You Have No Soul And Neither Do I

Probably the most famous (and most often quoted) philosophical idea is that of "I think therefore I am". The great French philosopher Renee Descartes first put forward this idea and the majority of people that quote it have no idea what it means. What Descartes did to come to this conclusion is one of the simplest and yet also most revolutionary thought experiments ever. Descartes realised that the simple human senses that we use to make sense of the world (taste, touch, smell and so on) are actually very poor. They can be easily misled and confused. We've all seen those simple optical illusions that can confuse the part of the brain that deals with sight incredibly easily. He postulated (ooooo fancy) the possible existence of an "Evil Demon" that deceives our senses to influence us for it's own ends creating a false world around us (think the Matrix). A scary Evil Demon creating a fake world around you... scary. So with this possibility now raised what exactly in this world can we say definitely exists; that does not rely on our senses for us to know or experience?

Descartes questioned the existence of everything. He stripped everything back. He systematically eliminated everything that could only be known to exist through the senses and came to a rather uncomfortable truth. The only thing he could be entirely sure existed was himself. Everything else could be an illusion created by the "Evil Demon", the only certainty being that if he is thinking then he must exist as he would not be able to think without existing. "I think therefore I am". The chair you are sitting in. You can see it but couldn't that be an illusion? You can feel it but what if that's just false sensations being sent to your brain? You can smell it and taste it (Are you licking your chair? Gross.) but these can both be fooled too.

So Descartes was left stuck on a metaphorical rock in a vast sea of complete uncertainty. All he could be sure of was his own existence. Pretty scary huh? But Descartes had a way off his rock. He had a way out. He had an answer!

At this point Descartes went from being one of the greatest philosophers in history (I mean a true genius) to an absolute simpleton of the lowest order. What could he possibly say to undo all of his great work and reduce his fantastic thought experiment to nothing more than a badly constructed delusional mess?

Yep that's right he brought God into it.

Descartes said that even though everything else in reality may not exist, God (of course) exists ("But what about all the questioning? How do you know God exists? Through your senses? But you said...") and God is good ("Wait how do you kn...") so God would never deceive us so everything is actually real and our senses are great and all is right and happy in the world!

He actually did this. He came up with the most impressive piece of critical thinking ever and then he ruined it completely. It makes me weep to think that such a great mind was held back so much by his beliefs. For him it was fine to question the existence of reality itself but it was too much of a stretch to question his Lord. Really sad.

But how does this link to the (non)existence of the soul as described in the title of this here blog post? Well Descartes went one better than just giving everything up to God he also said that his thought experiment shows proof (of a sort...) of the existence of the soul. He reduced everything down to a singular "I" which he argued was his soul. His true essence, the essential part of himself that could not be divided.

I don't agree.

Before I go into why lets take a quick delve into the different philosophical beliefs about the soul. Plato believed in the existence of the soul and described it as being split into different parts. He used the allegory (fancy word for metaphor which is a fancy word for "story to make hard stuff knowable") of a chariot. The charioteer represents intellect and reason which tries to guide the soul to truth. The chariot is pulled by two horses, the one horse being moral impulse and "noble" passions, the other horse being irrational passions and... appetites shall we say. As these two horses are opposites there is conflict and it's not all smooth sailing. The charioteer must try his best to steer the soul as a whole to truth.

This idea may be familiar if you know anything about the psychologist Sigmund Freud. He proposed the idea of the Id, Ego and Superego making up the unconscious mind and being the driving force behind the personality and they are essentially the same as the chariot but rather than being immaterial soul-stuff they are constructions and ways of functioning in the brain.

In Hinduism (and many other beliefs) the soul is eternal and can be reincarnated into new bodies, the quality of your next life determined by how good of a life you have lived in your current incarnation. This idea helped cement the caste system which is still in some areas enforced today. Yay...

In Christianity... well there are about a bajillion differing views as always. Some say there is a soul and it's immortal, some say there is a soul but it's not immortal, others say that human souls are immortal but animal souls aren't (Thomas Aquinas to be exact. If he's right it means that you ain't seeing Fido in Heaven. Sorry but those are the rules. Apparently.) What they do seem to agree is that the soul is an incorporeal substance that makes up your personality and "inner self".

So does this mean there's a chariot lodged in your body somewhere? Well no obviously (that was just a "story to make hard stuff knowable") but if there isn't a chariot in you then what is in you making up your personality and where is it? What's it made of? How does it work?

As you are, I am sure, aware the soul has yet to be found in dissections of the human body (can you imagine if that did happen? "What's that squishy grey bi... OH JESUS IT'S THE SOUL!" But yeah that won't happen...). A supporter of the whole "humans have souls" argument would say this is because the soul is not a physical substance. It is not of this world. It is a spiritual substance that cannot be experienced by mere human senses. Now this sounds very impressive and mysterious but it is actually the perfect set up to, what I believe, is the most devastating argument against the souls' existence:

"If the soul is a transcendental, spiritual substance that cannot be touched or seen or experienced in any way in the physical world how exactly does it drive the body?"

The soul is often called the "ghost in the machine", the spiritual driving force of the physical meat suit we call the body but if this is true then how can the ghost press any of the buttons or pull any of the levers of this great complicated machine? Casper can't pick up a banana how is he expected to drive a monster truck?

(The idea of the "little man pulling levers in your head" leads to another argument against the soul. If the soul is the little man driving the body does that mean there is another little man driving the soul? And is there then another man driving that man and another driving that one and so on forever? Is it infinite regression? Does the chain stop at some point? If it does stop, why does it stop? What makes the soul so special that it is self-controlled? How does it self-control?)

How does the soul interact with the body? Is there a soul molecule? Does it swerve about and direct the physical molecules of your body? How do these two polar opposites interact? I would say that there is no interaction because the soul does not exist.

Another metaphor for you (this post is chock full of them...), a foreign student comes to visit a university and asks to be shown this university he has heard so much about. A lecturer takes him round and shows him the accommodation they have, the fantastic science labs, lecture halls, sports facilities, everything. He even shows him the brand new toilets. After the tour the lecturer asks the student what he thinks and the student replies "Those were all really nice buildings but where is the university?" (Hilarious isn't it? Isn't it? Well it shouldn't be. It's a metaphor not a joke. This is philosophy. This stuff is serious.) The student was expecting the university to be something above and more than just the buildings and it could be said that this is the same with people that dissect the brain to try and find where exactly the soul is.

When someone damages their brain their personality can change. Phineas Gage is a famous example (and it's an amazing story). His entire mood and personality changed after a metal pole got blown through his brain. He became short tempered and rude contrasting to how he was before the accident, a patient kind man who rarely lost his temper (Who can blame him right? I would be pretty short tempered and rude if a metal pole and been shot through my face at high speed). If the physical structure and well being of your brain can affect your personality then what is there to suggest that there is something over and above the brain itself that is the "real" you?

And then of course there is the fact that people change over time. How can the soul be "perfect, pure and eternal" if people change? I am certainly not the same person I was when I was, say, 13 (Thank God. Does anyone ever look back and think "I was so much better at being a person at 13..."?) so do souls change and grow? If this is true then  what happens when we die? Do souls keep changing? After a million years of being a soul floating around Heaven, meeting all of your virtuous heroes and the greatest people of history, will you really be the same person that first arrived at the pearly gates?

I feel like people's opposition to the idea of us being simply the product of our brains, is somewhat rooted in the fact that us humans are a big headed bunch. "I'm more than just my brain! I have an immortal soul that is pure and complex unlike my simple physical body" (Snooty or what? Everyone looks down on this plane of reality until you tell them that you have a plate of cookies. All of a sudden they care a great deal about the real world...) It could also be the great fear of death that is instilled in our very genes. It's damn stressful knowing you are going to die. If there was a way for you to survive past death then wouldn't you want to believe in it? Wouldn't that be a great comfort? It also allows you to meet up with your loved ones! That would be nice.

So anyway back to Descartes (You thought I'd forgotten...). Descartes was a genius but unfortunately it appears he was human too and fell for the trap of wanting to believe in something so much he sacrificed proof and logic for it. He ran away from a scary thought and hid behind his God. So what is the "I" if we have no soul? Well some philosophers say Descartes was wrong to stop at "I". All that we can really REALLY be sure of is that thought is occurring. We can't be so sure that there is an "I" thinking but we know that there must be thinking happening somehow. So now we seem to be in an even worse position. We don't even have the "I" to lean on. Now it seems we are just floating thoughts in the void.

There is though, a way off the island of doubt. We accept reality as it appears. We have no proof, no evidence to say that reality is real but we also have very little reason to question it. Things usually stick to the logical rules that we observe in the universe. We can't rule out the possibility of the Evil Demon but there is nothing to suggest that it exists. So is it better to just accept that reality is real? If we do then we can explain why we can reduce everything down to just thought. The interactions of the brain come together to form the self. The shape of the different areas of the brain and the strength of the connections between them can explain the personality and the individual. The soul is not a single simple substance but the interactions of literally millions of neurons in your brain. This explains people's capacity for change, how people's moods and decisions can be influenced by what they eat, the weather, temperature, hormones. Everything becomes clear. When we die, we die entirely because our brain ceases to function. There would be no need for an afterlife.

But is it right to just give in and hide away from the question? Well is it really possible to keep asking the question? Descartes himself admitted that this total rejection of all of reality was essentially impossible to keep up. You still get hungry, tired, you still need the loo. Perhaps we are too rooted in reality to sufficiently question it. Descartes was so entrenched in Christianity he could not imagine a world where it was an illusion. Perhaps our soft, squishy, ape-brain is just too dependent on reality to be able to reject it. If we continue to grow and expand the capabilities of our mind, to develop our souls to even greater depths, then perhaps, in some distant future where man is unrecognisable but still considers this question, we may be able to contemplate it.

For now, the implications of rejecting the existence of the soul are really quite severe. The majority of religions that preach of an afterlife are cast aside. Psychics and other charlatans (sorry mystics) are put out of a job. We no longer have the crutch of the next life to fall on when times get tough. When our loved ones die we lose the hope that we will see them again. Is this too much to cope with?

I believe that when you die... well then at that point you are dead. That's it really. Brain activity ceases, you decompose, the materials that make up your body go back out into the universe to be used in some entirely new way. Why do I think this? Well there is no evidence that points to any other conclusion.

I have come to this conclusion through a lot of thinking. I've debated back and forth with myself (and others) and I can't help but come to this idea. One fact that put me onto this course of thinking was finding out that a woman is born with all of the eggs that she will ever produce. No more will be created during her life. What this means is that half of your genes are as old as your mother. How incredible is that. This revelation made me think and I realised that all the eggs are just cells that have split from other cells. It's also true of the sperm cells. They are merely cells that have split from other cells. Those cells split from other cells which originally were produced by another sperm cell and an egg cell. It's the same with those sperm and egg cells. They are from their previous parents sperm and egg cells and so on back back back for millions of years. You are an extension of your ancestors  combined cells and, in many ways, not a separate being. You have just budded off them.

Now just let that sink in a second and see if it hits you the same way as it hit me. Just think what this implies. At no point in this long line cells begetting cells have cells spontaneously popped out of nothing. They have always come from previously existing cells. Life has never stopped and then started again (as far as we know), it's just been a continuos chain stretching across the eons to this very moment where I am writing this. We are all essentially one organism. We are made of the same stuff, we are all just cells growing forth from other cells. It's not just you and me and the rest of the human race. Every single living thing is made up of cells that already existed and replicated. This means that we are all (all known living things on this planet) the products of a small group of the original living cells. Those first living beings that came into existence through the collecting together of strings of proteins in just the right chemical conditions began to grow and replicate, and now here we stand. We are all connected and in the grand scheme of the universe there is almost no difference between you and the mould that grows on bread if you leave it out for too long. I think that's amazing. This idea doesn't make me feel small, on the contrary I feel like I am a part of the universe. I am not a single "I" sitting lonely on a rock, I am a part of a great system that is simply unimaginably old. I don't need a soul to feel special. I'm a living creature. That's incredible to me.

It's a miracle! He's wrote another thing!

Soooo...

Miracles.

No.

Here's why:

Miracles are defined as "an event not ascribable to human power or the laws of nature and consequently attributed to a supernatural, especially divine, agency." So a miracle by definition is something that breaks the very laws of nature, something seemingly impossible, incredible, fantastical. The only thing capable of these feats is an omnipotent deity or supernatural force. The conversion of water to wine, walking on water, rising from the dead... pretty impressive. Personally I prefer Derren Brown but each to his own.

So why don't I believe in miracles? Well mostly because I don't ascribe to any particular religious belief (see other posts for why) so when I come across something that doesn't seem to make sense or have a logical cause then I don't just instantly say "[Insert appropriate deity/supernatural force here] has done this! Praise be to [him/her/it]!" I like to find out how and why the event has occurred.

Case in point (and one of the funniest stories in the entire world) the story of the "crying" trees in Frezno, California. A tree outside of a cathedral started to weep the tears of God himself (strange how they didn't say they were the tears of Allah or the tears of the Norse goddess Freyja just went straight for their own god...). People came from all over to bask in the glory of God's wonder. Crying trees. Pretty incredible huh? The one problem with this is that it wasn't actually tears. It was bug poop. Aphids were sucking the sap out of the tree and then pooping out a liquid-like substance that rained down due to the sheer number of the aphids. So people were travelling from all over to go and stand under a tree and get crapped on by aphids whilst calling out to God Almighty. In my opinion funny as Hell.

So how was it that people so easily believed that these were the tears of God? Well first off ignorance. These people didn't know about the aphids. This is perfectly excusable. They didn't know. Fair enough (although it does apparently happen every year and there were trees down the road that were also "crying" but anyway...) people can't be expected to know the reason for something they have never seen before (...every year...) but the way you react to something new is down to you as a person. Why didn't anyone question this? Well the second reason they believed this was a miracle is that they have never had to question anything in their entire lives. This is now just speculation but something tells me that they haven't ever had to think of anything for themselves. Parents, school, politicians and right the way through their lives the Good Book. They have been brought up to follow and at no point was questioning encouraged.

Now I don't see myself as some "free-spirit, man!" or some counter-culture guru who "knows the way things truly are" (I'm not that much of a dick). I am absolutely sure that I have been influenced by my parents and society and all the other various influences that can influence me but what I believe sets me apart from those who believed a tree was crying is that I would ask "Why is this tree crying?"

If I saw a tree crying I would not go "Wow. That's cool. God must have done that" I would find out exactly how plant-life had developed the ability to cry then I would probably offer it a tissue and tell it to pull itself together. My mind boggles that the first person that noticed this just accepted that this must be a miracle and didn't question it which brings me onto reason number kolme (3 in Finnish. Does that count as revision?): These people were looking for a miracle.

It's a sad fact that on this speck of rock and water, which is spinning round a massive (but not that massive in the general scheme of things) ball of nuclear fusion, not everyone is quite content. People are always looking for signs, especially from their chosen deity, because loneliness, for most, is a fate worse than death. In the TV series Vikings, a Northumbrian monk is kidnapped by vikings (surprise!) and contemplates the slaughter and sale into slavery of all his kinsmen. He calls out to God and asks why this has happened and why He won't answer his prayers, desperately looking for a sign that he is not alone because that would be so incredibly crushing. 

(Rather cleverly, on the writers part, he hears a noise and then finds an owl has flown into the house. He says "Oh it's just an owl" but if he was a viking he would see this as a sign from the gods. Owl's have no meaning in his own religion and so it is dismissed as a coincidence...)

If you had a sign, anything at all, to show that you weren't alone in this gigantic infinite void we call the universe, how reassured would you be? To know that everything will be ok and you don't need to be scared anymore. Perhaps more importantly that you are right about the way the world works. 

"Wait a minute" I hear you say "just because this one was poop doesn't invalidate all the other miracles!" and that's true but I can dismiss a fair few more miracles with only a single sentence.

Why did God perform this miracle?

"Jesus has appeared in my toast!" Why?
"The Virgin Mary has appeared to me on a cork!" Why?

The really stupid miracles where it's Jesus' face on some toast or his mum on a mouldy wall are simply pareidolia (Google it, I'm not doing everything for you...). Why would Jesus turn up on some toast? An omnipotent deity, that can literally create and destroy matter itself spends his time taking selfies with heated bread? Seriously? I kind of talked about this in the post I did on religious hypocrisy but if I was God I think malaria would come higher up on the list of "Stuff I should deal with" than imprinting my likeness with the help of electrical appliances onto wheat products. Anyone that actually believes that that's what God does is essentially insulting their one true deity.

Even the famous ones like turning water into wine and walking on water were (if they have been reported truthfully and accurately in that most inaccurate of books) stupid miracles. Very impressive tricks but it's not going to do much for tsunami victims.

These are just useless miracles, obviously they are stupid but what about when someone is saved from a natural disaster or survives a horrific car crash unscathed? What about when Jesus fed the 5000 or healed the sick? Well I think I can cast a shadow of doubt onto these miracles with one question too:

So God is selective?

Jesus feeds the 5000 but leaves all the other starving people in the world to go hungry? He cures one guys leprosy but doesn't actually eradicate it from the face of the planet? He heals SOME blind and lame people but still leaves open the possibility and opportunity for everyone else to go blind or lame?

This stumps the whole "All loving God" idea pretty good. He saves some guy from a car crash but the kid born with a hole in their heart doesn't get a look in. How loving.

At this point the devout believer in miracles desperately flicks though his papers and tries to find a miracle that can survive this barrage of questioning. They don't find one.

The only way out of this is to accept that their God cares more about toast selfies than dying children, accept that their God is not all-powerful or he isn't all-loving, accept that their God is selective and may well not love them or reject the existence of miracles. I suggest that the last one is the most comforting and doesn't impinge on God (as long as you can live with the whole "part of His plan" thing and that he isn't going to come and save you. You will have to save yourself or look to others for help).

So why doesn't God intervene? Well imagine that miracles are real, the laws of nature are putty in the hands of God. It would be terrifying. The laws of nature could change at any time. What if God decides to turn off gravity or walking on water becomes possible for everyone? What if it was more subtle like increasing the boiling temperature of water by 1 degree? How would you be able to live in this world of uncertainty? It would be utter chaos. But the world is not chaos it is strictly ordered. Why would God create such order and then 6000 years in (there are actually people that think the world is only 6000 years old which isn't actually far out. I mean they are only wrong by a few BILLION YEARS) just go "Screw it I want to walk on water" or "Crap, out of wine. Quick pass me the Evian"?

Miracles make no sense. It's non-sensical. It's bloody stupid.

So next time you see a story in the newspaper or hear of a miraculous occurrence, please stop and think to yourself "Could it just be bug poop?"