The issue which I am trying to think about is how these concepts emerged and inform thinking, especially in relation to human consciousness. — Jack Cummins

So tell us what you think ...

My perspective is that the various terms of mind, soul, spirit and self overlap and probably capture partial aspects of the inner experiences of human beings. Self is definitely the most popular at the present time, especially as the others suggested some kind of disembodied form. Spirit may be the the most complicated because it captures some kind of transcendent reality and this may not be ruled out entirely but it is entirely speculative and fits most easily into spiritual worldviews.

My personal favourite term of the group may be mind because, unless one is a dualist, is not separate from the body. The difficulty with it may be that it is often associated with the brain most clearly and consciousness may be not entirely reduced to the body. In some ways, self enables a more expansive view but it may be too focused on the social negotiation of the person's core of being. Of course, every person exists in a social context as recognised in the social sciences. The issue may be that the idea of the self may be too socially reductive and not allow for the unique and separate consciousness of the person to be valid in it's own right.

However, I would not wish to use the idea of mind and reject all the others because, as discussed in the earliest discussion on the thread it does all depend on the context of the usage of the terms, especially as all philosophy has a linguistic aspect. It may be that it is simply worth thinking of our own favoured use of the four terms, as well as others, such as the ego, in the way in which the subtle differences point to underlying approaches to in understanding the nature of consciousness and what it means to be a human being.

... the inner experiences of human beings — Jack Cummins

Tell me how do you know that any other human being than yourself has "inner experiences". None of the concepts in the OP make clear how you (or anyone) can know that.

We know that other people have inner experiences because we are able to talk about them in a comparative way. For example, we can talk about our experiences of music or dreams. With knowing about what it means for others to think about what it means to think of one having a soul, mind, spirit or self. The term spirit is the most complicated because it may involve relationships beyond the physical world and it gets into the realm of metaphysics. But, to compare soul is about thinking of the depths of experience of being, mind probably as reflective consciousness and self as what it means to have a centre in the phenomenological and social fabric of reality. It is likely that we would not even be able to engage in this discussion of inner experiences if we were not able to look inside ourselves introspectively and identify common aspects of such experience.

We know that other people have inner experiences because we are able to talk about them in a comparative way. — Jack Cummins

Yet if another didn't have "inner experiences" but acted or spoke as if she did, you wouldn't – couldn't – know. It seems to me, Jack, that's not a reliable way of knowing.

... common aspects of such experience.

If by "inner experiences" what you mean is subjective, then I don't see what about them can possibly be called "common" (i.e. public, objective). :chin:

Of course, we have subjective experiences. Your experience of listening to The Doors is unique to you and mine to me. However, they are not so subjective that there are not any common grounds. That would be bordering onto solipticism. It may not be objective but intersubjective. We can make some guess at others' minds on the basis of both behaviour and their own testimonies, in addition to our own experiences. Without this, there would be no empathy. Of course, people may make mistakes about others' inner experiences if they simply base their assumptions on their own, which is why listening to others is of vital importance.

It seems your Enformationism, since it requires an equilibrium between negentropy/Enformy and entropy, is fully compatible with evil (re BothAnd) and there you rock religion's boat (religion dedicates itself to uprooting evil from society).

True, we're teleologically-oriented people and we work towards an ideal - we want, sensu amplissimo, a long (eternal), happy life, but this is exactly what The Architect and Agent Smith say we rejected in The Matrix. Hence, I suppose, me question.

Of course, we have subjective experiences. — Jack Cummins

You take it as a given but you don't know. I agree it's a handy heuristic, and maybe that's all it is.

We can make some guess at others' minds ...

... and your / my own "mind" too – since it's also "subjective" – perhaps an introspection illusion ...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introspection_illusion

I would agree that people often make too many assumptions about other's psychological experiences. That is why I specify the importance of listening. Of course, our listening to others is filtered by our own cognitive biases too. So, the models we make of other people's inner experiences are only working models and like most other aspects of everything in life knowledge is partial, with an underlying uncertainty.

↪Gnomon
It seems your Enformationism, since it requires an equilibrium between negentropy/Enformy and entropy, is fully compatible with evil (re BothAnd) and there you rock religion's boat (religion dedicates itself to uprooting evil from society).
True, we're teleologically-oriented people and we work towards an ideal - we want, sensu amplissimo, a long (eternal), happy life, but this is exactly what The Architect and Agent Smith say we rejected in The Matrix. Hence, I suppose, me question. — Agent Smith

I'll quibble with your term "requires equilibrium". The thesis merely accepts as a fact of life, that this world is not perfect for human needs & desires, so it's necessary for us humans to work within the physical constraints of the natural world. In that case, equilibrium would be like a Mexican Standoff, in which nobody wins. Despite the odds stacked against us, we "teleological" people tend to aim for perfection (Heaven). But a fatalistic "happiness" is to settle for stable equilibrium. Yet, in the Hegelian dialectic, notice the dashed arrow down the middle of the zig-zag path of evolutionary progress. That is an interpolation of the average path through history. It's neither Good nor Evil, but acceptable, it's OK..

However, as you said, humans are both teleological and idealistic. So we shoot for the stars, and settle -- temporarily -- for a small hill. The ancient Greeks tended to be Pragmatic and Fatalistic. So, the Stoics advised that we avoid setting our sights too high, because failure to achieve your aims can lead to anxiety & depression. Nevertheless, humanity as a collective does have more control over Nature & Fate, than as individuals. Therefore, even though equilibrium allows us to barely survive, shooting for the moon (dis-equilibrium), can give us a "leg-up" (advantage) over implacable Nature. If we settled for equilibrium, we'd still be chimps climbing trees.

But that ambitious path is full of hardships & disappointments. So, while we fight Fate, we must be prepared to take our lumps without quitting. For example, putting a man on the moon was a human dream for ages. But only when technology caught up with our teleology, did that idealistic ambition become practical. In that case, persistent progressive Enformy (Good) won a round against big bad digressive Entropy (Evil).

The primary difference between the Religious "boat" and the Technological rocket is hard work instead of blind faith. 2000 years ago, one upstart Religion aimed for Heaven, but waited for a miracle. A century ago, rocket scientists made practical plans to put a man on the moon. And voila! We can now see boot prints in moon dust on YouTube. So, the lesson of Enformationism is : Nature rules, but humans are unruly. :smile:


Fatalism (revised):Everything happens due to a cause, but due to proximate and accessory causes, not to perfect and principal causes.
https://uh.edu/~cfreelan/courses/fate.html

Stoic acceptance is about accepting what is outside of what is under one's control. Human minds are prone towards agonizing over the future or the past.
https://stoameditation.com/blog/the-four-pillars-of-stoicism/

"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, Or what's a heaven for?"
___Robert Browning

BLUE = GOOD ; GREEN = BAD ; PINK = ONE STEP FORWARD (one giant step for mankind)

THE RESULT OF BLOOD, SWEAT & TEARS, AND INTELLIGENT AIMS

I figure all the kinds of psychology are joined at the hip with philosophy because each system demarcates what will be recognized as phenomena and what will be excluded. This condition obviously includes the presuppositions about what is happening but also includes the praxis of therapy and evaluating what is helpful or not.

Technology to the rescue ... again? Yep, I concur, it seems possible to turn earth into a paradise, but then when yin peaks, yang is just around the corner.

Philosophy and psychology have such an important relationship. In the beginning of the last century they overlapped and it was the movements of behaviorism, psychodynamic theory, psychiatry and cognitive psychology which changed all of that. In some ways, philosophy became the forgotten twin. This is rather unfortunate because it the essential partner in thinking about 'mind', especially as all psychological rest upon philosophical assumptions, including ideas about human nature.

I had a dream.

Actually I had 2 recurring dreams as a child. At the age of around eight learning something of the facts of life, I realised that they were memories of birth trauma. They were wordless of course, but became describable to myself as I learned to speak. The first: I am in a field and a huge thing is coming down, crushing me. That is a contraction. The second was associated with the house I was living in as a child. I had to go from the warm sunny kitchen along a dark passage to light a fire in the cold gloomy living-room, but there was an unnameable monster in the passage. That was the memory of the birth-canal and actual birth.

I think this is fairly rare, and one reason I think I had these memories available even as dreams is that I was my mother's 5th child and had a very easy birth. I think for most, birth trauma is too extreme and the memories have to be shut off completely.

Anyway, in relation to @Gnomon's dialectic there is no memory of the life in the womb as such; there is no event, nothing much happens; "there's absolutely no strife, living the timeless life". Birth is the antithesis of life in the womb, the first event, and awareness is the first synthesis. Thus is the problem of evil easily answered: without the pain and terror, there would be no awareness, no subjectivity.

Technology to the rescue ... again? Yep, I concur, it seems possible to turn earth into a paradise, but then when yin peaks, yang is just around the corner. — Agent Smith

“Being challenged in life is inevitable, being defeated is optional.” – Roger Crawford

Anyway, in relation to Gnomon's dialectic there is no memory of the life in the womb as such; there is no event, nothing much happens; "there's absolutely no strife, living the timeless life". Birth is the antithesis of life in the womb, the first event, and awareness is the first synthesis. Thus is the problem of evil easily answered: without the pain and terror, there would be no awareness, no subjectivity. — unenlightened

I suppose what you're implying is that "pain is a necessary evil". Hence Evil is not optional for a learning & growing process. Positive & negative feedback are how we learn in a heuristic (trial & error) process. But a nudge in the right direction should be sufficient, so why the torment of cancer? What do we learn from pain without a lesson? Maybe bad things happen to good people, simply so we can learn that "God is no respecter of persons" (Romans 2:11). Without experience of Evil (Satan), we would not recognize Good (God) -- life would be meaningless. "No awareness, no subjectivity", no cognizance, no knowing. . . . no progress, no growth, no maturation. :smile:

Is pain a necessary evil? :
No. Pain is a vital function of the body to indicate something is wrong. Without pain, we’d leave our hands on hot stoves, or walk on nails. We’d never seek treatment for many life-threatening things. We may not even notice we’re injured, or that our appendix ruptured, etc. Pain is a very, very important part of life.
https://www.quora.com/Is-pain-a-necessary-evil

so why the torment of cancer? — Gnomon

That's a bit of a weasel question - I don't mind a bit of discomfort, but...

Life is the dialectic. Bliss plus torment produces awareness. Again and again; more and more. Take the heroin and ease the pain at the cost of your life. Yeah, leprosy does not directly cause disfigurement, but numbness, that leads to damage to the extremities, infection, and loss. But this is more. The heaven that is the womb cannot be experienced, because there is no comparison, only the loss of paradise can be felt.

This is rather a hijack of the thread though. Perhaps we should get back to discussing the language ...

“Being challenged in life is inevitable, being defeated is optional.” – Roger Crawford — Gnomon

I intelligo.

Life is the dialectic. Bliss plus torment produces awareness. Again and again; more and more. Take the heroin and ease the pain at the cost of your life. — unenlightened

:death: :flower: