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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Souls
Message-ID: <1566@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 21-Aug-85 19:32:01 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1566
Posted: Wed Aug 21 19:32:01 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 24-Aug-85 14:00:26 EDT
References: <573@utastro.UUCP> <1291@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week
Lines: 29

>>Charley, this is a crock of soup. If "we" get resurrected, then that implies
>>continuity of something that characterizes the "we" through the death-
>>resurrection phase.  [HOULAHAN]

> Well, then... perhaps we should stop using the word life then, and call it
> something else.
> 
> This argument relies entirely on an intuition about the nature of Life: that
> it enjoins a certain continuity of existence.  I would like to see the
> nature of this continuity explicitly stated (in a way that holds up in an
> atheistic world too), and then maybe we can start discussing how we can
> apply this to something we of necessity know no details of. [WINGATE]

Charlie, for the last time, when you refer to any "something" that exists
beyond the end of life, you are implying that there is something more to
us than our physical bodies, i.e., souls.  You may not want to call it
that (perhaps because of the baggage you seem to admit that the word carries),
but you are referring to a soul nonetheless.  Denying that an applicable
word may be used to refer to a concept (choosing to use another word and
DENYING that the applicable word applies) is just as silly as taking a word
with an existing definition and tacking on totally different meaning to
it for the purpose of "getting" something to "exist".  One (erroneously)
"gets" you something that doesn't apply, the other denies that the original
term applies just because you're using a different word (perhaps specifically
to avoid using the original).
-- 
Meanwhile, the Germans were engaging in their heavy cream experiments in
Finland, where the results kept coming out like Swiss cheese...
				Rich Rosen 	ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr