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From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Souls
Message-ID: <1348@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 23-Aug-85 01:01:34 EDT
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.1348
Posted: Fri Aug 23 01:01:34 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 25-Aug-85 02:45:46 EDT
References: <1291@umcp-cs.UUCP> <1566@pyuxd.UUCP>
Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD
Lines: 32

In article <1566@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:
>> 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).

Fine, then, it's for the last time.  I choose not to believe your assertion,
because both you and Padraig refuse to justify it.  I find it amusing that
two atheists seem to have so much knowledge of the possibilities of the
supernatural.  I'm also amused by this persistent fallacy that the existence
of something at points A and B in time implies the continued existence of
the thing between those times.  I don't know where to begin to criticize
Rich's totally spurious lesson in semantics.  So, I guess that's the end of
this discussion....

Charley Wingate   umcp-cs!mangoe

   The wind blows where it pleases