Personally, I don't expect a soul to exist. It would imply that mongoloids have a soul too. Do they have a mongoloid soul? Does their mongoloid soul go to the next plain of existence -or to a special plain for mongoloid souls, after they die? How about embryo souls? I'm not aware of having a soul -but I'm conscious. The tricky thing is, if consciousness characterizes a person, what does the soul do?
IMO, your consciousness is the result of your experience over a lifetime. At old age and with dementia, with no good recollection of my past, my soul would be how old? 18, when I was still a moron? 30, when I thought I knew it all? 80, when I utter incoherently sentences? What good is the soul of an old man with dementia in an afterlife?
No soul exists, if it does, it will have no recollection of my life, as brain is the matter where all memory is stored, that's how I see it.
Talking about hell and souls. If a soul is tortured in hell (as ordered by a loving god) , it would imply that souls have a nervous system to feel pain.
Well.... something isn't right here, LOL!
Regarding hell, I don't imagine it as a place where people are tortured in a symbolic way representative of how they lived their life. I don't even think that Christians originally believed that; it seems to have really taken hold with Dante's Inferno. The "weeping and gnashing of teeth," mentioned in the Bible may well have been the Pharasees and other "religious" people (who were actually hypocrites) who Jesus said would not go to heaven when they died, which would logically make them quite angry.
Also, remember what I said of stoicism, and Hinduism. If we are not the body, or even the mind, but the soul, then punishing the soul wouldn't be done by physical means. If it is thoughts and perceptions that have the power to hurt the soul, then us choosing to be angry/sad/etc. would be "hell." That opens up a lot of meanings for what "hell" is. Honestly, I don't claim to 100% know what hell is, or even if it exist. I don't know, and I'd like to think I'd live my life the same regardless.
Also, regarding souls, Plato/Socrates view, as well as the Hindu/Buddhist view is that not every soul will go on to some eternal afterlife, but most souls are "reincarnated" into a new body. It isn't until they eventually no longer have strong attachments to this world, that they no longer have a desire to be reborn to satisfy these urges, that they are freed from the cycle of birth and death, and go on to be with God.
I'd have to re-read what Plato and Hindus say about us not remembering our past lives, but they said something lol. I recall Plato saying something to the effect of "learning is remembering/recalling."
In any case, if you adhere to reincarnation, then it seems most logical that most people who die aren't going to heaven (or hell), but are being reincarnated again to try to figure it all out. If someone dies as an infant, they're not going to eternal afterlife as an infant; that seems kind of crazy actually (if you really want to hear some disturbing implications of modern Christianity's "age of culpability" or "all babies go to heaven" I'll share it). The soul of an infant likely isn't an infant soul, but a soul with an infant brain and body.
As to why we don't remember past lives, I don't know. I'd have to look into it further. I honestly don't even know 100% if I believe in reincarnation or not, but again, I don't think it matters. Either way, I only know I have this life here and now, so I may as well try to be happy and good now, not simply live for some afterlife, or say I'll just try to be better in the next life. Doing good is good, if there is some additional benefit in the next/after-life for it, even better.
muscleupcrohn , after re-reading your posts, I realized that you apparently adhere to stoicism.
-Do you believe in a personal god? (the one that answers to prayers?)
If not, most of my rants about the supposed "goodness" of god were a "straw man attack".
Sorry for that.
You know, I don't really think I adhere to any one belief entirely.
I'd say I try to live my life guided the most by Stoicism. But Stoicism is largely applicable with many "theologies." Marcus Aurelius didn't seem to know exactly what happened after death, but that he shouldn't worry about what he can't control. I think I agree with that.
Interestingly enough, Aurelius, one of the big stoics, actually did pray. See how:
The gods are either powerless or poweful. If they are powerless, why do you pray? But if they are powerful, why not rather pray for the gift of not fearing any of these things, or of not desiring any of them, or of not feeling grief for any of them, rather than that any one of them should be absent or present? For surely, if the gods can co-operate with humans, they can co-operate to these ends. But perhaps you will say: ‘The gods put these things in my power’. Then is it not better to use what is in your power with a free spirit than to be concerned with what is not in your power in a spirit of slavery and abjection? And who said to you that the gods did not co-operate with us, even in relation to things in our power?
Begin at least to pray about these things and you will see. This man prays: ‘How may I sleep with that woman?’ You should pray: ‘How may I not desire to sleep with that woman?’ Another prays: ‘How may I not lose my child?’ You should pray: ‘How may I not be afraid of losing him?’ Turn your prayers round in this way and observe what happens’
So one can be a Stoic and believe in a God(s) that one can pray to. It's a different sort of prayer than what is normal though. He basically says that if we pray for something in our power, why pray for it and not just do it? Perhaps, even if God(s) don't exist, prayer can be a tool, much like meditation, where we can take the time to focus on what we want and how we can obtain it, and that, for a Stoics, everything you want should be in your power already! The prayer would be to help us realize this, which we can do with or without a God(s)!
Epictetus almost seems to say that we shouldn't fear death because we won't really exist, at least in the way we do now, so why fear it? Plato, on the other hand, who was also very influential to the Stoics, believed in reincarnation of the soul. As to what I believe, I don't really know, but Stoicism would tell me not to worry about it too much, as would Buddhism. It's better to focus on what is in my control (Stoicism) and live in the present moment (Buddhism).
But Gandhi, a Hindu, says the he believes being a good Hindu made him a good Christian too, so it seems to me that being a good Stoic may also make one a good Hindu. If there is a personal God who decides our fate in the afterlife, I'd like to think that anyone who sincerely strives to do good, and to help, or at least not hurt, others, and to not be dependent on or a slave to "things," would bring a "smile to God's face" (please him). But I don't know, and does it really matter?
So I suppose then that I am essentially a Stoic, haha!
The way I try to live life can be best compared to or based on Stoicism, perhaps supplemented with other "beliefs" from other systems where Stoicism is often silent or at least not explicit. Either way, the concept of heaven and hell, of reincarnation and the soul, no matter what I believe, the Stoics would say these things shouldn't be something we worry about, as they are out of our control. We can think on them, sure, and form beliefs, but not be disturbed by them. I still do think I believe in a "God," but so did Marcus Aurelius, and so did Plato/Socrates. But for them, they did good regardless, and not for a reward in the afterlife.
And you don't deny that something is fishy about the "just and good" lord.
