What is a soul ?

[Kulaf]

I don't think a soul is anything. Souls do not exist. People are afraid of dying so they invent a part of themselves that is immortal. People may believe that souls exist, just like they may believe that ghosts exists but that does not make them any more real than the tooth fairy.

A part of you IS imortal.......science be praised!

[Partha]

When I turn up the radio, that's when I know it's got soul.

[Alluveal]

Vanilla Ice doesn't count...

[Ariannda Kusanagi]

Vanilla ice didn't even count in the late 80's

Harlowe he said "I believe that it is the soul Christians think of". He did NOT say "I believe in the soul Christians think of"

Are you pregnant or something ? you seem to be nit picking even more then usual ...

[Select]

Having an Alpha Female complex creates an obsessive desire to put other females down to establish authority.

Allu - YEEEEER NEXT.

[Revenant_Blues]

Living on a world where transit between individual nations results in arrivals analogous to visiting another planet, such a question is at least uneasily approached, let alone answered. A soul is infinitely defined differently dependent upon who one asks for said definition, yet a finite number of philosophical explanations exist complicated by myriad diversity of individual opinion.

Let us separate the psyche from the supposed soul-- gelid mathmatical logic from special natal instinct further distilled to instinctual insight, guilt from basic moral transgression, and alturistic love of environmental sensory input (a startlingly beautiful sunset) and the base spirit of other human beings; chemical reactions or transcendent, supernal sentience?

My belief regarding the soul is pertinent only to those who know and care for my person (spirit?) and thus rings archaic and does not speak to attempted public definition. Nonetheless, I personally believe in the Ba and Karma has proven itself-- sometimes painfully viable. To a naysayer, the "gut feeling" must arise from actual guts, yet I've seen neither souls nor feelings in nary a gut pile ... human or otherwise.

Something preternatural our flesh embodies ... call it immagination, call it chemical manipulation; dismiss it with great caution.

[Revenant_Blues]

[Dd: Deleted a bunch of repeats that the board caused]

[Alluveal]

Dude.... Ritalin and the Submit button = bad mix.....

I dig Harlowe's posts. Besides, she has a dirty Gigli-like secret on me and that's enough . . . oh yes, that's enough.

(dramatic pause)

[Harlowe]

Well I can see Select & Ari have turned into Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum. Ari, you were nit-picking Klast shithead. He answered your question. If you could read his entire post and not see "HIS" opinion in that, well, we know which Tweedle you are.

Allu isn't going to be next because she along with Ark and a few others are actually intelligent and well-spoken. Nothing to nit-pick there, I enjoy everything they post.

[Ariannda Kusanagi]

Frankly I resent the implication that I am neither intelligent nor well spoken as while it may not be my exact forte on this board I have proven to be both. You choose to nit pick me because you view me to be some dumb-blonde who can't seem to carry a coherent thought in a bucket much less a conversation with someone as superior as yourself.

The question is "What is a soul". I asked for a clarification on a particular post, not to nit pick but to gain further insight from a regular poster who is (as far as all things go around here) someone I consider to be a friend, as I have sought from all of you by hitting the submit button to begin with, and I fail to see how that makes me either ignorant or stupid, but thanks for the re-evaluation on my persona. I'll be sure to carry such wisdom with me down the path of enlightenment as I further search for self worth and validation along the way via Brell Rants.... lol oh wait !

The ideals and thoughts and mistakes that are knitted both around and inside everyone form certain illusions that allow us to let others see what we choose them to see. This is part of your soul. We choose to "bear our soul" to those whom we deem appropriate and worthy, and we allow them to see us at our most vulnerable. I believe our soul is the essence within us that gives us all a bit of our own spark, an tangible portion of what makes US human and helps to separate us from the apes and the dogs some of our forefathers believe we arose from. The soul is the bit inside you that makes you unique, that makes you kind and that drives you to do great deeds. Sometimes the deeds are evil (as we've established thanks to Allu, whom I agree with) and sometimes they're as simple as moving that turtle out of the road. The soul is what allows you to function as a human in a normal capacity. I think some people have more of a soul then others, or at least a deeper soul, and this is what separates normal people, from great people (again evil or otherwise). The soul doesn't differentiate between good and evil, it simply exists and is in an unreachable place. However I also think certain things that happen in life do damage our souls, and perhaps sometimes our will to live. When someone says "I've had my heart broken" clearly their heart didn't shatter into a million pieces as many teenage girls would have you believe, but perhaps a piece of their soul had been taken by the callousness of another human being. what happens to this piece of soul that's been taken from it's owner I can't say, but I think it still exists in little bits beauty all around us.

[Garrdor]

The soul is fear. Fear that we slip into the darkness once all our organic functions/sensory receptors cease.

[Kulaf]

Why fear? Fear is the animal response to death......the do anything at all costs to live response. That is what is hard wired into your brain. I would argue that soul is hope and nobility. That ability that let's you toss yourself on a grenade to save your buddies even though you know you will probably die. The response that let's you take a bullet instead of your child.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Why fear? Fear is the animal response to death......the do anything at all costs to live response. That is what is hard wired into your brain. I would argue that soul is hope and nobility. That ability that let's you toss yourself on a grenade to save your buddies even though you know you will probably die. The response that let's you take a bullet instead of your child.

Those are hardwired reactions too. Plenty of examples of that in the animal kingdom.

[Kulaf]

Not at all the same.....because animals are not aware of their own mortality. That is what seperates us.......we know we are doomed to die.

[Alluveal]

The soul is fear. Fear that we slip into the darkness once all our organic functions/sensory receptors cease.

What a pleasant thought. Come BACK TO THE LIGHT, CAROLANNE.

[Garrdor]

The 'light' is only preferred over the dark because we've yet to develop decent nocturnal eyesight. Naturally we would lump that visualization into the support of something we view as 'good'.

Sorry, didn't mean to get all anal over a movie quote :-p

[Kulaf]

Let there be light.

[Select]

Not at all the same.....because animals are not aware of their own mortality. That is what seperates us.......we know we are doomed to die

I disagree. With seeing your buddies get mauled by the lion and eaten while still alive and doing everything you can to avoid that same fate, I think animals know and I think they know better than we do. Elephant graveyards could be another example.

[Ariannda Kusanagi]

That plays back into the fight or flight instinct present in both humans and animals Select. It's the same as a guy waving a gun, you move, or you get killed. The same goes with the elephants and the lions. It's not that they are aware of their mortality, it's that they're afraid of a natural predator. I would be under the impression (however not being an elephant and having never asked one I can't say for certain) that they aren't necessarily under the impression they're going to die, it'd be more like an "OMG THATS BAD!" kind of thing.

[Select]

Elephants make the many miles trek to die where other elephants go to die. That has nothing to do with fight or flight.