Humans Have Souls

Pro may have missed a few things... 1. The agreed definition of immaterial for this debate says "rather than contingent on the physical." Pro asserts: "Just because something is contingent on something, this does not mean that it is not immaterial." My response: Actually, that's exactly what it means, in this debate...since consciousness is contingent on the physical, which is counter to the definition of immaterial, consciousness is not immaterial, and therefore not a soul. 2. Pro's pieces of evidence, in the form of Robert Lanza quotes, weren't Robert Lanza quotes. Pro stated, 1st round: "Lanza continues: 'Lanza also believes...the body can be dead...absorbing consciousness which migrated to this universe.'" My response: Lanza continues by saying "Lanza believes?" Who is he? Tarzan? Does Lanza always speak in the 3rd person? Pro, all of your "evidence" from Dr. Lanza is just Signs of the Times's paraphrase of their interpretation of Lanza's work; these are not Lanza's own quotes, even if Pro says they are. Pro, why should we trust your sourcing? 3. I had mentioned Robert Lanza's lack of experimental evidence for his claims of biocentrism and the idea of a traveling consciousness. Pro complains: "My opponent seems to dismiss this entire argument on the basis that Lanza has been critiqued by many people. This an extremely poor rebuttal." My response: Nope. It wasn't that he's been critiqued; it was WHAT he's been critiqued for. The people I cited all had critiqued Lanza on his lack of testable predictions about the immortal consciousness. There's no experimental evidence for Lanza's biocentrism idea, period. I dismiss Lanza's ideas based on the lack of experimental evidence, which neither Lanza nor Pro has provided. 4. Pro mentioned first round that "consciousness is a spiritual product of the brain" and sourced it. There are three problems with this. A. The source was answers.yahoo.com, which isn't authoritative on matters of consciousness, neuroanatomy, or philosophy. B. Pro's link did not link properly in order for us to verify it. C. Pro DIRECTLY contradicts himself in the 2nd round by saying "I am not basing [the soul] off spirituality...therefore, I am going with immaterial - not spiritual." My response: So which is it Pro? Is consciousness/the soul "a spiritual product of the brain" as you claim it is in round 1, or is it "not spiritual" as you claim in round 2? 5. The definition, agreed on by Pro, for spiritual in this debate: "spiritual - of or relating to religion or religious belief" http://www.debate.org... Pro claims 2nd round: "Spiritual =/= religious. If my opponent wants we can discuss why this is not the case separately" My response: Then why did you agree to a definition that literally is the opposite of what you're saying? 6. This is perhaps the most crucial of Pro's misses. https://theamericanscholar.org... Since Pro only cited secondary sources about Lanza's work, Pro missed the most important source...Lanza's own work. You see, what I have sourced above is Robert Lanza's own article, with his own words, published in the American Scholar; there is no secondary source or paraphrasing. Since Pro is using Robert Lanza to demonstrate that consciousness is immaterial, I must see what Lanza says about the contingency of consciousness on the physical. After clicking the link to The American Scholar article by Robert Lanza, go down to about the 20th paragraph and Lanza clearly states: "Consciousness cannot exist without a living, biological creature to embody its perceptive powers of creation." https://theamericanscholar.org... Lanza uses this as his reasoning to adopt a biocentric view of the universe...read it for yourself. So Pro, if the very source you're using to demonstrate the immateriality of consciousness claims that consciousness is contingent on a living, biological creature, then how do you reconcile this? Pro, is Lanza correct that consciousness is contingent on biological creatures? *Now on to Pro's A and B thought experiments.* Pro has us imagine that there's a human with a neuronal brain and consciousness, A. Pro then has us imagine that there's an exact copy of A's head and body, we'll call B. Then we are to imagine that both A and B are put in two separate dark rooms with the same temperature and air pressure. Pro claims either A & B have the exact same awareness or A & B have separate awareness. The latter seems correct to me, and here's why: The moment you make the copy of A, B is already receiving different stimuli than A. Before even putting them in their separate rooms, A and B must be in two different points in space; they are in fact humans, thus on the macro physics scale. At these different points in space, A and B receive vastly different stimulus from light, radiation, gravity, objects and their distinct relative distances from A and B, bacteria, and dust. Yes, by being in different points in space stimulus affects you differently, and A and B are no exception. Since the stimulus is in fact different for both A and B, their consciousness is unrelated to each other; one has to account for natural fluctuations in stimulus that stimulate each person's consciousness differently. So, by the time A and B get to their sequestered rooms, B has already been inundated with different stimuli than A, so their consciousness is different. Even in the controlled rooms, there are minor differences, and these all stimulate consciousness differently. Pro says: "imagine that A"s brain was instantly replaced with the newly created brain of B"s. From the physical point of view, nothing in A"s physical composition has been changed." My response: Nope. The new brain that A receives has already been exposed to other stimulus that A's original brain was not exposed to, so it is physically different now. Different neurons have fired, different amounts of blood were sent to the brain, and the cells of each brain have changed to account for these differences given only A's and B's different positions in space and the fluctuations of stimuli there within. So, because stimuli is different in different points in space, conscious brains react and change differently to these stimuli. The consciousness is still contingent on the physical. I maintain that consciousness is contingent on neurons as Cambridge University declares, I'll add that Dr. Robert Lanza agrees that consciousness is contingent on biological beings, and I also maintain that humans do not have souls, because Pro has not demonstrated anything immaterial being part of humans as the definition for soul requires. Oh, though irrelevant to this debate Pro claims: "Since every neuron in A"s brain is physical and deterministic..." My response: Just because it's physical, doesn't mean it's deterministic. Since there are so many naturally fluctuating stimuli (light, temperature, radiation), conscious beings' reactions are not deterministic; as the stimuli fluctuate, so do our reactions, which are physical.