Ghost in the Machine

If your car breaks down, you go to the mechanic to have it fixed. However, if it is a total wreck and beyond repair, you relegate it to the junkyard and buy a new one. If you are sick, you typically go to the doctor for treatment. However, if your ailment is beyond medical remedy and you are sure to die, you may either accept your fate without question or you may entertain the popular delusion of an afterlife. Most people have this wishful thinking that their consciousness can still survive even after physical death when all the cellular metabolic processes cease to function. This belief is tantamount into believing that the speed, torque, power and mileage of a totally wrecked car can still exist even without the car itself.

You might say that I am committing the logical fallacy of wrong analogy. You may say that human beings are different from cars. Inspiring as it is, the belief in the afterlife or the soul is just a belief. It is not founded on any verifiable scientific evidence. Its widespread popularity can simply be explained by our egocentric tendency to give too much importance on ourselves. This belief is fueled by the psychological need for purpose and reinforced by the social conditionings that are instituted in religions. Depending on the particular religion, there are actually different views regarding the existence of the soul. In Hinduism, for instance, the soul is believed to be reincarnated into different forms until it achieves perfection. In Buddhism, the idea of the immortal soul is more vague. Nirvanna is not really heaven in the Christian sense but a state where the sense of self is completely annihilated and become part of the cosmic consciousness. It is a state between being and non-being.

On the other hand, the Abrahamic, monotheistic religions (i.e., Judaism, Christianity and Islam) generally assert that the individual souls will face divine judgement either immediately after death or on an appointed time. This appointed time is known as the final judgement where all the souls of the dead will be resurrected and will either receive eternal reward or eternal punishment. There are actually different doctrines concerning the idea of the immortality of the soul. Even the closely-affiliated Christian sects have different doctrines regarding this. Some sects support the idea that it is only during resurrection that the immortal soul becomes existent. On the other hand, there are sects that believe that the immortal soul is already incorporated in the physical body at the time of conception and will automatically face judgement after bodily death.

The different religious doctrines about the soul only prove that this belief is only arbitrary and culturally-determined. The overwhelming scientific evidences point out to the fact that the soul does not exist and cannot possibly exist. The so-called human soul or spirit can be reduced in terms of brain activities. These brain activities are determined by physical parameters such as biochemical reactions, synaptic or neural connections, and electrical impulses. If you change any of these parameters, the brain activities will also change. Hence, personality and state of consciousness can actually be manipulated. If the soul does exist, it is dependent on the physical existence of the brain. Without the brain, the soul is nothing. The idea of the soul is directly connected to the phenomenon of consciousness. Since we, human beings, as self-aware organisms, tend to disassociate our consciousness from physical existence. Consciousness is intangible. It cannot be seen or touched but it can be experienced. Hence, most of us think that consciousness is a non-physical process.

However, the overwhelming scientific evidences point to the opposite direction. Consciousness or soul is just a purely physical process that is governed by the laws of physics. If the brain is the hardware, then the soul is the software. The software cannot operate without the hardware. Even the so-called Near Death Experience can be duplicated in the laboratory by using strong electromagnets, electrical stimulations and introducing certain types of drugs into the blood stream of the subject. If the soul does exist, then the brain is unecessary. Nonetheless, it can easily be demostrated that the brain is the center of human identity, personality and consciousness.