Proof Soul Exists?

[ChristInAll]

When I say soul in this context, I am not speaking of God. I am talking about our non-material true reality where our consiousness comes from. I am a little worried about embracing Christian Science because of my fear that the soul does not exist. Is there any way to prove that the soul exists and our consiousness is in that and not material?:confused:

[Anastasia]

The existence of a soul as the place where one's consciousness comes from isn't something you can PROVE. There are many ways one could try to conduct an experiment, but, really, that sort of thing comes down to personal belief. Sorry if you were looking for a definitive answer -- this one isn't promising you one thing or another.

Scientists have shown that our conscience is a physical reaction in our brains. They've hooked people up to little brain monitors and seen the brain's physical response when moral decisions are made. But, of course, one could argue that the physical action is a result of something deeper. Who knows. It's up to you to decide where your belief lies. If you want your logic to rest on "because the Bible says so," then cool. If not, then you'll probably search for a definitive answer for a while. Good luck.

[Starlight Rider]

The nature of consciousness is a puzzle that has stumped theologians, philosophers, biologists, psychologists, and physicists through the ages. Nobody has ever seen where it comes from, so as Anastasia says, don't expect to find objective proof from any source.

However, maybe I can help suggest where you might pursue your study of the subject.

There are three basic viewpoints on this that compete for attention.


That matter is the fundamental reality and consciousness is a product of material processes.
That consciousness and matter are separate things that interact in a brain.
That consciousness is the fundamental reality and that the "things" we perceive are images in thought.


The first and third views are "monistic" in that they assume a single source of reality, while the second is "dualistic" and assumes two separate realities that intermingle.

The first explanation is the probably most commonly accepted view in the western world. But it is not without problems. It cannot explain certain "paranormal" phenomena such as spiritual healing, premonitions, etc. In quantum physics the matter-based reality model involves a number of inexplicable paradoxes, such as photons behaving like both waves and particles depending on how they are observed. Furthermore, it poses a sticky problem of cause and effect. If matter creates consciousness, how can consciousness manipulate matter? How can consciousness that is created by matter turn around and move a material arm or leg? Wouldn't that be an effect becoming a cause? It would be like the clay manipulating the potter. Finally, as Mary Baker Eddy asked, how can something with no inherent intelligence become self aware?

The dualistic view also has problems. From a theological point of view it requires two separate creations, a spiritual one and a material one, which somehow interact. This violates the idea of one infinite God. In physics it violates the principle of conservation of energy, which states that the amount of energy in the material universe remains constant. However, in the dualistic view, in order to move your arm some energy must be transferred from the spiritual realm of consciousness into the material world, which physics says is impossible.

That leaves the third view, where consciousness is the fundamental reality. This is essentially the Christian Science view, though we take it a step further by assuming God to be that consciousness. It is not, however, unique to CS. It is also found in many eastern spiritual traditions. In the western world, many physicists are openly entertaining this model as well. They say it neatly eliminates the various quantum paradoxes.

While they cannot provide definitive proof, you might consider reading a book or two on quantum physics. There are many good titles out there. The one that got me interested, and which I actually first read about in the CS Sentinel, is called God and the New Physics by Paul Davies. It was written in 1983, so it doesn't include things like string theory, but the basics are there and it is fairly easy for the layman to follow. A more recent book entitled The Self Aware Universe was written by Amit Goswami, a University of Oregon physics professor. His book is harder to follow, but he is one of the leaders in promoting the consciousness-based reality model among modern physicists. If you read Paul Davies book first, you'll understand Goswami's book better.

As a disclaimer, none of this can prove or disprove the teachings of Christian Science. Only your own application of CS teachings can do that for you. I only present the above discussion in the hopes that it might help you gain a fresh perspective.

[Norbu]

Jim,

You have put this analysis excellently.

However there may be a forth hypothesis: This may be similar to Bohm's implicity and explicit order, other elements of quantum physics, chaos theory, and systems biology and complexity theory.

Consider Einstein's famous equation that essentially says that matter and energy are phases of the same "substance". Which comes first; chicken or egg? Is the wave separate from the ocean? Is space separate from form? Is idea separate from mind?

From where does order emerge? How do systems "self organise"? Emergent order cannot be predicted by linear models. Order seems to emerge in new forms that have seemingly new qualities to the elements which seem to be the constituents of what emerges.

Look carefully at anything you can choose to name. What are the parts that make it up? What happens when you start to remove parts of the thing you have named. At what point do you find the thing you thought was there is no longer there. we can show that all named things that we can percieve with our senses are like this.

What happens when we do this with consciousness? We can break it up into different elements perhaps but there is one part of the processes of consciousness that remains indefinable in terms of physical senses or measurements: awareness itself. We have to ask: Is awareness a thing at all? Does awareness exist outside of all the other things that we now recognises as being conventional definitions of processes of events that we can measure or sense in some way?

You have two options here I would argue: your option 3. and the following option:

Buddhists (and some twentieth and twenty first century thinkers) argue that all is contextural and interdependent including "awareness." They isay there is no monistic substance at the source of all being (mind). There may appear to be patterns of "mind", there may appear to be patterns of matter but in the end we cannot separate any particular thing into a self existing substance... Even God needs an expression! Even Love needs an object of devotion! Is God separate from his expression? Is Love separate from the object of her devotion?

Norbu

[Starlight Rider]

Norbu, you make my head spin! But upon re-reading your fourth proposition, it sounded familiar to me. It looks like you are referring to what Amit Goswami, in his aforementioned book The Self Aware Universe, calls "tangled hierarchies." As I understand it, which is not particularly well, it is not a fourth proposition so much as a variation on number three. It still requires a consciousness based reality, but without relying on temporal concepts of cause and effect. As with my fraction analogy above, tangled hierarchies are perfectly plausible in an infinite universe of Mind unfettered by the perceived limits of time and space.

I hope we haven't lost the rest of the group on this. It's weird stuff, but I think it foreshadows the ultimate union of science and Science.

[Norbu]

Hi Jim,

I confess it makes my head spin but I think this is also a critically important aspect of the contemplation of these things. Surely Mrs Eddy spent so much effort trying to untangle causality for a very good reason.

I just wish to point out that Amit Goswami cleary asserts monistic idealism as the philosophical base for his "tangled hierarchies of causality". He is asserting this analysis as a corrollery of Brahminism. Within theses tangled hierarchies he is identifying a single universal cause which is absolute, self creative and aware. This application of monism will not identify good and evil outside a relative context. Good and evil, when perceived in a relative context are based on relative understanding and relative skillfulness of the actor. This system doesn't exclude the existence of matter but explains its existence with a tangled hierarchy of "upward" and "downward" causation in entangled eddies of forms that emerge from the absolute.

CS has, I believe, only some similarities with this form of monistic idealism but postulates a set of erroneous experiences in a realm of the illusion of matter (Brahninism accepts that matter is a dreamlike dance of existence but does not accept that there is any individualised experience outside this dreamlike dance of creation). CS does not, as I understand it give this realm of matter any causal base other than the error of ignorance maintained by forces of animal magnetism which it considers are mirage like. In some respects at least I would suggest Mrs Eddy would probably describe the "tangled hierarchies" of Amit Goswami as pantheistic as they accept "upward causality" of gross substance (matter) effecting ethereal substance (consciousness) as well as downward causality (mind effecting matter). However Mrs eddy does accept, as I understand it, that adjusting human understading to the Divine will transfor "material experience" in a way that results in a more "spiritually based experience". She posits substance, a genuine ontological existince (rather than a false ontology of matter), in Spirit (as a synonym for a monistic God in which his idea, creation is inseparable, perhaps even inextricably entwined in a relationship of love of Love).

For the purpose of clarification, Buddhism rejects all ontological assertions: Whether they are monistic materialism (mind an epiphenomenon), dualism of mind and matter (of which pantheism is a significant variant) and monistic idealism whether it be of Brahministic (which Mrs Eddy would, I think describe as a variant of pantheism) or Mrs Eddy's philosophical position (at least as I understand it). However, I'd argue that the actual effect the result of holding the Buddhist position has distinct similarities to a variant of Mrs Eddy's ontological position combined with the hypothesis of "tangled hierarchies".

In the end the measure of the system of ideas that are subscribed to has to be measured in its encouragement of ethical behaviour, health, harmony, selfless unconditional love and compassion and the experience of limitless joy.

I hope this makes everything crystal clear,

Norbu :confused: