On the Purpose of Bodies
Some of my readers have asked for clarification about my leanings toward thinking that souls cannot exist without bodies.
I've used before the software/hardware analogy:[The soul] is like software, whereas the body is like hardware. Software can "exist" in the mind of a programmer or stored in written form on paper, but without hardware, software cannot function.
How is it that we communicate with the software in our computers? We must use input devices -- keyboards, mouses (Yes, that's the correct plural,) the like.
How do our computers communicate with us? They use output devices - monitors, printers, the like.
Humans and animals are no different.
Our senses are our input devices. Without them, no other souls could communicate to us. Just like mouses and keyboards often have different functions, so too we have multiple senses.
Without any senses, you would be powerless, about as useless as a computer without a working mouse or keyboard. Even if you were a super genius, without inputs what could you do?
Yes, you could still be alive, but in a sad state of life. A computer can likewise be turned on and allowed to "run", but without input devices, what is the point?
Our voices are an example of output devices. We also can communicate in other ways, such as touch and motion. Without them, we could not communicate to other souls.
Without any methods of communication - which all require a physical element - you would again be powerless, the same as a computer without a monitor or printer or speakers. The super genius could never share what he or she had discovered, making the discovery rather useless.
Of course, the senses and the forms of communication work together, just as input and output work together. Vision is the sense that observes communicative motion; hearing is the sense that perceives vocal communication, and so on.
None of this would be possible without corporealness.
Now by corporealness, I do not necessarily mean "limited to the four dimensions of space time". A hypothetical body of four dimensions passing through our three spatial dimensions could appear as a variety of differing and fluctuating solid shapes depending on how it chose to align itself when passing. Or it could hover "over" our dimensional "plane" thus being entirely undetectable to us. But if it is detectable to us, it must use a body - even if it is a four-dimensional one.
Even those forms of communication of today that would have seemed magical in times past still require corporeal input and output systems. Wireless communications still require transmitters and receivers. Wireless communication would be impossible without them.
What I am suggesting is that one of the major "purposes" of bodies, of "hardware", is for communication - both input and output - and that without either input or output, you have a hopeless situation; you have complete and utter isolation and inability to really do anything. This is why I think that the idea of bodiless souls makes little sense.
Tomorrow, I may post on "the purpose of emotions," which I think connects to this topic.
Comment link for Facebook readers
I've used before the software/hardware analogy:[The soul] is like software, whereas the body is like hardware. Software can "exist" in the mind of a programmer or stored in written form on paper, but without hardware, software cannot function.
How is it that we communicate with the software in our computers? We must use input devices -- keyboards, mouses (Yes, that's the correct plural,) the like.
How do our computers communicate with us? They use output devices - monitors, printers, the like.
Humans and animals are no different.
Our senses are our input devices. Without them, no other souls could communicate to us. Just like mouses and keyboards often have different functions, so too we have multiple senses.
Without any senses, you would be powerless, about as useless as a computer without a working mouse or keyboard. Even if you were a super genius, without inputs what could you do?
Yes, you could still be alive, but in a sad state of life. A computer can likewise be turned on and allowed to "run", but without input devices, what is the point?
Our voices are an example of output devices. We also can communicate in other ways, such as touch and motion. Without them, we could not communicate to other souls.
Without any methods of communication - which all require a physical element - you would again be powerless, the same as a computer without a monitor or printer or speakers. The super genius could never share what he or she had discovered, making the discovery rather useless.
Of course, the senses and the forms of communication work together, just as input and output work together. Vision is the sense that observes communicative motion; hearing is the sense that perceives vocal communication, and so on.
None of this would be possible without corporealness.
Now by corporealness, I do not necessarily mean "limited to the four dimensions of space time". A hypothetical body of four dimensions passing through our three spatial dimensions could appear as a variety of differing and fluctuating solid shapes depending on how it chose to align itself when passing. Or it could hover "over" our dimensional "plane" thus being entirely undetectable to us. But if it is detectable to us, it must use a body - even if it is a four-dimensional one.
Even those forms of communication of today that would have seemed magical in times past still require corporeal input and output systems. Wireless communications still require transmitters and receivers. Wireless communication would be impossible without them.
What I am suggesting is that one of the major "purposes" of bodies, of "hardware", is for communication - both input and output - and that without either input or output, you have a hopeless situation; you have complete and utter isolation and inability to really do anything. This is why I think that the idea of bodiless souls makes little sense.
Tomorrow, I may post on "the purpose of emotions," which I think connects to this topic.
Comment link for Facebook readers