Spirit or brain?
 

     Where does the personality come from? A lot of the people on here don't buy into any religion, (myself included) but that doesn't mean we believe there is no spirit/soul. I was just wondering how people felt on this subject. Are we really just meat, with chemically programed responses, or something more that can move on when the body dies?

I think our brain gives us a baseline of personality--inherited, chemical/biological affects, general human tendencies, etc. But I definitely believe that our spirit gives color to the canvas (the brain).

Sperm donor and I share many personality traits (the way we laugh, our stubbornness, among them). But I'm a completely different person than he is--I'm empathetic, I'm more creative than mechanical, and I'm not afraid to show "sissy" emotions.

And if we didn't have spirit, there'd be too much predictability. I'd be just like my mom and dad, my mom would be just like her mom and dad, etc. We wouldn't truly be individuals. That would be boring as hell.

Man, if I were exactly like my mom and dad, I'd be in a world of trouble.

     Hmm, I don't know. I'd like to think that I'm more than blood and tissue, but I'm not sure that's a solid argument. When you consider how many facets a personality has, double it and then blend randomly an amazing variety could be produced.
     I have a friend that was adopted, in his mid-twenties he met his real mom. We were roommates at the time and I witnessed her making gestures and using body language I'd seen out of him for years. This was the first time they'd seen each other since the day he was born.
     My own Daughter has the same smartass tendencies that I, my father and my Grandfather have. As well as the tendency to not worry much about the affect of our words, also inherent in the family. Meanwhile, I keep my mouth in check around the girl-child and her mom actively discourages her sarcastic tendencies.
     Obviously, physical, mental and even emotional traits can be passed. Often times purely genetically, since even though they weren't taught they exist in the child.
     So, there has to be spirit because it's needed for variety? Hmm, no, I don't buy it due to the extreme diversity one individual can possess. I have a friend who's mom's a holy-roller now. When he was a teen she custom painted Harleys and lived a life appropriate to that job. Both persona's are sincere. One person can play many roles in their life. Two mixed? The mind boggles...

I've read articles claiming even tiny babies can pick up moods and attitudes of the people (family) around them. You might be teaching the kids things you don't even realize.
I don't know if it's true for children, but I've seen it in animals for sure.
If kids can do this then why couldn't they put together combos of emotion. If one parent has an emotion that is usually paired with the other parent having another emotion then when the first appears they would expect the second. Sort of a learned response. I'm just theorizing here but it seems possible. :confused:

     Ok, I'll buy that. However, I didn't know my Dad. I did however clearly get my smartass tendancy from him. I was away from him at about three months, and have only seen him a few times in my life. I garantee my mom was always disaproving of the sense of humor I seem to have picked up from him... Yet here I am, and my daughter is the same. (oh yeah, she's going to be trouble...)
     Also, that theory completely ignores my first example. He was seperated from his mom, literaly, on the day he was born. Yet their hands moved the same way when they talked twenty-something years later.
     By the by, am I to take it that you are on the spirit over body side of this?

I..um..well...I don't know. OH MY GOD....I don't have an opinion on this! xoxoxo Bruce slinks back to his van down by the river.:blush:

     Slink away you should! Begone, you are no longer worthy of the proud title, "Opinionated Bastard".

The decision on this issue should be obvious, unless you're a faith-loving bible-beater. The existence of a spirit has never been scientifically proven. The brain, genetics, and trait inheritance, however, HAVE been scientifically proven.

Which is more likely to be the source of anything? Something that is proven to exist, or something that exists only hypothetically?

"Mere accumulation of observational data does not constitute proof"
One of Heinlen's books.
Simply because you haven't seen the soul doesn't mean it isn't there. We can't see gravity, and definitely don't understand it, but it's there. What if the "soul" were some kind of magnetic field? Hmmm..that would explain why people driving while talking on cell phones are such dolts.

I never said the spirit wasn't there, I simply said that it hasn't been proven to exist. That's the difference between me and an atheist -- I don't rule out things that I know nothing about. (or, I try not to, at least.)

Attributing an effect to a cause that there's absolutely no evidence of, however, is pretty foolish in my opinion.

I tend to think of the "soul" as simply the conglomeration of a person's values, thoughts, and feelings... the combination of abstractions which make a person unique. Everyone has one, but it's nothing supernatural.

It is a bleak view to think of ourselves as chemically programmed meatsacks though... if there is no spirit or soul, no heaven and hell, and no great diety... if everything we think and do is preprogrammed response to chemicals and electrical impulses according to the laws of physics... if creativity is nothing more than a rogue electron strking a vulnerable neuron... then that means that everything was basically pre-decided the instant the universe was created. So if the universe were suddenly destroyed and a new one born in exactly the same fashion, we would lead the same lives, because all of the same rogue electrons would still hit the same vulnerable neurons at the exact same times. I would still type this same posting, and you would still read it and get the same "this guy is really full of bullshit" feeling you're experiencing now. Things like creativity, morals, and choice would all be illusions. Bleak.

One powerful reason to believe in an afterlife is the desire to think that there is more to life than being a helpless puppet in this version of the universe. So do I believe in an afterlife? I WANT to.... but my preprogrammed response happens to be one which won't allow me to easily swallow such an idea without evidence. And a "feeling" isn't evidence to me. Well, maybe circumstantial evidence.

Ok, I'm done.

I dunno, I think some things happen just by random chance. It could have happened one way, or it could just as easily have happened another way. If that idea is true, then the new universe would still end up completely different from its predecessor.

Well, what causes something to be random though? Does our concept of random really exist? Something that is seemingly random is really behaving exactly as it should according to the laws of physics, on any scale. Things are perceived as random to us because we cannot observe the cause, and/or the cause is too complex for us to grasp wholly, like the weather.

Even the direction that each subatamic particle came barreling out of the sigularity at the Big Bang (assuming you buy that theory) was governed by physics. If you put together the same set of circustances exactly, the laws of physics would still make the same calls and the same results would occur.

Of course if you can come up with something that is truly, genuinely random, then I am wrong. But I can't think of anything that is truly random.. everything is triggered by <i>something</i>.

Well, crap, I guess you've got me there!

Woo Hoo! That means when I look back at all the wrong choices I made, it wasn't my fault. It was preordained, preprogramed. Thanks, man.:beer: