But souls? How do you prove souls exist? — Corvus

I don't think souls/spirit are real distinct beings. We apply those terms to the nonphysical, 'mental' processes which ultimately cause/include the illusion of being, although they are actually fleeting and empty processes.

But when we go on to speak of non-linguistic thought, here we are really lost and have been for thousands of years. — Manuel

Perhaps it is our own definitions creating obstacles to further "discovery." Take non linguistic thought. I might argue that even the seemingly nonlinguistic, is linguistics, if the latter has as its common feature a Signifier/Signified, ie. 'meaning-construction' function. What nonlinguistic thought is not yet, primarily about meaning?

That would have to be proved, not stipulated.

Or you can make the terminological choice of putting things this way, which is fine.

Or you can make the terminological choice of putting things this way, which is fine. — Manuel

Isn't that inescapably the case? Some adopted by convention for various reasons, including, as you say, proof; some fringe applications of the terminology, and not adopted. That is a mammoth question, I know. My point brings me back to what is the body? Not a thing to best access with knowledge, but rather the thing we are [isolated from knowledge].

I’m new here, but I’m curious to know what evidence there is that my mind is the same as my body. The quote from Maurice Merleau-Ponty didn’t offer any evidence. I haven’t read any of his work, so maybe he does make a case elsewhere, but it wasn’t in the quote I saw.

The quote from Maurice Merleau-Ponty didn’t offer any evidence — Clearbury

Hard to compress evidence for anything into three words :-)

Regardless, welcome to the Forum.

We apply those terms to the nonphysical, 'mental' processes which ultimately cause/include the illusion of being, although they are actually fleeting and empty processes. — ENOAH

Do you mean then souls / spirits are something that we apply to the illusion of being? That sounds like souls / spirits are illusions.

Isn't that inescapably the case? Some adopted by convention for various reasons, including, as you say, proof; some fringe applications of the terminology, and not adopted. That is a mammoth question, I know. My point brings me back to what is the body? Not a thing to best access with knowledge, but rather the thing we are [isolated from knowledge]. — ENOAH

We could, if we so choose, go back and use Descartes definition of body, which is extended substance. And mind would be non-extended.

The problem is that we now know that a body is not an extended substance, it no longer holds.

What should be done is to say which are properties unique to bodies and how these properties cannot be mental in any way. Then you could have an argument.

Incidentally, this is for philosophy. In ordinary talk, when we are talking to other real-life people, we use "body" and "mind" rather loosely, but it serves the purposes of the everyday.

That's not what we are doing here, which is being technical and trying to get at what a body is. As I've said, I don't think we know what it is.

What should be done is to say which are properties unique to bodies and how these properties cannot be mental in any way. Then you could have an argument. — Manuel

That is excellent. Granted that the mental (for humans) 'uses' matter/energy (whatever it's called, currently) to 'generate'. But, simply put, that which is generated--Signifiers--is not matter/energy. To classify it objectively is the challenge, given it is really classifying itself. But the mental is more like the direction in which a finger is pointing (rather than the finger, or what it is pointing to (unless it happens to be pointing to another direction--which is often the case)); so as opposed to the body (including the nervous system, synapses etc.; including mood, sensation, drives--all presumably material processes) the mental is empty, a 'thing' totally other, yet not real in the way we prima facie receive the material, I.e., the body, as real.

I realize that my loose terminology may need tightening. I can see you've been doing that. Hopefully, you can read my question for what it is really asking, rather than what it might accidentally appear to be asking, given terms (mis)used.

That sounds like souls / spirits are illusions. — Corvus

In my opinion, not just illusions (that's ultimately what I would call the spin which human mind superimposes onto reality) but 'soul/spirit' are misunderstandings: illusions within the illusion, about what the illusion might be.

but 'soul/spirit' are misunderstandings: illusions within the illusion, about what the illusion might be. — ENOAH

Surely the concepts of souls / spirits have existed for thousands of years. If you are religious believing in after life, resurrection or the heavenly world and God, wouldn't soul be the essential being for the belief?

Bodies get old and die through time. Minds die too. But souls supposed to survive after death to be identified for what the being had done, and how it lived to be placed in the different parts of the heavenly world, or the hell. To be able to keep continue the life after death according to the holy scriptures.

Without soul, the old body disintegrated, and mind evaporated, the system wouldn't work, or wouldn't make sense.

I would say that I am a person. I am conscious and bodily to be sure, but I am not a mind or a body, and I don't have a body.

While we're at it, I am not a soul, and I am not my brain. I am a whole, conscious, physical unit. — Kurt Keefner

I would say that i am a body that has a mind, not a mind that has a body.

But the i am that i am is not the body that is. I am an activity, a continuous dynamic adaptive complex event that started at some point in the past between my conception and birth, and will end when my body ceases to function (particularly my brain), unless of course the mind can be translated away from the old body or brain and reinstantiated in a new one in some way. This is why i believe it is called 'being'. I am being in the body, and without the body i am not.

The mind is the dynamic adaptive activity between the parts of a system or body. Note that the brain is the body proper of the mind we are usually referring to in these discussions. There are different kinds of bodies for different kinds of minds.

If the coherent flow of activity alone of the brain can be abstractly isolated and separated from the brain body then that by itself can in my view be considered who you are in essence. That is your "I am being", your "soul". This is just a thought experiment to illustrate what/who you essentially really are from the perspective of this theory at least, not that the mind can be literally separated from the body in reality. Your mind needs your body, but your body does not necessarily need your mind. Your body can indeed survive without your mind as evidenced by cases of brain dead living people.

Bodies get old and die through time. Minds die too. But souls supposed to survive after death to be identified for what the being had done — Corvus

The first, I agree without reason to disagree; the second, I agree, with the qualifier that I go a step further and doubt that Mind ever lived in the first place; the third I have no reason to believe.

Why is the body not enough. I don't approach these things religiously (as in conventional religions), but even if I did, God created the natural universe, we created the spiritual to answer questions which from God's perspective we have no business asking. For so called Abrahamic religions, these questions are humans eating knowledge not life. For so called Vedic-Buddhist religions these questions are us consumed by the fruits of our works, rather than just doing our works because it is within our natures to do.

Do you think consciousness can be uploaded into a computer or a new body?

Do you think consciousness can be uploaded into a computer or a new body? — Kurt Keefner

I do think so, but it has to be done in a very specific way in order to maintain continuity of being. What do you think?

Why is the body not enough. I don't approach these things religiously (as in conventional religions), but even if I did, — ENOAH

Could it be because body is temporal? As we all know, bodies get old, die and becomes dust. Bodies don't last too long.

The issue is that body is being treated here as if you are attempting to give properties to bodies which belong to them, independent of what we attribute to them (nervous system, synapses, etc.) and somehow saying that this makes it "more real" or more concrete or something along these lines.

I'm not sure what this amounts to. A body being more real than mind is a sentence I can't make sense of.

As for the mind being an empty thing, something that merely points, I don't think this is factually true. That is, the very fact that it even points to something is already an activity the mind has. So, it can't be empty in this way.

I suppose the question to ask would be, what are you attempting to prove or what would be advanced or made clearer by supposing that body and mind are so different?

Quite coincidentally, this video interview just came out a few hours ago that kind of addresses or relates to the subject of this thread, particularly my post. You might find it interesting. check it out:

Michael Levin - Why Intelligence Isn't Limited To Brains.

Could it be because body is temporal? As we all know, bodies get old, die and becomes dust. Bodies don't last too long. — Corvus

I'd say, it is because of the structure of our "thinking" that we even "desire" eternity/immortality. Of course our bodies are "temporal" in their lived forms. That, to me, doesn't prohibit them from being our only "reality"

I suppose the question to ask would be, what are you attempting to prove or what would be advanced or made clearer by supposing that body and mind are so different? — Manuel

To answer that question, because the others require more focused attention, I'm trying to get at the fallacy we have trapped ourselves in because mind emerged, with 'unique' structures etc., which is, that it is the 'seat' of our being/reality/truth, at the expense of what is already a prima facie given. Not I think therefore I am, but rather it thinks therefore it exists...but what is it? Whereas body lives, therefore it is. The latter can at least be shared with the rest of the universe. It is this oddity, Mind, that only humans seem to have, and that has 'fooled' us 'narcissistically, into wanting it to be special, more real, the being within the being etc

Where's the evidence that the mind is the body? Without assuming that the mind is the body - which is question begging - what evidence is there that the mind is part of the body?

the very fact that it even points to something is already an activity the mind has — Manuel

Because there is no language accessible to precisely express the point, these metaphors might be helpful, although also tricky.

In my metaphor Mind doesn't point, it's the finger (body) which points. Mind isn't even the thing it is pointing to. Mind is the direction in which it is pointing. That is how mind is empty. And in that sense is the body 'more' real. The finger is more real than the direction in which it is pointing.

Isn't body the precondition for being conscious? — Corvus

This I agree with. It's just that I go further than what is implied. I think Body is the only condition for being conscious. Mind are the projections which emerged/evolved and now operate out of that Consciousness, displacing the organic system of, more or less stimulus and response, with stimuli which have been so over produced (maybe kickstarted/driven by language), that an autonomous process takes place which we take to be our experience; assuming an agent/experienced, and from there, concluding a real and separate being (even those who insist they aren't dualistic yet speak of mind as if it has a reality distinct from the body's--forgive the non-technical language).

Not I think therefore I am, but rather it thinks therefore it exists...but what is it? Whereas body lives, therefore it is. The latter can at least be shared with the rest of the universe. It is this oddity, Mind, that only humans seem to have, and that has 'fooled' us 'narcissistically, into wanting it to be special, more real, the being within the being etc — ENOAH

Ok. So, it's kind of like trying to push down or put into context that in having minds, we are not "extra special" and so those features of the world that lack mind - which you are calling body - are "me", more so than this mysterious mind, which is misleading.

You can say that I would only note that you are mentalizing the body with properties which are not clear it could possess absent minds - me-ness and being "central".

I would add that it is very far from evident if we can say that the stuff physics describes "bodies" of being made up of, fundamental particles and quantum phenomenon are like or unlike minds. It's very obscure, and I don't think it's a trivial answer (if one can even be given at all).

Because there is no language accessible to precisely express the point, these metaphors might be helpful, although also tricky.

In my metaphor Mind doesn't point, it's the finger (body) which points. Mind isn't even the thing it is pointing to. Mind is the direction in which it is pointing. That is how mind is empty. And in that sense is the body 'more' real. The finger is more real than the direction in which it is pointing. — ENOAH

Yep, it is hard to talk about this stuff, for sure. Here's how I see it, I don't think it's true to say that "fingers point", because they don't. People point, using fingers and many other gestures. A pointing finger absent an interpreter like us, is quite meaningless, so far as I can see.

Ah, ok, so the finger is "more real" because a kind of more "concrete" feeling, as bodies appear to have.

Well, I'd say that "concrete things", things that can be touched with our hands, are almost absent in the universe, especially if you consider how many things exists which we cannot touch, which is almost everything.

I'd say that "concrete things", things that can be touched with our hands, are almost absent in the universe, especially if you consider how many things exists which we cannot touch, which is almost everything. — Manuel

You're definitely challenging my, beyond complacent, settlements, which is good.

But OK, please let me know what you think of this baby step. Even if so called concrete things turn out to be other than as they appear, perhaps also evasive, etc. Are they not yet, all of them together, bodies, trees, oceans, and rocks, something physics explores differently than it does the ideas which appear to shape our experiences and are not constructed out of matter. I get that we have dreamed that they might be, but if we are being fair, a thought might require matter to generate it, but once projected and gone, it is gone. Because it never really was.

I'd say, it is because of the structure of our "thinking" that we even "desire" eternity/immortality. Of course our bodies are "temporal" in their lived forms. That, to me, doesn't prohibit them from being our only "reality" — ENOAH

If your body has lost all the contents of your memory let us suppose, but it still functions biologically. Would you be able to know then, your body is you?

Where's the evidence that the mind is the body? Without assuming that the mind is the body - which is question begging - what evidence is there that the mind is part of the body? — Clearbury

Things that affect the body affect the mind. For example, drinking alcohol changes what we feel. Construct a long list of such examples. Inference to the best explanation suggests that therefore the body is the mind, or perhaps the functions of the body is the mind.

If your body has lost all the contents of your memory let us suppose, but it still functions biologically. Would you be able to know then, your body is you? — Corvus

That is exactly my point; there is no real "you" and "your" body is not "yours". The question dualists need to consider is why a human body wouldn't be itself without the constructions and projections we classify as a separate entity and call mind. Why is a lizard still a lizard without thought and language, but only humans have a soul? Sure, we claim that God prefers us and gave us a soul. But I think we've grown up enough to stop clinging to that.

We're all immortal

I, for one, do not trust math.

We may be immortal for all that. (EDIT: And it looks like a cool book that I'd enjoy reading)