Comments on Some Questions About the Soul Taking into Account Actual Neurosciences Knowledge
34 Pages Posted: 23 Nov 2016
Date Written: November 20, 2016
Abstract
The distinction between mind and body is everyone's experience. Mind is universally accepted as immaterial, disagreement is about what is the mind immaterial stuff. Whenever this stuff is considered not obeying the rules of Physics but having supernatural properties a dualistic conception of mind and body is assumed. Nowadays, it is undisputable that the brain is the seat of the mind, although many claim that mind can not be reduced to the physiology of the brain. If mind and soul are related entities, some sort of relation between the soul and the brain has to be accepted.
Modern neurosciences are disclosing the complexities of the cerebral processing and the knowledge acquired about the dynamics of the neural circuits inspires new insights both about the soul/mind/brain relationships as well as about the very nature of mind and soul. Some of these modern theories assume that quantum events are the core of mental states.
Here, mind is proposed to result from controlled quantum events and relations between soul, mind and brain are discussed taking into consideration the questions raised by Saint Thomas Aquinas about the soul, because of its importance to our occidental culture. and because it raises the most fundamental questions about soul or spirit shared by the most important existing religions.
Keywords: brain, sool, Aquinas, Quantum Computing, Distributed Processing Systems, Formal Languages
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