On existence of Mind and Soul

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
On that note, here is VS Ramachandran's well known article on mirror neurons and the mind in a vat.

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran06/ramachandran06_index.html

Thanks BdN, enjoyed getting into that well written article. I will subscribe to the "Edge" site, which I hadn't as yet encountered. Real science on the edge indeed - let's have more, there is still too much passe' reductionism and simplistic New Age populism around.

I can only recommend it to others who may not have yet encountered it.

Quote from its "About" page,

"It's ever more delectable that the Edge Foundation— the network of prominent scientists and intellectuals founded by literary agent John Brockman in New York — has worked against the reciprocal ignorance of literary cultures and sciences of each other. Successfully. If you take the algorithms developed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, which measure the value of links, Edge's website ranks seven on a global scale of ten. The New York Times ranks nine, eBay at eight. — Sueddeutche Zeitung"

It is my first aquaintance with mirror neurones, and quickly I was reflecting on the mirror analogy that so often arises in Eastern philosophies.

Sure enough, VS Ramachandran closes with,

"We are all merely many reflections in a hall of mirrors of a single cosmic reality (Brahman or "paramatman"😉. If you find all this too much to swallow just consider the that as you grow older and memories start to fade you may have less in common with, and be less "informationally coupled", to your own youthful self, the chap you once were, than with someone who is now your close personal friend. This is especially true if you consider the barrier-dissolving nature of mirror neurons. There is certain grandeur in this view of life, this enlarged conception of reality, for it is the closest that we humans can come to taking a sip from the well of immortality. (But I fear my colleague Richard Dawkins may suspect me of spiritual leanings of "letting God in through the back door" for saying this.)"


Much for thought and reading from all this, thank you again. One aspect is how awareness, either individual or as some sort of containing holistic quantum-based "field", relates.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
Scientists ( naturally,firstly the psychologists)
have almost admitted that "Mind"exists although there is nothing within the physical body which is its location. The Brain is a mass of nervous cells which do not very much differ from other cells within the body. Nobody has so far located the prime mover of Brain within the body. So,Scientists have come ...[text shortened]... the existence of soul.
Anybody can tell what is the latest scientific view on these matters?

Forgive me if I am late to this discussion and have not read all the posts.

Has anyone talked about the level of explanation?

It is useful to speak in terms of minds, for some things,

and useful to speak in terms of neurons, for other things.

Just as it is useful to speak of things in terms of individuals, for some things, and tribes, for others, and nations, for others, and humankind, for others.

It might be useful to speak in terms of souls, for some things.

As long as we understand what we mean by these terms.

This can be done without concern about their "existence". They are useful ways to talk about things, or not, given the situation.