From: kempmp@phoenix.oulu.fi (Petri Pihko)
Subject: Consciousness and the soul
Keywords: consciousness, soul, mental models, psychology
Organization: University of Oulu, Finland
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Sun, 24 Jan 1993 01:50:49 GMT

The recent talk on abortion touched on the subject of soul, which,
according to nearly all religions, must exist as an entity which is
somehow separate from the body and only temporarily linked to it. 
It was also claimed that science can never disprove the existence of
soul. This is true, but somewhat misleading - by its very nature, science
can never really _prove_ (or disprove) any hypothesis, it can only 
develop better and better theories and models of the world around us and,
in the end, inside our brain. 

So, what _is_ human soul? Many Christians I've talked to claim it is
exactly the part in me which is conscious, which makes decisions, which
thinks, which guides our body. So it is essentially our "self". (Please,
if you disagree with the above, present a better definition - I have never
heard any atheist definitions ;-)) 

Thus, this would imply that whenever I _want_ (ie, decide) to do something,
I would first make a conscious decision somehow, somewhere in my brain,
where the soul ( = self) supposedly resides, then show readiness to do
it (for muscle movements, this can be readily measured by the readiness
potential, which shifts to a different value before the muscle can contract),
and then, finally, do what we wanted.

Research on brains and consciousness has, however, demonstrated that
this is not the order of events. For instance, Libet et al. (no, I don't
have the reference at hand, unfortunately) have found that the readiness
potential always comes first, and after a delay of approx. 400 ms, the
subjects can report they wish to (flex their fingers, in this case).
The time of a conscious desire was measured by allowing the subjects to
watch a revolving spot and to report its position at the time they felt the
urge to move. 

Thus, it seems as if the conscious "self" weren't so much in control 
after all, which would be a real contradiction with the above definition
of soul. So, where is the "free will"? I make a wild guess here, but
why do we have to link free will with the highest level of consciousness?
I think it is the unconscious (or, the lower level of consciousness, see
below) event in the brain that is really "free", ie, the "cause". But the
conscious brain, once it becomes aware of what is going to happen, can
veto the action 100...200 ms before it would have taken place, as was
also demonstrated in Libet's studies.

In an article by Susan Blackmore (in New Scientist, 1 April 1989), where 
Libet's work is also described, she tells us about some more radical 
views: Consciousness is just an illusion, an afterthought to help us. 
The concept of self, which is the brain's mental model of itself, separates
"me" from "the rest of the world". 

It takes half a second to realise you've read this.

Blackmore develops the idea further; she suggests that the brain develops
many (infinitely many?) conscious mental models at all perceptual levels,
but there is only one "me", my model of self. Thus, the rest of my body
appears to be unconscious, since the other models do not include the concept
of self. 

..

I would like to hear comments on this, also from the pro-soul Christians
(if you read this newsgroup). The reason I post this to alt.atheism is
that I think we have no reason to believe that our souls could be saved,
if we don't even have any "soul", just a mental model. 

Petri

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 ___. .'*''.*        Petri Pihko    kem-pmp@          Mathematics is the Truth.
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       ' *' .* '*    SF-90650 OULU  kempmp@           the Game.
          *'  *  .*  FINLAND         phoenix.oulu.fi  -> Chemistry is The Game.