[ExI] The Soul

[William Flynn Wallace]

I don't understand most of this, but I do understand that you left out most
of the mind:  the unconscious part.  bill w

On Sun, Apr 26, 2020 at 3:46 PM Will Steinberg via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> In my opinion, I define the soul and the mind differently, and I am not
> sure if they are the same.
>
> The mind: we all know what this means, I think.  An organized, conscious
> thing.  I will withhold my views on consciousness because I don't think
> they are necessarily relevant.  Suffice to say that if it can think, it is
> a mind.  I will leave it up to the reader to determine for themselves what
> thinking is.
>
> The soul: this one is tougher.  Let me see if I can devise some 'axioms of
> the soul':
>
> 1. Presence: It must exist
> 1 --> 2. Permanence: It must exist for non-trivial periods of time
> 3. Integration: Its parts must be part of a clearly defined system with
> boundaries.
> 2 + 3 --> 4. Closeness: given a permanence period A to B, the probability
> that the parts of the system are integrated in the same manner at B as they
> were at A must be much higher than the probability that they are integrated
> with foreign parts at B.
>
> By this definition, an atom is a soul.  Does it HAVE a soul?  I am not
> sure; that is a kinda philosophical monist/dualist question.  A solar
> system is a soul.  A molecule is a soul.  A body is a soul.  What do these
> things have in common?  There is something about angular momentum here.
> Whether it is spatial or chronological angular momentum.  For example, I
> think something like the Krebs cycle is 'soulish'.
>
> Due to this, I don't think I can believe, in good conscience, in
> transmigration of the soul.  In my opinion, souls are rather leaky.
> Something I do believe in is some kind of archetype-sharing-resonance
> taking place of transmigration.  Sort of like Wheeler's One Electron
> Universe.  The idea is that, for parsimony, things that are formed
> similarly are the same (at least to their degree of similarity.) So for
> every archetype within my pervasive, integrated system, I have experienced
> transmigration from many souls.  I guess I believe the universe can't
> really tell the difference between things that are the same or extremely
> similar.  I believe this is somehow connected to spooky action at a
> distance, and, if true, would provide some sort of mechanism for many
> 'supernatural' occurrences--telepathy, ancestral memories, ghostly things,
> in particular.  If telekinesis exists it is probably not by this mechanism.
>
> Perhaps if 2 brains across history are very similar, the universe can't
> quite distinguish the 2, and so their waveforms leak between one another
> and possibly cause ancestral memories in the newer and premonitions in the
> older.
>
> For ghostly things--these are said to usually be engaging in some kind of
> repetitive motion: stuck in one place doing one thing.  I think it is
> possible that there is some kind of resonance effect: if you walk up and
> down the stairs in a similar way every day, perhaps whatever way you are
> consistently altering the reality field (cellular automaton?) can have some
> kind of cumulative effect.  So even in the future, your shadow may be seen
> to be engaging in this action.  If there is enough resonance to muster your
> mind, perhaps this being could even do things that were not part of its
> training, because they have begun to actively think and decide.
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