrees with the empirical evidence. bornagain77

EG, you again build in many loaded assumptions. KF kairosfocus

A baby, born or not yet born, is by definition weak, voiceless, vulnerable. So, it is "naturally" prey. Thus, one of the key aspects of parenthood, family and family-friendly community is to protect the most vulnerable of all, who literally embody our future, our posterity. So, there is a long term "fitness" test that weighs societies and civilisations in the balances. KF kairosfocus

KF

EG, what, precisely, do you mean by cloning yourself, and how can such be done.

In reproductive cloning, researchers remove a mature somatic cell, such as a skin cell, from an animal that they wish to copy. They then transfer the DNA of the donor animal's somatic cell into an egg cell, or oocyte, that has had its own DNA-containing nucleus removed.

This has been done with many mammals and there are no restrictions, other than ethically, why it wouldn’t work with humans. And if this were done, would the clone have a “soul”? Would it share the “soul” of the donor DNA? Or of the donor of the oocyte? This would imply that “souls” are not unique and are divisible. Ed George

@Ed George

I don’t think there is a single answer to this. If a woman has an abortion just because they do not want to have children then they are not increasing their “fitness”. However, if they have an abortion because they are too young and not financially prepared for children, then an abortion could increase their “fitness” if it opens the door to them having a larger number of children when they are ready.

Was not the "goal" of survival to live enough to reproduce?

Alcock, an evolutionary biologist, therefore concluded that "we exist solely to propagate the genes within us."

Truthfreedom

@Silver Asiatic

What specific fitness advantage did that particular feature have? Well, again – whatever it was, it certainly worked well because the organisms are alive and well. Running fast, moving slow, protecting children, killing children, easy reproductive path, difficult reproductive path, limited diet, expansive diet, robust exterior, delicate exterior, predator to many species, predator to none …

Their just-so stories. Darwinism and imagination go hand in hand, and what a lethal combination. Truthfreedom

Acartia Eddie:

This is common in some fish as a means of making smaller size foods available to the adults, thus allowing more reproduction.

More reproduction just leads to more food. Reproduce so you can eat. Doesn't sound like a good evolutionary strategy... ET

Acartia Eddie:

Ignoring the fact that nobody has demonstrated that we are created beings, …

It's what the evidence says-> that we are Created/ Intelligently Designed beings.

Does this mean that if I were to clone myself, something that is well within modern capabilities, that my clone would lack a “soul”?

That would be up to the giver of souls. ET

EG, what, precisely, do you mean by cloning yourself, and how can such be done. What is the actual empirical evidence on cloning of human beings -- speculation is not enough, nor is sci fi. KF kairosfocus

EG, 50: "nobody has demonstrated that we are created beings" It is most satisfactorily shown that life based on cells uses language in its central operations. Language is a signature of design, thus of small-c creation. Next, the increments in FSCO/I (a lot of it directly coded information) to get to humans is beyond any reasonable reach of blind chance and/or mechanical necessity. The result is the same, small-c creation. Multiply, by the fine tuning of the observed cosmos [the only actually observed cosmos] that supports C-chem, aqueous medium, cell based life on terrestrial planets in circumstellar and galactic habitable zones. That indicates design of the universe, so big-C creation. Assumptions, assertions, arguments and claims to the contrary have now consistently failed. It is time to set such aside. KF PS: The idea of a soul and its actualisation are categorically distinct matters. kairosfocus

JAD

The theory behind eugenics was that it was supposed to correct what would have happened if natural selection had been allowed to continue unimpeded. That is, natural selection would have eliminated weaker, undesirable members of society– “morons, mental defectives [and] epileptics,” in Sanger’s words.

I happened to come across this earlier today:

Herbert Spencer (1820-1903). Spencer was an English social philosopher and prime advocate of Darwin`s theories, perhaps doing more than any other figure of his era to gain acceptance for the theory of evolution. Spencer also applied Darwinian theory to human development, arguing that wealth and power were signs of fitness and that mankind benefited from intense competition and removal of the weak and unfit.

There again, it mentions "the removal of the weak and unfit". That was classic Darwinism. The "unfit" obviously didn't have the fitness advantage so they wouldn't be naturally selected. Getting rid of the unfit was an evolutionary activity. Margaret Sanger said and worked for the same thing. There's a group that is fighting what they call "black genocide" which is where abortion advocates target poor, black neighborhoods. People are "concerned" about high birth rates in poor neighborhoods. Abortion is one means of "eliminating the unfit".

Of course, how anyone could know what would have happened– well, that’s the big problem with eugenics as it is for everyone else. None of us have a crystal ball which allows us to peer into the future.

True. Evolution is supposed to be "more certain than gravity". With gravity, when I see a round object rolling down a hillside, I can explain fairly accurately where it will end up. That's gravity. Evolutionists don't really do predictions like that. They can't do them. It's the moral quality of human beings that fights against genocidal atheism of the sort that Sanger, Huxley and the signatories of the Eugenics Manifesto promoted. https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/esp_sociopol_depopu16e.htm Silver Asiatic

TF

I have asked dozens of them how the two above statements relate to “fitness” and, until today, I have not received a single logical answer.

I've been arguing with them for over 15 years. The Theory works like this: 1. We observe organisms today. They are alive. So, they survived. 2. Whatever survived must have had a fitness advantage, otherwise they would not have been selected. So, what we observed has a fitness advantage. 3. Whatever features we observe, whatever behaviors, everything about the organism contributes to the fitness advantage. What specific fitness advantage did that particular feature have? Well, again - whatever it was, it certainly worked well because the organisms are alive and well. Running fast, moving slow, protecting children, killing children, easy reproductive path, difficult reproductive path, limited diet, expansive diet, robust exterior, delicate exterior, predator to many species, predator to none … Abortion, homosexuality, birth control -- are all playing a part in reducing the human population in some areas. Demographers estimate that global population growth will end this century. https://www.forbes.com/sites/joelkotkin/2017/02/01/death-spiral-demographics-the-countries-shrinking-the-fastest/#4698b476b83c Evolution tells us nothing. Silver Asiatic

Abortion is just another form of eugenics. Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, was an early twentieth century eugenicist. Despite being a racist (she called for the targeted sterilization of African Americans*) she is still celebrated by the secular progressive movement in the U.S. The theory behind eugenics was that it was supposed to correct what would have happened if natural selection had been allowed to continue unimpeded. That is, natural selection would have eliminated weaker, undesirable members of society-- “morons, mental defectives [and] epileptics,” in Sanger’s words. Of course, how anyone could know what would have happened-- well, that’s the big problem with eugenics as it is for everyone else. None of us have a crystal ball which allows us to peer into the future. [*In a letter (12/10/39) to Clarence Gamble, she wrote, “We don’t want the word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population.”] john_a_designer

TF

I just want to understand how our Evo- friends explain this: If I kill my offspring: – Does it increse “fitness”? – Or does it decrease “fitness”?

I don't think there is a single answer to this. If a woman has an abortion just because they do not want to have children then they are not increasing their "fitness". However, if they have an abortion because they are too young and not financially prepared for children, then an abortion could increase their "fitness" if it opens the door to them having a larger number of children when they are ready. Ed George

KF

TF, some predators will kill their own species or their own offspring. KF

This is common in some fish as a means of making smaller size foods available to the adults, thus allowing more reproduction. Fitness can take many different forms. Ed George

BA77

And this follows logically from first principles in that, as Karsten Pultz recently pointed out, the Idea for a created entity must necessarily precede the created entity.

Ignoring the fact that nobody has demonstrated that we are created beings, this means that the "soul" must exist before conception. Fair enough. Does this mean that if I were to clone myself, something that is well within modern capabilities, that my clone would lack a "soul"? Ed George

@47 Silver Asiatic

Maybe there is some mysterious fitness advantage by killing your own children.

Misterious indeed, because a woman killing her own children is not passing her genes on. And why should people feel outrage and battle abortion? Evolutionists, please? I would really love to know. I have asked dozens of them how the two above statements relate to "fitness" and, until today, I have not received a single logical answer. I am dying to know. Or maybe your ToE is crap? Truthfreedom

TF, some predators will kill their own species or their own offspring. KF kairosfocus

TF The leftist, Communist (as in China), abortionist or otherwise anti-God person wants you to kill your baby or to use birth control and not have any babies. That way, they can have a fitness advantage over you. So, they try to frighten you or ridicule you, until you believe their lies and do exactly what they want. That's social-manipulation for the fitness advantage of those in control, and those we allow to influence us and tell us what we should think. Strangely, those same powers who are convincing you to kill your children, actually don't take advantage of their fitness benefits because they do the very same stupid things and kill their own kids with abortion and birth control. What advantage is that, when they don't have any competition? All we can say is that the Blind Watchmaker told them what to do and they listened and followed. Maybe there is some mysterious fitness advantage by killing your own children. You'll eventually outpopulate your competition because??? Maybe they kill more than you do? So, instead of an arms race to get stronger against each other, it's a race to see who will die off slowest. We might imagine that it would just be easier to have a fitness advantage by not killing one's own kids and simply having them. But that sounds too much like something God would want, so the Blind Watchmaker is against it. The key idea is that as long as they get rid of God, evolution will be a success. They're hoping that everyone will just kill themselves off and leave a lot of nice places for their own families, but it's not working that way. Silver Asiatic

KF

Predatory behaviour. KF

I do not understand. How does it relate to "fitness"? (I am on your side!). I just want to understand how our Evo- friends explain this: If I kill my offspring: - Does it increse "fitness"? - Or does it decrease "fitness"? Truthfreedom

TF, predatory behaviour. KF kairosfocus

, used to dehumanise the unborn child, and to undermine morality. They used to explicitly appeal to the recapitulationist icon to make it seem that the child in the womb is in effect not yet human. Now, it will be a lot less explicit. KF

Hi Kairosfocus. What I meant to ask was: - How does abortion relate to "fitness"? Does abortion increase or decresae "fitness"? Truthfreedom

TF, used to dehumanise the unborn child, and to undermine morality. They used to explicitly appeal to the recapitulationist icon to make it seem that the child in the womb is in effect not yet human. Now, it will be a lot less explicit. KF kairosfocus

Ed George states,

"nobody has answered the question about "when this “soul” is imparted to the human being(?)."

Actually,

Ephesians 1: 1-4 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. Jeremiah 1:5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

And this follows logically from first principles in that, as Karsten Pultz recently pointed out, the Idea for a created entity must necessarily precede the created entity.

Idea for a created entity must necessarily precede the created entity - examples https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/image-1-1024x645.png

But Ed George may ask, "But hey, I don't believe in God so why should I afford a human embryo any more respect than "any other eukaryotic cell?" Well, the insurmountable problem for Ed George is that, in his rejection of God, besides forsaking objective morality altogether, he has also forsaken any claim that life has any objective meaning, value, or purpose whatsoever. In atheism, any value or meaning that one may impart to life must necessarily be of one's own making and therefore illusory:

Study: Atheists Find Meaning In Life By Inventing Fairy Tales - Richard Weikart MARCH 29, 2018 Excerpt: However, there is a problem with this finding. The survey admitted the meaning that atheists and non-religious people found in their lives is entirely self-invented. According to the survey, they embraced the position: “Life is only meaningful if you provide the meaning yourself.” Thus, when religious people say non-religious people have no basis for finding meaning in life, and when non-religious people object, saying they do indeed find meaning in life, they are not talking about the same thing. If one can find meaning in life by creating one’s own meaning, then one is only “finding” the product of one’s own imagination. One has complete freedom to invent whatever meaning one wants. This makes “meaning” on par with myths and fairy tales. It may make the non-religious person feel good, but it has no objective existence. http://thefederalist.com/2018/03/29/study-atheists-find-meaning-life-inventing-fairy-tales/

There simply is no way to derive any true value or meaning for life without God. Just how does one go about deriving any true meaning and value for a person from a Atheistic worldview that maintains any meaning for life is self invented and therefore illusory? In fact, under Atheistic materialism, the 'true' resale value of all your material constituents is about one dollar?

How much is my body worth? Excerpt: The U.S. Bureau of Chemistry and Soils invested many a hard-earned tax dollar in calculating the chemical and mineral composition of the human body,,,,Together, all of the above (chemicals and minerals) amounts to less than one dollar! http://www.coolquiz.com/trivia/explain/docs/worth.asp

I would like to think, despite the atheistic atrocities of abortion, euthanasia, Nazism and Communism, that most people intuitively know that they are worth far more value than a dollar?!? Atheists, in their rejection of God, simply have no way to derive any true meaning or value for human life. Whereas in Theism, particularly in Christianity, there is no trouble whatsoever figuring out how much humans are really worth since infinite Almighty God himself, through Jesus Christ, redeemed our souls: Thus our souls, i.e. our very lives, are of infinite worth!

Mark 8:36-37 What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?…

Moreover, not that empirical evidence ever really matters to Ed George, but there is also the little fact that a human embryo, in terms of size, is also now found to exist at 10^-4 meters, which 'just so happens' to be the ‘geometric mean’ of all possible sizes of our physical reality.

The Scale of The Universe - Part 2 - interactive graph (recently updated in 2012 with cool features) http://htwins.net/scale2/scale2.swf?bordercolor=white

Going even further, Dr. William Demski, in the following graph, gives a more precise figure of 8.8 x 10^26 M for the observable universe’s diameter, and 1.6 x 10^-35 for the Planck length which is the smallest length possible.

Magnifying the Universe https://academicinfluence.com/ie/mtu/

The preceding interactive graphs point out that the smallest scale visible to the human eye (as well as a human egg) is at 10^-4 meters, which 'just so happens' to be the ‘geometric mean’ of all possible sizes of our physical reality. As far as the exponential graph itself is concerned’ 10^-4 is, exponentially, right in the middle of 10^-35 meters, which is the smallest possible unit of length, which is Planck length, and 10^27 meters, which is the largest possible unit of 'observable' length since space-time was created in the Big Bang, which is the diameter of the universe. Thus not only does Ed George, since he has rejected God, not have any way of deriving any true value or meaning for life in the first place, Ed George is also at a complete loss as to explain exactly why a human egg would be found to reside at the geometric mean of all possible sizes in the universe. In defending human embryos, it is also interesting to point out that "Life Begins With a Dramatic Burst of Light"

Life Begins With a Dramatic Burst of Light – Cornelius Hunter – April 30, 2016 Excerpt: As one newspaper put it, “Bright flash of light marks incredible moment life begins when sperm meets egg.” And: “Human life begins in bright flash of light as a sperm meets an egg, scientists have shown for the first time, after capturing the astonishing “fireworks” on film.” One of the researchers described the burst of light as “breathtaking.” http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2016/04/life-begins-with-dramatic-burst-of-light.html

Thus in conclusion, since Ed George's atheistic worldview winds up in catastrophic epistemological failure in regards to deriving any true meaning and value for human life, (value and meaning for life are in fact 'illusory' in atheism), then it should be rejected outright prior to us even trying to ascertain true value and meaning for life. Moreover, it not only that the Theistic worldview is the only philosophically coherent worldview there is in regards to deriving any true meaning and value for human life, but empirical science itself, via the human embryo being at the geometric mean of the universe, backs up the Christian's claim that the human embryo is of far more importance in the grand scheme of things than the Atheist, who advocates for abortion, is inclined to believe beforehand. If only Ed George had an ounce of integrity in his investigation of the evidence, then he would, at least, honestly admit this. But alas, I've just about given up all hope that Ed George will ever be honest. He seems determined to fight against God no matter what the evidence says to the contrary. Sad! It seems we care more for Ed's soul than he himself does for his own soul. But anyways, for the rest of us, there is this promise from God...

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

bornagain77

In the grand scheme of Evolution: - Where does abortion fit in? Truthfreedom

ET, 38: Successful birth is down to at least 4 - 5 months now, and there was recent discussion of the child in the womb manifesting pain responses at maybe 12 weeks. But in the end, such is a side issue; there is one clear point of beginning for a human life, conception (and not as redefined, 7 - 9 days later, implantation). There is no good reason to look at superficial characteristics (it looks like a little ball of cells etc) or worse recapitulationism (it's ascending the evolutionary ladder to become human, see the gills of a fish etc) and try to dehumanise the early life of the child in the womb. Where, we know separately, that computation on a substrate is a dynamic-stochastic process, not one driven by rational, conscience-informed insight. We infer from the underlying nature of being, as we understand it, that if Men are mortal and Socrates is a case of being a man, then Socrates has the said core characteristic, mortality. It is not that signals holding the analogue of or encoded for the two premises somehow cause a circuit -- per dynamic-stochastic chains of cause-effect bonds -- to produce the output holding the analogue of or encoded for the conclusion. No, on deep logic of being we understand that particular members of a class exhibit its core characteristics connected to its identity as a class. The archetypes are present in the case; archetypes, though abstract, are real. For further example, Socrates also exhibits being a unit, he is an individual. We cannot escape this, even, oh our circuits deliver reliable outcomes [on logical reasoning, that's a laugh, errors and fallacies are exceedingly common, reflecting subtly warped thinking or even failure to think] so hey presto we should trust the algorithms, functional organisation, information bases and management of noise etc is rooted in logical inferences and its roots in the nature of being and distinct identity. Logic or responsible rationality governed by inescapable duties to truth, right reason, prudence, sound conscience, fairness, justice etc are prior to science, Mathematics, empirical investigations, experience, observation and reflection, etc. In short, we are seeing what it means for us to be living, rational, knowing souls in action. There simply is a plus factor at work that transcends GIGO-limited computational substrates, even wetware substrates. KF kairosfocus

Acartia Eddie:

We are talking about whether a computational substrate, such as the brain, can produce consciousness.

There isn't any evidence for that. There isn't any evidence that materialistic processes can produce a brain. You have nothing but denial and nay-saying.

You can claim that the “soul” is independent of this, but you have yet to provide any compelling evidence for it.

And all you have is your continued denial and nay-saying. You don't even appear to understand what evidence is. ET

Acartia Eddie:

I would argue that the defining characteristic of humanity is our consciousness.

And yet other organisms are also conscious.

Calling it an immortal soul is just wishful thinking.

And you know all about that as all you have is wishful thinking.

But this still does not answer the question about when this “soul” is imparted in the human. Is it at conception, sometime thereafter, or not until we are born?

Before birth.

That is critical to concluding that the fertilized cell is owed our respect and protection.

Only in your simple mind.

If it does not have a “soul” then it is no different than any other eukaryotic cell.

Only in your simple mind. ET

Ed George

I would argue that the defining characteristic of humanity is our consciousness.

That's one aspect of the soul, certainly. From self-aware conscisousness we are able to obtain knowledge. We recognize the difference between the object known and the knower. The knower is our self. But that's the rational process. So, consciousness is really together with the rational power. From consciousness, we recognize the First Principles of Reason - first the Law of Identity. We recognize, we as a self-person, exist, and that is different from the rest of existence. Thus, we have logic and reason.

And all we can say about it is that we don’t know how it develops but we do know that there is no evidence that it exists before we are born (or, it can be argued, before a certain stage of development) or after we die. Calling it an immortal soul is just wishful thinking.

From a scientific-materialist viewpoint, we cannot have any evidence that consciousness exists, since we must use consciousness to evaluate anything. We would need some means, independent of a conscious mind, to determine if a conscious mind exists. Otherwise, it's a circular argument. "There is material evidence that consciousness exists because I can observe it with my conscious mind". That's clearly illogical. We have to accept that consciousness exists since we possess it, but it cannot be demonstrated. To then insist that we need more empirical evidence of consciousness in other beings than we have for our own would be equally false.

But this still does not answer the question about when this “soul” is imparted in the human. Is it at conception, sometime thereafter, or not until we are born?

It is imparted at conception with the emergence of a human person at that point..

Another related question is, if I cloned myself (not beyond current scientific possibility), is my close fully human? Does it have a soul? If it has a soul, where did it come from?

Assuming your clone has rational powers, a sense of identity, a moral conscience and the capability for abstract, creative thought -- then yes, this is a rational soul. There would be some kind of moment of ensoulment for that particular event. This kind of thing was a big challenge through history as some more advanced cultures encountered less advanced. One group was considered to be non-human, and so lost rights. Bartolomeo de Las Casas brought this issue to light as European explorers encountered native American tribes. The problem was solved via theological reasoning. A human has sacred value because he or she is created by God, who is all good and who has great love for humans. So, we are required to respect and care for other humans. Other philosophies and religions could see it another way. The Aztecs, for example, believed in human sacrifice. A human being had value, but not so much that enemies couldn't be sacrificed to their gods. They also believed in cannibalism to an extent. In a world without God as the creator, for example, if people believed that clones were the products of humanity. I don't know what prevents the belief that a clone could be a product, owned by the clonee as a pet or animal. Silver Asiatic

KF

EG, have you ever got hands dirty working with the hardware level of a digital or analogue computer?

Yes I have. But that is irrelevant. We are talking about whether a computational substrate, such as the brain, can produce consciousness. All we can say at this point is that the brain appears to be absolutely necessary. Damage the brain, chemically alter it or stimulate it with electricity, and we can alter, suspend or destroy consciousness. You can claim that the “soul” is independent of this, but you have yet to provide any compelling evidence for it. The best you have is NDE, which can be reproduced chemically. Ed George

EG, you have simply repeatedly side stepped the answer on ensoulment that is on the table. Manifestly, as rational, responsible, significantly free creatures, we transcend what blind chance and mechanical necessity can account for; on pain of self-referential absurdity as say Haldane pointed out. We are living, rational, responsible, significantly free souls. The manifest point of origin of a human being is conception, so we have every epistemic right to hold that this includes all of our being. It is those who wish to object who face the proper burden of warranting their case; implicit, long past sell-by date inferences on ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny or the like are nowhere near good enough. Especially, when what is on the table is the at will slaughter of our living posterity in the womb at a rate of about a million more per week. With that on the table, simply the reasonable possibility that we deal with more than an empty blob of tissue parasiting on a host [this language echoes claims that have been made by abortion advocates] is enough to shift the burden of warrant. KF kairosfocus

EG, have you ever got hands dirty working with the hardware level of a digital or analogue computer? The key element for the latter is an integrator; let's take the mechanical version, a ball in rolling contact with a disk so that its position relative centre accumulates angular position at a variable rate. The heart of a digital computer is an arithmetic and logic unit, pivoting on adder circuits. The heart of that, is an X-OR gate linked to an OR gate, both being amplifiers with suitable connexions to create boolean algebra functions. Neural networks are essentially weighted sum amplifiers triggering outputs at thresholds. All of these are dynamic-stochastic essentially blind processes which are not free to reason or weigh moral balances. They simply carry out signal processing based on organisation and programming. (And don't get me started on your need to account for the FSCO/I to allegedly build extremely complex cases and program them through glorified lucky noise selected for trial-error success in a context where FSCO/I islands of function will be deeply isolated in seas of non function in configuration spaces.) The common principle is GIGO, these are functioning blindly and will be no more reliable than their organisation and programming; and, they are inherently not free or responsible. In sum, we are here dealing with something categorically different from what is needed to address responsible, rational freedom. That you seem willing to infer that blind chance and/or mechanical necessity account adequately for responsible, rational freedom and self-moved agency simply tells us the absurdities of evolutionary materialistic scientism and its ideological fellow travellers. Perhaps, it will help you, to note that J B S Haldane, cited above, was a co-founder of the neo-darwinian synthesis. KF PS: Let me cite Reppert, for a further key summary:

. . . let us suppose that brain state A [--> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief [--> concious, perceptual state or disposition] that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.

kairosfocus

KF

EG, our conscious, responsible, conscience guided rational freedom is precisely what a computational substrate can never attain to and marks how we are self moved, initiating creatures who are genuine first causes.

This (the bolded) has not been proven. All we can claim is that a man-made computational substrate has not attained this.

So, absent demonstrable proof to the contrary, our responsibility is to respect the ensouled nature of the human being, from his or her earliest moments.

But nobody has answered the question about when this "soul" is imparted to the human being. That is critical to concluding that the fertilized cell is owed our respect and protection. If it does not have a "soul" then it is no different than any other eukaryotic cell. Ed George

EG, our conscious, responsible, conscience guided rational freedom is precisely what a computational substrate can never attain to and marks how we are self moved, initiating creatures who are genuine first causes. Without such, we lack the freedom to be rational, which leads to the self-referential incoherence J B S Haldane pointed out, as was cited twice above. Further to this, you have simply ignored the substantial matters on the table and seem intent on repeating assertions, questions or even demands as though such were decisive. The opposite is the case, the rational responsible freedom implicit in your argument is precisely the direct reason why we know there is in the core of our being what transcends the sort of dynamic-stochastic non-rational entity that a computational substrate manifests. Likewise, there is precisely one obvious, empirically supported point of becoming human: conception, indeed half the time the child in the womb is of opposite sex to his mother. So, absent demonstrable proof to the contrary, our responsibility is to respect the ensouled nature of the human being, from his or her earliest moments. Where, lastly, it is plain that one cannot isolate consciousness [and, presumably, linked behaviour] as though that decided the matter, indeed, to the onlooker, consciousness is invisible and unobservable, it is inferred or accepted on testimony. That, is the zombie problem. So, what empirical, observable proof have you to offer that there is a conscious, responsible, rational, rights bearing creature standing behind the string of comments from "you" above? KF kairosfocus

SA

The defining characteristic of humanity is the rational soul.

I would argue that the defining characteristic of humanity is our consciousness. And all we can say about it is that we don't know how it develops but we do know that there is no evidence that it exists before we are born (or, it can be argued, before a certain stage of development) or after we die. Calling it an immortal soul is just wishful thinking.

The human soul is not potentially human, but is actually human. It was made actual from a Being that preceeded it, which has the power to actualize the potential of a soul.

But this still does not answer the question about when this "soul" is imparted in the human. Is it at conception, sometime thereafter, or not until we are born? Another related question is, if I cloned myself (not beyond current scientific possibility), is my close fully human? Does it have a soul? If it has a soul, where did it come from? Ed George

Kf @27,

Do we see how we have come to the point of enabling the worst holocaust in history? 800+ million unborn in 40+ years, nearly another million per week.

The problem is the typical secular progressive wants to have it both ways. On one hand, they argue that a woman has a right to choose which of course, is a euphemistic way to say that a woman has a universal right to abortion. (Notice that they can’t even be open and honest about what they are really arguing about.) On the other hand, their so-called rights have no basis because they are made up whole cloth. How am I or anyone else obligated to recognize some else’s made up rights? Consider a parallel case which is more than ironic: PETA’s effort to ban leather because it involves slaughtering “innocent” animals. Am I obligated to support such a ban because someone else believes it’s immoral to kill animals? To compound the problem, a lot of the people who support abortion or believe that animals have rights (sometimes they’re the very same people) are also moral subjectivists and relativists. How am I or anyone else obligated to recognize and respect a moral belief that is completely subjective, arbitrary and opinion based. john_a_designer

Acartia Eddie:

I think that it is more accurate that the potential for human life begins at conception.

That's just stupid talk. Science has determined that life begins @ conception. And if it the result of a male human mating with a female human, then that life is tat of a human.

Where there is disagreement it is around when human rights begin.

They should begin at the starting point. Anything else is arbitrary and contrived.

I don’t believe that a “soul” exists, at least not in the way I assume that you do.

And we don't think that you exist, at least not in the way we assume that you do. ET

Human nature is the essence of what it is to be human. The defining characteristic of humanity is the rational soul. Artistotle teaches that man is a "rational animal". Like an animal, but separated because of the power of reason. So, where there is human life, there is the human soul. Through hylomorphism, the soul is infused into matter and human nature is created, at the beginning of life. As Aquinas teaches:

the human soul is sometimes in a state of potentiality to the act of intelligence—acquires its knowledge somehow from things—and thus has various power ... http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1090.htm

The human soul is not potentially human, but is actually human. It was made actual from a Being that preceeded it, which has the power to actualize the potential of a soul. As Aquinas says, however, the soul has potentiality to intelligence - the intellect can grow in knowledge. Also, the soul can grow in virtue or be damaged by vice or sin. As we make conscious decisions, we choose good or evil actions, we choose truth or lies. The intellect can be made better by adherence and appreciation of truth, or made corrupt by lies and evil. Intellectual virtues are habits of the soul. So, we can improve the quality of our soul each day, although the simple existence of any human soul has infinite good value in itself. Silver Asiatic

Do we see how we have come to the point of enabling the worst holocaust in history? 800+ million unborn in 40+ years, nearly another million per week. kairosfocus

JAD, inherently, computational substrates cannot account for self-moved RRF, lets use SM-RRF. The substrate is dynamic-stochastic and inanimate . . . ANIMA is of course, soul in Latin, not rational, volitional, responsible, free. KF PS: I have long since put the two tier controller, Smith Model as a context to discuss embodied ensoulment. The cybernetic loop is informational, feedback laced and computational, but it is governed, which is where SM-RRF enters. kairosfocus

EG, you have no good reason for inserting "potential," it is little more than a rhetorical gambit enabling of holocaust and driven by the influence of evolutionary materialistic scientism. which, is self-referentially absurd, undermining rational, responsible freedom so mind, warrant, knowledge. We can set it aside. With those blinkers off we instantly see that computational substrates cannot -- not merely do not -- account for rational, responsible freedom. In other terms, if your argument "works," it defeats itself. So, we have every reason to recognise that rational responsible freedom [RRF] reflects something beyond even wetware computational substrates; something we rightly speak of as mind or soul. In that context, the potential in the newly conceived child in utero is not to become human, but to develop appropriately as a human being, from stage to stage of life. In which context, we must recognise the inherent dignity and worth, thus duties of care thence, by mirror image, rights. KF kairosfocus

The conscious mind is something that “materialistic science” cannot explain. Materialists try to argue that mind and consciousness somehow emerge from mindless matter but they never really explain how. The goal of science is, after all, basically explaining how. If materialists can’t explain HOW, the belief that consciousness is just some kind of emergent property is just an unwarranted assumption. john_a_designer

BO'H: Pardon, but your scientism is showing. The evidence of our conscious, rational, responsible, conscience guided inner life is in fact antecedent to and foundational for doing science, or even Philosophy, Mathematics, Computer Science and Statistics. As, J B S Haldane pointed out almost a century ago, as was cited above. Let me repeat, for convenience:

"It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms. In order to escape from this necessity of sawing away the branch on which I am sitting, so to speak, I am compelled to believe that mind is not wholly conditioned by matter.” ["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209. Cf. here on (and esp here) on the self-refutation by self-falsifying self referential incoherence and on linked amorality.]

To put it simply, computational substrates are inherently non-ratonal. They are dynamic-stochastic entities that move from input to output blindly, as they are organised and programmed. That is exactly what rationality cannot be. If, it is to have any credibility or authority. So, your implied view is self referentially absurd, undermining rationality itself. That undermining then opens the door to the sort of nihilism and cynicism we see all around. Plato, c 360 BC, had more to say on the matter, as was highlighted at comment 4 (which you should have engaged on the merits):

Athenian Stranger. . . . when one thing changes another, and that another, of such will there be any primary changing element? How can a thing which is moved by another ever be the beginning of change? Impossible. But when the self-moved changes other, and that again other, and thus thousands upon tens of thousands of bodies are set in motion, must not the beginning of all this motion be the change of the self-moving principle? . . . . self-motion being the origin of all motions, and the first which arises among things at rest as well as among things in motion, is the eldest and mightiest principle of change, and that which is changed by another and yet moves other is second. [ . . . .] Ath. If we were to see this power existing in any earthy, watery, or fiery substance, simple or compound-how should we describe it? Cleinias of Crete. You mean to ask whether we should call such a self-moving power life? Ath. I do. Cle. Certainly we should. Ath. And when we see soul in anything, must we not do the same-must we not admit that this is life? [ . . . . ] Cle. You mean to say that the essence which is defined as the self-moved is the same with that which has the name soul? Ath. Yes; and if this is true, do we still maintain that there is anything wanting in the proof that the soul is the first origin and moving power of all that is, or has become, or will be, and their contraries, when she has been clearly shown to be the source of change and motion in all things? Cle. Certainly not; the soul as being the source of motion, has been most satisfactorily shown to be the oldest of all things. Ath. And is not that motion which is produced in another, by reason of another, but never has any self-moving power at all, being in truth the change of an inanimate body [--> including, today, computational substrates], to be reckoned second, or by any lower number which you may prefer? Cle. Exactly. Ath. Then we are right, and speak the most perfect and absolute truth, when we say that the soul is prior to the body, and that the body is second and comes afterwards, and is born to obey the soul, which is the ruler? [ . . . . ] Ath. If, my friend, we say that the whole path and movement of heaven, and of all that is therein, is by nature akin to the movement and revolution and calculation of mind, and proceeds by kindred laws, then, as is plain, we must say that the best soul takes care of the world and guides it along the good path. [ --> Plato here explicitly sets up an inference to design (by a good soul) from the intelligible order of the cosmos.]

Notice, is not that motion which is produced in another, by reason of another, but never has any self-moving power at all, being in truth the change of an inanimate body [--> including, today, computational substrates] Our rational animality, rational ensoulment tells the quality of souls we are in our core being; the embodiment is not entrapment in dirt, but it does not displace that we are self-moved agents capable of being initiatory causes. Such, as when I use my arms and hands to type this comment. Then, we note that we do know, scientifically, when new life begins, at conception. We also know from Q-mech that at micro scale, influences can act on matter; as say the Casimir effect illustrates in a crude way. So, there is no further credibility to the notion of an autonomous, wholly mechanical world. In that context, there is no good reason to dehumanise the unborn child in utero. Until there is positive reason and evidence to hold otherwise, that is the logical point where a whole, new human being comes into existence. KF kairosfocus

SA

A human life begins at conception. That’s the only reasonable conclusion.

I think that it is more accurate that the potential for human life begins at conception.

Choosing another starting point would be arbitrary and subject to great danger.

I don't think that anyone disagrees that conception is the starting point. Where there is disagreement it is around when human rights begin.

In the human soul is found the creative, moral and rational powers that exist in human beings.

I don't believe that a "soul" exists, at least not in the way I assume that you do. But nobody has attempted to answer the question about when this soul is imparted in the fetus? Is it at conception? Is it during brain development? Is it indivisible? Is it immortal? Are there a finite number of them? Ed George

Kf @ 16:

JAD, yes, consciousness is a clear case, but the unconscious have not ceased to be human or ceased from having rights…

I am not denying any of that. My point is that consciousness, which in humans manifests itself in self-consciousness and rational thought, is something we know self-evidently. Therefore, it’s the logical starting point from where all of us, if we’re intellectually honest, must begin, including the dyed-in-the-wool materialist. john_a_designer

In the human soul is found the creative, moral and rational powers that exist in human beings. Within the soul, human beings used the immaterial power of imagination, logic, rational thought and philosophical tests -- to invent something we call "science". Modern day science via methodological naturalism and our current scientific method did not always exist. It was created by humans. Obviously, we cannot use science to explain how we created science, since we created science before science existed. So, science was not involved in its own creation. It did not exist, then we made it up. Science was unnecessary (since it did not exist) in the development of science, so it cannot be the only means we have for understanding things. The powers used to create what we call science are found in the human soul. That's what existed before there was materialist-science. The creative, inventive power that enabled us to understand the world rationally. We couldn't use science at all for that. Science was non-existent. It was useless for that task. The same is true now. Asking how science can explain the origin of its own methods and rules is the same as asking how science was used to create the scientific method. It wasn't. Science wasn't around for that. Science doesn't know such things, and can't know. Science depends powers within the human soul for its own existence and validity. Silver Asiatic

There is all this talk about a soul, or the disembodied mind, but there is nothing about when it starts.

That’s what science is for- to make such determinations

I would agree. So can those who believe in the existence of a soul explain how we can scientifically determine if an individual possesses a soul? Bob O'H

KF

You are right that it is because we manifestly rise above simple animality, exhibiting rational, responsible, conscience guided personhood that we find it self evident that there are mutual duties of care starting with to life, thus, rights.

I was glad to see EG offer that logical progression which is actually the correct foundation for understanding human life -- but the fact that he questioned it is a problem. As you say, we rise above animality. Why do we sense the responsibility of personality and care for other humans and not other existing things? We respond to the value that we see. We encounter a very high value whenever we see a human - we know there is a moral conscience and a huge potential for goodness in each person. So, we have the virtue of reverence - which is the admiration of greatness when we encounter it. A person lacking reverence is not capable of recognizing or responding to values. A thing of greatness is not known or appreciated. Everything is reduced to nothingness - nihilism. A cigarette butt has the same ontological value as a newborn baby. An equal amount of reverence is given to both. But a person of awareness and conscience will recognize the enormous value and potential for goodness within the life of a newborn baby. The child receives reverence and care.

Therefore, the dehumanisation by assertion or implication of our living posterity in the womb, to allow mass slaughter under colour of law is dubious and destructive.

We lament dehumanization because of the great value human nature has. We know the potential for good in each human - to become a person of moral and spiritual greatness. To dehumanize anyone is a crime.

The plain fact is, that a new human life begins at conception (half the time, not even the same sex as the mother) and that that is the only unique, manifest start point.

A human life begins at conception. That's the only reasonable conclusion. Choosing another starting point would be arbitrary and subject to great danger. To mistreat or even kill a human being because of a mistaken understanding of the person's value is like slavery or other crimes against humanity. It's the old moral law governing hunters in the forest, when aiming at something "that might be a human or might be a deer", there's only one moral choice and that is not to shoot.

There is no good reason whatsoever to withhold recognition of a unique human being with full rights from that point.

We want an enlightened society where we care for others and respond to who they are. An infant developing in the womb is the most vulnerable and defenseless. So, we seek to protect and care. Silver Asiatic

Acartia Eddie:

There is all this talk about a soul, or the disembodied mind, but there is nothing about when it starts.

That's what science is for- to make such determinations. But then again you and science don't mix.

To me, the most important question is, when is a human being imbued with this “immortal soul”?

If it is so important to you then you should be trying to figure it out instead of spewing your ignorant trope on a blog.

It seems to me that these questions have to be answered before we can say when the right to life begins.

Science says life begins @ conception. That is why you have issues with understanding it. ET

JAD, yes, consciousness is a clear case, but the unconscious have not ceased to be human or ceased from having rights. Even the dead are owed respect due to the dignity of the human being. And that is one of the horrors of war, undermining respect. KF kairosfocus

EG, really. You are right that it is because we manifestly rise above simple animality, exhibiting rational, responsible, conscience guided personhood that we find it self evident that there are mutual duties of care starting with to life, thus, rights. One needs only establish living humanity to then recognise that the benefit of the doubt accrues to the living human being. Therefore, the dehumanisation by assertion or implication of our living posterity in the womb, to allow mass slaughter under colour of law is dubious and destructive. You have the burden of warrant the wrong way around. The plain fact is, that a new human life begins at conception (half the time, not even the same sex as the mother) and that that is the only unique, manifest start point. That this is the point of that fifth dimensional connexion would be a reasonable inference but is not subject to investigation in the test tube; we now know that the point of felt quickening is late in development. There is no good reason whatsoever to withhold recognition of a unique human being with full rights from that point. KF kairosfocus

The first big problem for materialists is proving that matter exists. The second big problem is proving that matter is all that exists. In other words, for the materialist matter and matter alone is sufficient to explain everything else that exists. The only thing that I know is that I exist. I know that because I am conscious and I am conscious of my own existence. Everything else I know are beliefs based on logical inferences. Therefore, the logical place to begin is with consciousness. However, even if the only thing I can be certain of is consciousness it does not follow that consciousness is the only thing that exists or I am the being that exists. The starting point is epistemological not ontological. So what is soul? It’s consciousness. So if you are conscious you have a soul. That’s self evident. john_a_designer

KF, you are avoiding the obvious. Human rights and the right to life are not afforded to the meat sack that we are. They are afforded to the person/soul/mind that we have. That begs the question, when do we attain the personhood/soul/mind? If this occurs at conception then I would concede that the right to life begins at conception. But if it doesn’t....? All I am asking is what your opinion is with regard to when we obtain our personhood/soul/mind. Ed George

PS, we know ourselves to be morally governed. There is utterly no good reason to usurp benefits of doubts so we feel free to kill unborn living posterity in the womb at will. That stunt is dehumanisation and it is notoriously a first step to abuses. kairosfocus

EG, Sev, your concepts are unfortunately being shaped by materialism, e.g. what is a soul made of. A soul precisely cannot be a composite mechanism governed by essentially computational dynamics, or else rational responsible contemplation using freedom will evaporate. The question is akin to asking what the number 2 is made of, and whether there is a box somewhere containing all the issued cases. If we are not responsibly and freely rational, then that holds for you too; you would be caught up in the collapse of credibility of rationality. So, by reductio ad absurdum, we are confident that there is more to us than mechanical embodiment. We here deal with another order of being, one that is radically different even as two-ness is not the same as two rocks. Next, we know localisability is possible as we experience embodiment. So, while we cannot picture the soul as some sort of glowing cloud in the machine, we can identify characteristics. Earlier, I discussed on extradimensionality as a model; and yes we cannot picture the 5th dimension (counting time as 4), but ponder a Klein Bottle. KF kairosfocus

Sev, I agree. There is all this talk about a soul, or the disembodied mind, but there is nothing about when it starts. Is there a box full of them and when the box is empty, no more? To me, the most important question is, when is a human being imbued with this “immortal soul”? At conception? At implantation? Three weeks? Three months? At birth? It seems to me that these questions have to be answered before we can say when the right to life begins. Ed George

What is a "soul" ? What is it made of? What does it do? Is it, as EG asks, embodied at conception? Are souls immortal or are they created and can they be destroyed? Like information, everyone talks as if it is a monolithic concept acknowledged by all but, to me, it seems just as ill-defined and mystical as The Force in Star Wars. Seversky

KF, I am interested in your concept of the soul. 1) are there a finite number of souls or is a new one created with every conception? 2) is the soul imbued at conception or sometime later? Ed George

BA77, Haldane on what happens if one assumes that mind reduces to brain:

"It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms. In order to escape from this necessity of sawing away the branch on which I am sitting, so to speak, I am compelled to believe that mind is not wholly conditioned by matter.” ["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209. Cf. here on (and esp here) on the self-refutation by self-falsifying self referential incoherence and on linked amorality.]

KF kairosfocus

Specifically, in the following 2010 experimental realization of Maxwell’s demon thought experiment, it was demonstrated that knowledge of a particle’s location and/or position converts information into energy.

Maxwell’s demon demonstration turns information into energy – November 2010 Excerpt: Scientists in Japan are the first to have succeeded in converting information into free energy in an experiment that verifies the “Maxwell demon” thought experiment devised in 1867.,,, In Maxwell’s thought experiment the demon creates a temperature difference simply from information about the gas molecule temperatures and without transferring any energy directly to them.,,, Until now, demonstrating the conversion of information to energy has been elusive, but University of Tokyo physicist Masaki Sano and colleagues have succeeded in demonstrating it in a nano-scale experiment. In a paper published in Nature Physics they describe how they coaxed a Brownian particle to travel upwards on a “spiral-staircase-like” potential energy created by an electric field solely on the basis of information on its location. As the particle traveled up the staircase it gained energy from moving to an area of higher potential, and the team was able to measure precisely how much energy had been converted from information. http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-maxwell-demon-energy.html

And as the following 2010 article stated about the preceding experiment, “This is a beautiful experimental demonstration that information has a thermodynamic content,”

Demonic device converts information to energy – 2010 Excerpt: “This is a beautiful experimental demonstration that information has a thermodynamic content,” says Christopher Jarzynski, a statistical chemist at the University of Maryland in College Park. In 1997, Jarzynski formulated an equation to define the amount of energy that could theoretically be converted from a unit of information2; the work by Sano and his team has now confirmed this equation. “This tells us something new about how the laws of thermodynamics work on the microscopic scale,” says Jarzynski. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=demonic-device-converts-inform

And as the following 2017 article states: James Clerk Maxwell (said), “The idea of dissipation of energy depends on the extent of our knowledge.”,,, quantum information theory,,, describes the spread of information through quantum systems.,,, Fifteen years ago, “we thought of entropy as a property of a thermodynamic system,” he said. “Now in (quantum) information theory, we wouldn’t say entropy is a property of a system, but a property of an observer who describes a system.”,,,

The Quantum Thermodynamics Revolution – May 2017 Excerpt: the 19th-century physicist James Clerk Maxwell put it, “The idea of dissipation of energy depends on the extent of our knowledge.” In recent years, a revolutionary understanding of thermodynamics has emerged that explains this subjectivity using quantum information theory — “a toddler among physical theories,” as del Rio and co-authors put it, that describes the spread of information through quantum systems. Just as thermodynamics initially grew out of trying to improve steam engines, today’s thermodynamicists are mulling over the workings of quantum machines. Shrinking technology — a single-ion engine and three-atom fridge were both experimentally realized for the first time within the past year — is forcing them to extend thermodynamics to the quantum realm, where notions like temperature and work lose their usual meanings, and the classical laws don’t necessarily apply. They’ve found new, quantum versions of the laws that scale up to the originals. Rewriting the theory from the bottom up has led experts to recast its basic concepts in terms of its subjective nature, and to unravel the deep and often surprising relationship between energy and information — the abstract 1s and 0s by which physical states are distinguished and knowledge is measured.,,, Renato Renner, a professor at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, described this as a radical shift in perspective. Fifteen years ago, “we thought of entropy as a property of a thermodynamic system,” he said. “Now in (quantum) information theory, we wouldn’t say entropy is a property of a system, but a property of an observer who describes a system.”,,, https://www.quantamagazine.org/quantum-thermodynamics-revolution/

Again to repeat that last sentence, “Now in (quantum) information theory, we wouldn’t say entropy is a property of a system, but a property of an observer who describes a system.” On top of that, ‘classical’ sequential information is found to be a subset of quantum positional information by the following method: Specifically, in the following 2011 paper, researchers ,,, show that when the bits (in a computer) to be deleted are quantum-mechanically entangled with the state of an observer, then the observer could even withdraw heat from the system while deleting the bits. Entanglement links the observer’s state to that of the computer in such a way that they know more about the memory than is possible in classical physics.,,, In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that (in quantum information theory) an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object’s entropy is always dependent on the observer.

Quantum knowledge cools computers: New understanding of entropy – June 1, 2011 Excerpt: Recent research by a team of physicists,,, describe,,, how the deletion of data, under certain conditions, can create a cooling effect instead of generating heat. The cooling effect appears when the strange quantum phenomenon of entanglement is invoked.,,, The new study revisits Landauer’s principle for cases when the values of the bits to be deleted may be known. When the memory content is known, it should be possible to delete the bits in such a manner that it is theoretically possible to re-create them. It has previously been shown that such reversible deletion would generate no heat. In the new paper, the researchers go a step further. They show that when the bits to be deleted are quantum-mechanically entangled with the state of an observer, then the observer could even withdraw heat from the system while deleting the bits. Entanglement links the observer’s state to that of the computer in such a way that they know more about the memory than is possible in classical physics.,,, In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object’s entropy is always dependent on the observer. Applied to the example of deleting data, this means that if two individuals delete data in a memory and one has more knowledge of this data, she perceives the memory to have lower entropy and can then delete the memory using less energy.,,, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110601134300.htm

Again to repeat, "In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object’s entropy is always dependent on the observer." To say that “entropy is always dependent on the observer” is antithetical to the materialistic presuppositions of Darwinian evolution is to make a severe understatement. An ocean of ink has been spilled by Darwinists arguing that Intelligence is not needed to explain life. (Much less will Darwinists ever concede that an "Intelligent Observer” is necessary in order to give us an adequate casual account of embryological development and/or for why life is so far out of thermodynamic equilibrium)). But I could care less what Darwinists want to believe beforehand. So to further establish that God must be the 'Intelligent Observer' who is bringing life to be so far out of thermodynamic equilibrium, it is first necessary to point out that, number 1, “quantum information” is found to be ubiquitous within life:

Darwinian Materialism vs. Quantum Biology – Part II – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSig2CsjKbg

And secondly it is also necessary to point out that quantum information. (and/or positional information), requires a non-local, beyond space and time, cause in order to explain its existence: As the following article states, “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,”

Looking beyond space and time to cope with quantum theory – October 28, 2012 Excerpt: “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,” says Nicolas Gisin, Professor at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, and member of the team. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121028142217.htm

Darwinian materialists, since they hold, via their reductive materialism, that space-time, matter-energy, is all that exists, simple have no beyond space and time cause to appeal to in order to explain this quantum information. Whereas Christian Theists, or course, do have a beyond space-time. matter-energy, cause that they can appeal to:

Colossians 1:17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

And thirdly, it is also important to point out that in quantum information theory that it is the quantum information itself that is primarily conserved, not matter and energy that are primarily conserved. As the following article states, 'In the classical world, information can be copied and deleted at will. In the quantum world, however, the conservation of quantum information means that information cannot be created nor destroyed.'

Quantum no-hiding theorem experimentally confirmed for first time - 2011 Excerpt: In the classical world, information can be copied and deleted at will. In the quantum world, however, the conservation of quantum information means that information cannot be created nor destroyed. This concept stems from two fundamental theorems of quantum mechanics: the no-cloning theorem and the no-deleting theorem. A third and related theorem, called the no-hiding theorem, addresses information loss in the quantum world. According to the no-hiding theorem, if information is missing from one system (which may happen when the system interacts with the environment), then the information is simply residing somewhere else in the Universe; in other words, the missing information cannot be hidden in the correlations between a system and its environment. http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-03-quantum-no-hiding-theorem-experimentally.html

The implication of finding 'non-local', beyond space and time, and ‘conserved’, quantum information in molecular biology on such a massive scale, is fairly, and pleasantly, obvious. That pleasant implication, of course, being the fact that we now have direct physical evidence strongly indicating that we do indeed have an eternal soul that is capable of living beyond the death of our material bodies. As Stuart Hameroff notes in this following video, “the quantum information,, isn’t destroyed. It can’t be destroyed.,,, it's possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body. Perhaps indefinitely as a soul.”

Leading Scientists Say Consciousness Cannot Die It Goes Back To The Universe - Oct. 19, 2017 - Spiritual Excerpt: “Let’s say the heart stops beating. The blood stops flowing. The microtubules lose their quantum state. But the quantum information, which is in the microtubules, isn’t destroyed. It can’t be destroyed. It just distributes and dissipates to the universe at large. If a patient is resuscitated, revived, this quantum information can go back into the microtubules and the patient says, “I had a near death experience. I saw a white light. I saw a tunnel. I saw my dead relatives.,,” Now if they’re not revived and the patient dies, then it's possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body. Perhaps indefinitely as a soul.” - Stuart Hameroff - Quantum Entangled Consciousness - Life After Death - video (5:00 minute mark) https://www.disclose.tv/leading-scientists-say-consciousness-cannot-die-it-goes-back-to-the-universe-315604

Verses:

Mark 8:37 Is anything worth more than your soul? Psalm 139: 13-16 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book

Supplemental note: Christians can also appeal to special relativity, one of the most precisely tested theories ever in the history of science, to support their belief in a eternal heavenly dimension that exists above this temporal dimension:

Excerpt from halfway down the post: ",,, My favorite proof for a Theistic universe is the proof for heaven that comes from Einstein’s special theory of relativity." https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/sabine-hossenfelder-makes-it-to-slashdot/#comment-691159

Verse:

2 Corinthians 12:2-4 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell.

bornagain77

as to:

"Men have souls Once one accepts that premise, one must accept the conclusions that follow from it: creatures with souls are not evolved from slime, since spirit, being simple and eternal, cannot be brought into being by matter, which is compound, subject to change and decay, nor brought into being by any blind natural process; therefore, instead, spirit must be created in a divine image, with the faculties of reason and conscience and creativity. "

Darwinian Materialists, of course, explicitly reject that premise and hold that we are are purely material beings. So in order to counter the false premise of Darwinian materialists that we are purely material beings, and to support the physical reality of the soul, I will appeal to scientific evidence. In the following article Stephen L. Talbott asks a very simple, yet very profound, question, "the question, rather, is why things don’t fall completely apart — as they do, in fact, at the moment of death. What power holds off that moment — precisely for a lifetime, and not a moment longer?"

The Unbearable Wholeness of Beings - Stephen L. Talbott - 2010 Excerpt: Virtually the same collection of molecules exists in the canine cells during the moments immediately before and after death. But after the fateful transition no one will any longer think of genes as being regulated, nor will anyone refer to normal or proper chromosome functioning. No molecules will be said to guide other molecules to specific targets, and no molecules will be carrying signals, which is just as well because there will be no structures recognizing signals. Code, information, and communication, in their biological sense, will have disappeared from the scientist’s vocabulary. ,,, the question, rather, is why things don’t fall completely apart — as they do, in fact, at the moment of death. What power holds off that moment — precisely for a lifetime, and not a moment longer? Despite the countless processes going on in the cell, and despite the fact that each process might be expected to “go its own way” according to the myriad factors impinging on it from all directions, the actual result is quite different. Rather than becoming progressively disordered in their mutual relations (as indeed happens after death, when the whole dissolves into separate fragments), the processes hold together in a larger unity. http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-unbearable-wholeness-of-beings

Darwinian Materialists are simply at a complete loss to explain how the billions of trillions of biological molecules in a human body can possibly cohere together as a single unified whole for "precisely for a lifetime, and not a moment longer." Shoot, Darwinists have no clue how all the parts of just a single cell might come together to form single unified whole, much less can they explain how the billions of trillions of biological molecules in a human body can possibly cohere together as a single unified whole. As James Tour puts the situation,

"We have no idea how to put this structure (a simple cell) together.,, So, not only do we not know how to make the basic components, we do not know how to build the structure even if we were given the basic components. So the gedanken (thought) experiment is this. Even if I gave you all the components. Even if I gave you all the amino acids. All the protein structures from those amino acids that you wanted. All the lipids in the purity that you wanted. The DNA. The RNA. Even in the sequence you wanted. I've even given you the code. And all the nucleic acids. So now I say, "Can you now assemble a cell, not in a prebiotic cesspool but in your nice laboratory?". And the answer is a resounding NO! And if anybody claims otherwise they do not know this area (of research).” - James Tour: The Origin of Life Has Not Been Explained - 4:20 minute mark (The more we know, the worse the problem gets for materialists) https://youtu.be/r4sP1E1Jd_Y?t=255

What Dr. Tour is alluding to in that preceding comment is the fact that having the correct sequential information encoded in DNA is not nearly enough in order to explain life. Besides the sequential information in DNA there is also a vast amount of ‘positional information’, (positional information that is telling the molecules of the cell exactly where to be), that must also be accounted for as well. And, when working from the thermodynamic perspective, the amount of positional information that is found to be in a simple one cell bacterium is immense. On the order 10 to the 12 bits,,, which is several orders of magnitude more information than the amount of sequential information that is encoded on the DNA of a ‘simple’ bacterium.

Biophysics – Information theory. Relation between information and entropy: – Setlow-Pollard, Ed. Addison Wesley Excerpt: Linschitz gave the figure 9.3 x 10^12 cal/deg or 9.3 x 10^12 x 4.2 joules/deg for the entropy of a bacterial cell. Using the relation H = S/(k In 2), we find that the information content is 4 x 10^12 bits. Morowitz’ deduction from the work of Bayne-Jones and Rhees gives the lower value of 5.6 x 10^11 bits, which is still in the neighborhood of 10^12 bits. Thus two quite different approaches give rather concordant figures. http://www.astroscu.unam.mx/~angel/tsb/molecular.htm

,,, Which is the equivalent of 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. ‘In comparison,,, the largest libraries in the world,, have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.”

“a one-celled bacterium, e. coli, is estimated to contain the equivalent of 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Expressed in information in science jargon, this would be the same as 10^12 bits of information. In comparison, the total writings from classical Greek Civilization is only 10^9 bits, and the largest libraries in the world – The British Museum, Oxford Bodleian Library, New York Public Library, Harvard Widenier Library, and the Moscow Lenin Library – have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.” – R. C. Wysong – The Creation-evolution Controversy ‘The information content of a simple cell has been estimated as around 10^12 bits, comparable to about a hundred million pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica.” Carl Sagan, “Life” in Encyclopedia Britannica: Macropaedia (1974 ed.), pp. 893-894

And the positional information that must be accounted for in order to give us an adequate casual account for how a single cell can possibly turn into the trillions of cells in a multi-cellular organism is orders of magnitude greater than that. Since Bacterial cells are about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells.

Size Comparisons of Bacteria, Amoeba, Animal & Plant Cells Excerpt: Bacterial cells are very small – about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells. https://education.seattlepi.com/size-comparisons-bacteria-amoeba-animal-plant-cells-4966.html

And since there are conservatively estimated to be around 30 trillion cells within the average human body,

Revised Estimates for the Number of Human and Bacteria Cells in the Body – 2016 Abstract: Reported values in the literature on the number of cells in the body differ by orders of magnitude and are very seldom supported by any measurements or calculations. Here, we integrate the most up-to-date information on the number of human and bacterial cells in the body. We estimate the total number of bacteria in the 70 kg “reference man” to be 3.8·10^13. For human cells, we identify the dominant role of the hematopoietic lineage to the total count (?90%) and revise past estimates to 3.0·10^13 human cells. Our analysis also updates the widely-cited 10:1 ratio, showing that the number of bacteria in the body is actually of the same order as the number of human cells, and their total mass is about 0.2 kg. https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002533

Then that gives us a rough ballpark estimate of around 300 trillion times 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Or about 300 trillion times the information content contained within the books of all the largest libraries in the world. Needless to say, that is a massive amount of positional information that is somehow coming into a developing embryo. And indeed, due to advances in science, we now know that an immense amount of ‘positional information’ and/or ‘quantum information’ must be coming into the developing embryo ‘from the outside’ by some ‘non-material’ method. At about the 41:00 minute mark of the following video, Dr. Wells, using a branch of mathematics called category theory, demonstrates that, during embryological development, information must somehow be added to the developing embryo, ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method.

Design Beyond DNA: A Conversation with Dr. Jonathan Wells – video (41:00 minute mark) – January 2017 https://youtu.be/ASAaANVBoiE?t=2484

As mentioned previously, the amount of ‘positional information’ that is somehow coming into a developing embryo from the outside by some non-material method is immense. Vastly outstripping, by many orders of magnitude, the amount of sequential information that is contained within DNA itself. As Doug Axe states in the following video, “there are a quadrillion neural connections in the human brain, that’s vastly more neural connections in the human brain than there are bits (of information) in the human genome. So,,, there’s got to be something else going on that makes us what we are.”

“There is also a presumption, typically when we talk about our genome, (that the genome) is a blueprint for making us. And that is actually not a proven fact in biology. That is an assumption. And (one) that I question because I don’t think that 4 billion bases, which would be 8 billion bits of information, that you would actually have enough information to specify a human being. If you consider for example that there are a quadrillion neural connections in the human brain, that’s vastly more neural connections in the human brain than there are bits (of information) in the human genome. So,,, there’s got to be something else going on that makes us what we are.” Doug Axe – Intelligent Design 3.0 – Stephen C. Meyer – video (1 hour 16 minute mark) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvwBaD8-00w&t=4575s

And as the following article states, the information to build a human infant, atom by atom, would take up the equivalent of enough thumb drives to fill the Titanic, multiplied by 2,000.

In a TED Talk, (the Question You May Not Ask,,, Where did the information come from?) – November 29, 2017 Excerpt: Sabatini is charming.,,, he deploys some memorable images. He points out that the information to build a human infant, atom by atom, would take up the equivalent of enough thumb drives to fill the Titanic, multiplied by 2,000. Later he wheels out the entire genome, in printed form, of a human being,,,,: [F]or the first time in history, this is the genome of a specific human, printed page-by-page, letter-by-letter: 262,000 pages of information, 450 kilograms.,,, https://evolutionnews.org/2017/11/in-a-ted-talk-heres-the-question-you-may-not-ask/

And in regards to this vast amount of positional information that must be accounted for in order to give as an adequate causal account for the Origin of life, and for embryological development, it is now found, due to advances in quantum information theory, that a "Intelligent Observer" is necessary in order to give us an adequate causal account for why life is so far out of thermodynamic equilibrium. bornagain77

F/N: Let us note, Plato in The Laws Bk X, on the soul:

Athenian Stranger. . . . when one thing changes another, and that another, of such will there be any primary changing element? How can a thing which is moved by another ever be the beginning of change? Impossible. But when the self-moved changes other, and that again other, and thus thousands upon tens of thousands of bodies are set in motion, must not the beginning of all this motion be the change of the self-moving principle? . . . . self-motion being the origin of all motions, and the first which arises among things at rest as well as among things in motion, is the eldest and mightiest principle of change, and that which is changed by another and yet moves other is second. [ . . . .] Ath. If we were to see this power existing in any earthy, watery, or fiery substance, simple or compound-how should we describe it? Cleinias of Crete. You mean to ask whether we should call such a self-moving power life? Ath. I do. Cle. Certainly we should. Ath. And when we see soul in anything, must we not do the same-must we not admit that this is life? [ . . . . ] Cle. You mean to say that the essence which is defined as the self-moved is the same with that which has the name soul? Ath. Yes; and if this is true, do we still maintain that there is anything wanting in the proof that the soul is the first origin and moving power of all that is, or has become, or will be, and their contraries, when she has been clearly shown to be the source of change and motion in all things? Cle. Certainly not; the soul as being the source of motion, has been most satisfactorily shown to be the oldest of all things. Ath. And is not that motion which is produced in another, by reason of another, but never has any self-moving power at all, being in truth the change of an inanimate body, to be reckoned second, or by any lower number which you may prefer? Cle. Exactly. Ath. Then we are right, and speak the most perfect and absolute truth, when we say that the soul is prior to the body, and that the body is second and comes afterwards, and is born to obey the soul, which is the ruler? [ . . . . ] Ath. If, my friend, we say that the whole path and movement of heaven, and of all that is therein, is by nature akin to the movement and revolution and calculation of mind, and proceeds by kindred laws, then, as is plain, we must say that the best soul takes care of the world and guides it along the good path. [ --> Plato here explicitly sets up an inference to design (by a good soul) from the intelligible order of the cosmos.]

KF kairosfocus

EG, again, you would divert a key issue into what is now manifestly an obsession on your part. Yes, many of the greeks were part of a culture that semi-normalised pedophilia, to the point where, when The Republic discusses love, it is all about what boys one prefers. Is that the model you want to advocate for a civilisation once healed and reformed from such evils by Christ? Thank you for the warning. KF kairosfocus

Plato and Same-Sex Sexuality Plato is perhaps the most significant and influential philosopher in the Western tradition. He lived from c. 428-347 B.C.E. and was a student of Socrates and teacher of Aristotle. At one time Plato wrote that the best relationship would be an erotically charged relationship between men, though he believed the highest relationship would not involve actual sexual contact. It is from this ideal that we get the term platonic relationship. However today a platonic relationship refers to a completely non-sexual relationship. Despite Plato’s assertion that an erotically charged but sexually unconsummated relationship was best, he does have Socrates say in the Phaedrus, that pairs of lovers, eromenoi (lover) and erastoi (beloved) could reach heaven even if they did take part in “that desire of their hearts which to many is bliss” (Crompton, 2003, p. 60-61). Crompton (2011) stated that in general “Plato’s dialogues are suffused with a homoerotic ambience” (p. 1). However, in Plato’s last work, the Laws [A1], he seems to take the opposite view (Hubbard, 2003, p. 9). In that work, Plato refers to heterosexual intercourse as “natural” and same-sex sex between women and men as “unnatural” (Jowett, 1937, 636, p. 418). Plato also writes of the origin of same and opposite sex urges. In his Symposium, Plato has Aristophanes tell a tale of human origins in which everyone was once a four legged creature until Zeus cut each in half. Each half tried to reunite with its mate and this explains the nature of human beings: Men who are a section of that double nature which was once called androgynous [made up of a man and a woman] are lovers of women, adulterers are generally of this breed, and also adulterous women who lust after men. The women who are a section of the woman do not care for men, but have female attachments: the female companions [that is, lesbians] are of this sort. But they who are a section of the male follow the male, and while they are young, being slices of the original man, they have affection for men and embrace them [the Greek verb implies a sexual sense], and these are the best of boys and youths, because they have the most manly nature. [bracketed material in Crompton] (Crompton, 2003, p. 58). This passage is an unusual celebration of male same-sex desire by contemporary Western standards. Plato is explicitly linking manliness not with heterosexual desire but with homosexual desire.

Ed George

Thoughts on the soul kairosfocus