Do we have souls?

[darkstar3]

171. Uh huh...Have you ever dealt with a relative

who suffered from Alzheimer's? Dementia? Brain damage?

The facts are simple. Those stricken with these unfortunate problems later in life suffer fundamental changes in self. Their feelings, their senses of right, wrong, decency, social interaction...their very grasp on the nature of life and the world around them changes in a way so jarring that the only way to describe the change is "they are a totally different person now."

I'm not exaggerating this, either. If anything, i haven't conveyed the raw magnitude of change. Brain damage patients have been known to suffer drastic changes in emotional states leading to the loss of relationships and jobs. Alzheimer's and dementia patients have been known not just to regress to an earlier state, as is depicted in popular culture, but to change into a person so unrecognizable that family members simply give up on visiting them in hospital.

It is your brain, unequivocally, that gives you the sense of self to which you refer. It is your brain that gives you your sense of morality, your consciousness, and your emotions. You say that's offensive? Well let me tell you what I find offensive. I find the fact that you twist my words into "superior intellect = superior value" offensive. I find the fact that your view is so anthropocentric that you ignore other animals with consciousness, emotions, and morality offensive.

And I find the idea of an "inner being, or essence" to be wishful thinking. I even engage in that wishful thinking sometimes, but I don't give that wishful thinking anywhere near the credence of actual fact.