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I normally don't reply to comments because I simply don't have the time these days. But a guest reader brings up an interesting point. What does constitute the soul? Is it simply our moral compass? Or is it our emotional response to a particular stimulus? Or is it simply our ability to make a decision based upon intuition; gut feeling? One of the many subtexts of this tale asks exactly that question? If a person's life experiences and personality traits could be transferred into a vessel, or device, that would permit worldly sensory experience, would the soul of that person be transferred as well? I would be interested in other opinions.
Peace of Spirit to All...
Kelly
Comments
Consciousness
How about consciousness and sensation? The difference between humans and many animals on one side, and rocks and machines on the other.
I really doubt that transferring one's personality and life experience into a vessel would put his consciousness there. Especially if the transfer is a copy. Horrifically if the transfer is a copy followed by murder deletion.
-- Daphne Xu (a page of contents)
Thought Provoking
Stories that question the edges of humanity are always interesting. At first I thought you were merely using your story to discuss the validity of binary discussions, but it was so much more. Excellent read. I love the way you developed your characters through the probing of your robotic hero. In my opinion your story would make a much better movie than many I've seen this year.
I believe our soul is our footprint. It is the summation of all of our life's activities. Selling our souls is committing an act so heinous that we're doomed to leave a negative footprint. If we leave the world a better place, we probably will have found a measure of happiness and in some way become immortal.
Beyond that . . . I'm not sure there is a beyond that.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Hmmm...
Dear Angela...
Thank you for your very kind comment. I love the analogy of a soul being like a footprint. It makes one think of one's personal legacy and invokes what we seem to 'feel' a soul should comprise.
May You Have peace Always...
Kelly
Does The Soul Exist?
I tried to address this issue in the first set of stories I published on this site, in which the central character discovers that his mind has been transferred - by means of a mysterious device - into the body of a young woman. He soon asks the question that gets to the nub of the matter: what exactly moved?
The answer I suggested was that the device somehow copied the patterns of neural activity that constitute his episodic (conscious) memory and used them to overwrite the young woman's, leaving the rest of her brain functions intact. It could do this because our conscious memories and those we use to ride a bike or catch a ball or indeed walk around without repeatedly falling flat on our faces are completely separate systems. This is why people suffering from amnesia don't usually forget how to use a knife and fork.
So what constitutes this character's identity? Is he simply the sum of his conscious experiences? Or is this the wrong question to ask?
The problem with such hard-to-pin-down terms as 'identity' and 'individuality' is that our brains contain no central decision-making unit. They run systems in parallel, unlike silicon-based computers that process information serially and are directed by a CPU. Although the enigma of consciousness is still very poorly understood, my own view is that it's an emergent phenomenon created by the brain's ability to predict the future by extrapolating the past. To cut a long story short, it has a better chance of survival if it makes me think in terms of desires, beliefs and goals, shaped, modified and improved by experience. Together they make up what I consider to be my 'self'.
But what about the 'vessel' you mentioned in your post? If it had an artificial brain capable of doing everything ours can, would we be justified in regarding it as essentially human? The point here is that whatever we called this entity, it would make absolutely no difference to how it operated. Were the first replicating molecules alive? Who cares? Their contribution to the future was the same either way.
Does the soul exist? Our brains - or rather the genes that made them evolve - certainly have a vested interest in persuading us that it seems to.
Ahhh...
Dear Nicki...
I made the acquaintance of a woman who manages decision making experiments at Columbia University and Princeton University. Of course she has no life running between New York City and Princeton, New Jersey. She is totally brilliant. Her undergrad thesis was published in The Journal of Experimental Psychology. Her masters thesis was ground breaking and has been spoken of in national and international circles. A thesis she did with her mentor at the University of Chicago is being reviewed by The National Academy of Science.
The reason I point all of this out is that her contention, and that of others in that same rarified atmosphere, is that psychology in all its forms (decision making, individuality, measures of self awareness) is nothing more than a pseudo-science. Nothing is written in stone and nothing can be quantified to exacting measures. In other words...it's not rocket science.
I've often spoken to her about decision making as it regards life choices. She believes that it is a wholly involving process. Learning, experience, and genetics all come into play. No one factor is greater than any of the others. The same seems to hold true for self awareness and the degree to which it is applied.
Using this woman again as an example... All of her clothing is black. In this way she never needs to worry about what to wear or how she looks. None of her amazing accomplishments have any true meaning to her outside the realm of her research. Her neglected to attend an award ceremony in her honor. Other than her lap top, phone, and smart watch, she has no possessions to speak of and doesn't seem to care about 'things'. She's the first to admit she has a limited vision of self awareness. This ran in her family. Her father was a chemist and ran a government lab and her mother was a mathematician at Chicago University.
So the nature of self awareness and decision making are still very much unknowns. And so is the functional anatomy of the brain for that matter. There are many new ideas in computer science that are revolving around duplicating brain function beyond simple decision making and these ideas involve the use of fluid environments that try to simulate neural synapses; the basis of all brain and body functions.
But, as you write, who cares? Whether we run or walk, we still get to where we're going. Thank you for your input and ideas. They were kind of the basis for writing the tale.
I Wish You Peace...
Kelly
Are we really talking soul or spirit?
The terms are often used synonymously, much like sex and gender. We all know that sex and gender aren't synonyms. In Christian circles, humans consist of three parts, body, soul and spirit with the soul and spirit being immortal, that is capable of existing after the body dies. (The big discussion of going to Hell or Heaven.) The soul, specifically being defined as "the thoughts, will, and emotions," while the spirit is the essence of the being... that which makes a person unique.
Just thought I'd throw that out there.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
So...
Dear Patricia...
I intentionally left theology out of the tale because the soul, and the spirit, are defined in so many different ways by each faith. Being a pagan myself, there is no real difference between the two (everything comes from and returns to the earth). I suppose the real question would be if a machine had the ability to emote, have likes and dislikes, but had none of the corporal needs of people (food, clothing, shelter, etc.), would it qualify as a 'being'? Without the corporal needs, (money, power and all other elements of the 'seven cardinal sins') would they become the meek who shall inherit the earth? Imagine a 'species' (they do randomly mutate) that's only purpose is to improve itself; more acute decision making, greater sensory abilities, stronger reasoning power, etc.
Without passing judgement, every house of worship has been a house of man (and woman), created to express an inner desire to acknowledge the gift of life and to answer those questions that have no answer in science (which at best is only a tool and not a belief system). However, all the rules, rituals, and everything inherent in a formalized theology are made by people who are always subject to those corporal needs. That is our flaw. Some choose to refer to this as 'original sin'. As a pagan I worship through the return of my energy to the 'common good'.
And...!!! Being dressed up and having somewhere to go (vanity???) is definitely one of the finer points of being flawed; one I definitely plead guilty to. ;-)
May You Have Peace Always...
Kelly