Soul question

[Nirenai]

I guess it will take me some time to leave this board and start writing in Althanas...

I wish to create a Soulless (http://www.althanas.com/world/showpost.php?p=1730&postcount=3) character but the more than I think of it, the harder it is to begin. Perhaps I should just make an elven ranger or human knight or something...
How is soul defined? How is a thinking being defined even? There are body, mind and soul? Or just body and soul? If mind and soul are two different things, where does one end and the other begin?

If soul is what remains of beings after they die, what are they (the dead beings) then...without body and mind? Do they have memory of their past, knowledge they acquired while they were still alive?
Do they still have personality?


I tried to write something myself, but would appreciate any help I can get on this.
Soul is the essence of any thinking being and it differs from character to character. Once it is divided from its owner (once the being dies), it can encompass that being's feelings, urges, wishes,... together with that person's knowledge and wisdom, its final form depending on the past of that particular being.
It can be everything, from a mere shadow of a simple farmer, full of strong but confused emotions, to a highly defined remains of a scholar, with his knowledge included, and in rare cases, still with some traces of reason and personality.

[Dissinger]

Welcome to my world. The Soul is one of the most interesting concepts in human literature. Obviously its more than memory, but it also is less than and animating spirit within someone. Some argue ghosts are souls without bodies, and hence the tales of the Lost Souls.

The Soul obviously has to be something that is beyond the memory. Often times people lump personality into a soul, but if this is the case, then soulless in this case would have no personality. Obviously emotions and reactions have to occur, if they are to fit into society on even a tangental approach.

Its tough to define it, and this character especially has to have a full count of what a soul truly is. Hence why I feel that this isn't exactly an easy question to answer, let alone field. We're getting into metaphysics here, and that's a realm of philosophy as wide as the ocean is deep.

[Ramirez]

Souls are delicious.

[Nirenai]

I intended to present Nirenai as a being without emotional reactions to happenings around her, using her knowledge (= her experience from the similar events that occurred to her in the past) as the only filter that decides on her next action. In that way I could pretty much avoid defining soul.

The problem I see starts here:

[30%] Communicator – Soulless, being that they have no soul in their body, are able to allow a soul of the dead to inhabit them. This skill is normally used to allow the dead to speak to the living, leaving the Soulless being as a mere medium between the barrier. Unfortunately this skill, if untrained as it is in most Soulless, can be taken advantage of and allow a spirit/soul to force itself into the body without the consent of the being… be they too weak to repel the invader. ((Can be easily trained))
Since this is one of the reasons why I am so attracted to this race and wish to use this ability as main plot of Nirenai's story.

So the question I cannot but need to answer is what remains of beings once they die.

[Taskmienster]

Well, canon wise a "soul" after death goes to the Antifirmament, a place where all dead souls go. There is a gate keeper that doesn't care so much that souls go in without his watch, but is deeply engaged in keeping the souls IN the place. That being said, a soul is something that remains after your character dies.

However, being a philosophy major, this presents a SHIT TON of difficult questions that, oddly enough, I've been mired in the past few months. What is a soul is the question that spawned from, can humans feel true emotions? For example, love.

Can you feel love for another person? Or can you only feel an infatuation for another person based on the chemical reactions that a brain sends it's host in regards to certain aspects of a person? Meaning, do you 'love' the person, or 'love' things about the person... and in turn does that mean that if we can't feel emotions but only the chemical reactions that make us 'think' that we believe in emotions, that we have nothing 'creating' these emotions?

If we don't have something creating these emotions, does that mean that we as humans don't have souls?

Oddly enough, I can't answer this. Due to the fact that I question love as an example plenty of people in happy relationships (Mathias if he sees this) believe that love does indeed exsist for another person and not just a chemical reaction that guides our thoughts to feel for another person.

I'm a philosophy major, as I said earlier, and the question about souls tends to lead a person to philosophy regarding emotions, metaphysics, philosophy of religion, and eventually in an obscure way to epistemology...

Haha. That's probably the least helpful thing you will receive to answer that question of yours, but that's all questions that I can't answer but can only provide further things to ponder.

As for Osato and the Soulless race, I went off canon belief's instead of personal metaphysical beliefs... since it was MUCH easier. Honestly, if you believe people don't have souls, that would make the Soulless race the true, pure, and perfect race.

[Nirenai]

Haha. That's probably the least helpful thing you will receive to answer that question of yours, but that's all questions that I can't answer but can only provide further things to ponder.I'm not so sure about that...check Ramirezes answer. Veeery philosophical :P


As for Osato and the Soulless race, I went off canon belief's instead of personal metaphysical beliefs... since it was MUCH easier. Honestly, if you believe people don't have souls, that would make the Soulless race the true, pure, and perfect race.Im not so sure about soul-less beings being pure and perfect, especially since I share your thoughts about love (and soul as a stand alone feat of humans). Far from pure we are, khem khem.

Another interesting and completely opposite view on soul is, that it represents everything that is moral in humans. Feelings are a product of our body answering to environment, thoughts are of course a product of our brains functions, but moral rules are something that cannot be easily explained with common (darwinistic ) theories since they do not necessarily improve one's position in the world. Soul could be used to explain this moral behavior of generally egocentric, beastly human race.


But I didn't want to start a philosophic debate, nor is my knowledge of english language sufficient to allow me express my thoughts clearly, I was just wondering if Althanas already has some concept of afterlife, similar to ours or not, and what characteristics do remains of the deceased inherit from their past lives.

On the other hand, this conversation is extremely interesting and I wouldnt mind reading more opinions on the Soul (as known in real life).

[Taskmienster]

Morals are, in my opinion, truly expounded upon after the Deconstructionism of the 1960's (I believe it was). Since then Relativism has become a major factor not only with our belief in the personal inner cultural study, but too cultural study outside of our own enviroment. This is more Cultural Anthropology, which is my second major. Relativism begets cultural awareness, and in turn makes "morals" relative to certain aspects of certain societies. What may be immoral to some (such as marriage to multiple people, owning slaves or servants, or even cannibalism) is a relativistic viewpoint expressed by the understanding of different societies. In some those things are immoral, but to their culture they aren't, they're things they've always done and always will do.

Souls aren't to blame for egocentric philosophies about the human race, ignorance and the lack of wisdom (depending on your beliefs) are to blame. Those that accept things such as the Bible, or their own personal beliefs (AND I AM IN NO WAY belittling the bible, though I'm agnostic - leaning towards atheism - I'm not getting into Philosophy of religion) as 'law' or 'absolute truth' are in my opinion ignorant. One culturally and religious fueled belief may say that marriage to more than one person is wrong, or that practicing 'magic' or 'believing in magic' is wrong.. but does that really make it wrong? Relative to the culture, it may or may not be wrong.

Who is anyone to say that they're belief is beyond someone else's and there's is the truth?



As for the Thayne and the antifirmament canon on Althanas, it can be found here:
http://www.althanas.com/world/showpost.php?p=2700&postcount=3

EDIT: Oh, I was also not aware that you didn't speak English as your native language. I apologize if I say anything that you don't understand, I'm trying to keep everything outside of the philosophical names (which I can't really simplify) to a base and easy to understand English dialect.

[AdventWings]

What is the Soul?

*Me holds his head*

Now, please take this with a spoonful of salt (No, nevermind. Just stick with a grain of salt instead), since I'm only an Ecology major. This questions is what people in my culture calls "A World's End Question" since you can try to analyse it until the end of the world and you still won't come to a conclusive answer.

Taskmeinster's descriptions help a lot when you want to define what the Soul is. For others, who are into more exploratory writing, sometimes end up giving their own definitions of Soul. Herein lies the question: What is your definition of a soul?

In my opinion of your dilemma, I think the exploration of the meaning of Soul is in the air for you. As an advocate of exploratory writing, having the Soulless experience the effects of not having a soul (in your definition) could help you to understand what it is your writing. Of course, this might not help if you don't know what to write about.

Since I personally believe the Soul is still an ill-defined concept, you could have your Soulless character start off by experiencing what it's like to be possessed by other beings' souls, then strip "it" and hypothesize its reaction.

Well, it's a suggestion, though not particularly helpful. ^_^;

[Taskmienster]

I did that in an epic-ly long thread with Osato and my other character Ranger. Where a disembodied soul was trapped in the tangible, real world, as a punishment for not helping kill a demon in a war that took place centuries in Althanas' past. The soul was a powerful wizard that could have swayed the war, but instead fled fearing the powers that the demons had regarding magic. He was forced to be the 'gate keeper' for the demon's hide out, and when he attempted to consume the soul of Osato he instead found himself a new home and took over the soulless man's body.

Eventually he cast magic through a real form, and in turn helped kill the demon and was released finally from his debt to society. Things like that make the prospect of not having a soul VERY fun.

[AdventWings]

Aye. So what is your definition of the soul? ;)

I'll leave the question open for you Soul-Seekers to define. I'm one myself. ;)

[Fatina]

Eh.

I am also heavily involved in thinking about souls. I've found out all my characters have some kind of soul-dilemma going on, where their souls have been moved around or they are no longer themselves. I haven't read what the other people have posted yet but let me just do this so i can get back to my chores.

I was actually just thinking about it because of a thread I am planing, and I happened to see this, it was kind of freaky actually, but anyway.

One of my characters is Melancor. He started off as a demigod branched off the destruction of a larger god. Since a god cannot be created nor destroyed, I'd figured it would work as mass, it can only change forms. I made this god's soul and body break into 7 different beings, each one of them being a side of this god's personality (lets say). However, they do not keep any memories from being the high god, nor does their body look the same.

Because he was so hardy to write for me, as a bad writer, I recently rested his personality with an IC reason.

He was turned into an immortal, instead of a god who have a much higher status and in all power. He was betrayed by one of his brothers who up to that point had considered it in his best interest if his brother Melancor returned to the realm of the gods. His body was torn apart after being injected with a holy poison. When Melancor wakes up he cannot remember who he is or where he is. His body has been reconstructed and re-rejuvenated he meets someone who tells him just what he is.

It is made clear that Melancor is no longer Melancor, but his body, and that he, the person being talked to, is an intruder. He is named Sylvan and he was created to keep Melancor's body alive until he re-awakens inside of him.

From this you can assume that your soul are your memories and personality. Arguably that is only the mind. But the way I presented is that mind is your consciousness, as going through motions or looking, smelling, tasting, understanding and reacting.

The dilema I had was that what melancor was experiencing was basically amnessia, could I claim that he was no longer him?

Was he soul-less? No, since he is not braindead there is someone recollecting memories after he awoke, Sylvan.

Then are there two souls, say he lost his memory, he can regain it then what happens to the other soul? The way I planted it was that they where, indeed two different souls. Would sylvan then disappear? In my story possibly. But if you take this logic to real life you would just say the merged together, the old memories, the real soul, with the one that was created and developed after he awoke.

Then I say that a person is only a person when soul and body are together. Mental reasoning or the mind is part of the physical body, but memories can be lost.

Now you would think a soul is really part of it then though. If one says that a soul is memories, likes and dislikes, what irritates you and sooths you, then after you try to separate mind and body, half of these fall out; things like taste, or what you like to eat relate to you body, as your tongue is the one responsible of interpreting tastes. Same goes for feeling, people with different kinds of skin may not like the same kind of fabric in their clothes. Sexual preference too is irrelevant in a soul.

Then there are likes such as your favorite color, which you could argue is decided through feelings. Maybe you where at the park on a really happy day of your life, and what you remember vividly is the lush green of the plants. Subconsciously that could be one of the reasons you like green. And again, colors can be chosen through feelings. Maybe you like the cold and relate it to blue, and that's your favorite color.

What are you left with after that? How you react to things, you opinions and your feelings, which are pretty much based on your life experiences. the ways in which you where raised and the things you have gone through. What kind of things you find are beautiful and which you fawn upon.

Then again you could say your body/mind are the ones that let you know what is that upsets you, since, if you could not cry, or have that weird feeling in you stomach when you are upset, you would not know you really dislike it. But there is one thing we have to consider, if we are going to separate mind and soul you cannot count the soul as a conscious being, and in arguments this line gets blurred out a lot. The soul is not human, high, or even sacred, it is not even as mundane as an object, it is even less than a thought.

If you'd like to compare a person to a computer, the soul would be everything that's in the hardrive (though not the hardrive itself, because its something physical that belongs to the body). The ability (and only the ability) of you computer to read information and interpret is comparable to the mind. Then, everything you see and can actually touch is the body. If you loose your data and your memory is restarted, your computer is no longer what you used to call you computer. All the things that you did, the advanced setting you moved around because you thought something was annoying, the background and the theme, plus all your documents are gone. But you are left with your computer still, and from there you just re-add whatever you lost, but it will never be the exact same as before.

So in short, here is what I've been trying to say. If a soul is real, I would say that your soul is your memories-emotions, and a very partial and limited amount of your personality. Mind and soul get mistaken often because in 'reality' they are one. People who are braindead have lost their mind, and basically lost their soul as well, the only way for a person to loose their soul then is by loosing their mind. In which case the body is completely and entirely a body. The soul is part of the mind, and the mind is part of the body, but the soul is not part of the body. Mind and soul act with one another to make you you. They are two pieces of a puzzle that doesn't work.

> A soul can 'not exist' without a mind and a mind cannot 'not exist' without a soul.<

If there was a way to make a person's body move without a mind, that would really be a soul-less person. They would have to be puppets without the ability to interpret things and gather feelings of embrace or hostility, unlike a baby, it would have to be a robot. Then what i can make out of my own logic is that a mind can create a soul, and a soul can be replaced, or recovered. Thus the soul is basically indispensable as far as the body's concerned. YOU are indispensable to your body, it's only purpose is to go through the motions or survival, for that it needs a mind to be an advocate in life, ones-self, the soul, is only a side effect that wasn't supposed to exist in the first place.


Then if your soul does not exists, but there is no thing in the natural world that you can call 'you' without being a whole, it does exist but not in our existence. Mind needs your body, to help it reason, and your body needs your mind to interpret the world. But you are not your body, and your body is not you without your mind- If both mind and soul are together, but soul is not in existence, then it exists in a world our reason cannot comprehend. When you, the soul, are put into your mind, the soul's counterpart in the real world , you, exist. When the body dies, the mind dies and the soul is shut from the real world, without the mind the soul does not reason, but it stays there in that world as an intangible vegetable. Its you that's there, not your mind and body, which are only tool for your soul to exist in the natural world. It is almost as if your soul where a parallel body/mind in the world of emotions.

Is this the place the ancients started calling "Heaven"?

Were we exist but our bodies are no longer with us, is it a realm that like God we cannot comprehend? If God exists there, then he exists in non existence and he is not present in our conscious existence.

If your soul needs your mind to gaze into reality, and the soul is a counterpart of your body/mind, then wouldn't you mind need your soul to gaze into that other world of "non-existence?". What the soul gets from linking to your mind is, touch, taste, smell, sight, hearing, vision and reasoning. What does your mind get from existing with the soul? Intangible feelings, sorrow, happiness, love? This non-existent world of emotions is parallel to reality, but it is not a physical world but we are in it, there is just no such thing as sight in it that's why we never acknowledge it.

If a body can exist in the physical world without a mind-soul, then is there an anti-body that would exist in the intangible world? If a body exists in the intangible world, then the soul is an exact counterpart of the mind and our physical body. If we conserve this concept of equality then, there really is a heaven. Heaven is existence, this, right now, would be heaven, existing parallel to the physical world. When a person dies then, their mind and soul are separated. The body decays in the physical world, but the soul may not in the non-existent world, nor does it disappear or vanish. This law of equality still holds true even after, because the mass of your body never did disappear, only rotted and transformed. Could your soul, then rot, dissolve and then turn into something different, like mass?

Could you then, be reborn. Have you been reborn? Your soul refurbished and paired with another mind to be brought into existence. Sounds like the Hindu belief in soul's re-incarnation. It makes sense if a soul is re-incarnated to not remember anything from its previous life-lives, as it could most likely be only a fraction of the last soul in was, mixed with many other fragments of other souls, then your emotions and your way of being haven't remained constant throughout the years but you are an accumulation of many other unrelated people before you.



I think its much more likely that the soul does not exist at all.

But then you start asking yourself, well, if I loose a leg, is it still me? yes.
If I loose an arm? yeah.
If I loose my torso? I suppose so.
What if I loose my brain, its only another body part. Eh, dunno?

But you are not a brain. if you brain gets removed then its just a brain, you have no consciousness. Yes, you mind needs your body to interpret, and your soul needs your mind. If your brain where to be placed in a different body would you be you? It would be part of me, but it wouldn't be my body. Then what are you? a new person?

I guess the real question would be, what is a human.

Listen, just write however you'd like don't worry about it, we know what you mean. We all would go about it about the same way, that's what I have done, bending so many lines and skipping others.There is no way you can be 100% correct when it comes to explaining a soul as the existence of a soul is a paradox.

In all seriousness I have to stop myself at this point I just rambled on and got exited writing that on the go I kind of answered some of my questions. I could go on and on with my scrambled logic that always contradicts itself. Writing this has made me examine things enough to make me wonder if there is such a thing as heaven. I'm afraid of thinking now, I'll step back into life.

[AdventWings]

OK, now. Let's not get too philosophical, even though the object of the thread is precisely about the question of the soul to begin with.

Fatina summed it up nicely at the end of the post. You could, however, research into some philosophers of metaphysics and take a little note from their literature to play in your story. It doesn't have to be exactly right - In fact, play it out as you would a regular character with the predetermined archetype. Then as you write, post it up and read it through some days later. You might find something interesting to continue on, even if it's not what you were looking for.

For starters, identify what culture your character is most likely influenced by and use that particular philosophical description of the Soul as a basis. Socrates' teachings from Greek Antiquity for western-based, Norse lore for Scandinavian or Shinto/Taoism as representatives for Eastern philosophies, for instance. The path will show itself the more you write. ;)

EDIT: Of course, you can also go the same route as Masamune Shirow (as in, Ghost in the Shell series) but that's a bit on the Sci-Fi/Cyberpunk/Dystopian theme. Your call. :p

[Saxon]

Well, canon wise a "soul" after death goes to the Antifirmament, a place where all dead souls go. There is a gate keeper that doesn't care so much that souls go in without his watch, but is deeply engaged in keeping the souls IN the place. That being said, a soul is something that remains after your character dies.

Really? Where did this come up? I'm not calling you out or anything, but I've never heard of the Antifirmament before. Is there somewhere where I or others can read more about this?

[Taskmienster]

# Death-Gate: Haunting and some forms of undead travel the Death-Gate to the Firmament, and the recently departed travel to the Antifirmament where they are taken to the Lands of Judgment.

* Death-Gate Guardian: Björmund
A direling as ancient as the continent of Salvar itself. He stands firm under the arch of bone, through which the dead are said to pass when they travel to the Antifirmament. Each soul requires his permission to pass in and out, though he's much more concerned with keeping souls from leaking out of the Antifirmament, than keeping them from getting in.

Resting his arms on an enormous claymore, Björmund is clothed from head to toe in furs and stands like a mountain in the midst of a blistering, biting arctic wind. He becomes more tired with every passing day, allowing a few spirits to slip past his wavering guard.


This comes from the 3rd post of the Codex of Thayne Lore found in the Roleplayers Corner.

http://www.althanas.com/world/showthread.php?t=294

[Saxon]

Alright, that makes sense. I had thought it seemed a bit familiar when I read it.