An Opinion Piece
Soul is self. Self is the result of the sum of chemical reactions and electrical impulses (experience) over time to the moment at which self is assessed. The assessment occurs in the physical organ we call brain, and the brain is the storehouse of self. When the storehouse is finished, so also is self and when that occurs, soul is no more.
It is the fear of non existence that disturbs the self. The self does not wish to not be. Being is all self knows and self is always at least respectful of and, for the majority, fearful of the unknown. For human beings and, I'd venture to say, many other animals, we have the capacity to imagine things. This capacity is what many have used to assuage their fears of the unknown. The worst unknown of course is that condition of not being.
Humankind has throughout its time of sentience on this planet used this capacity to invent soul, demons, gods, and sundry to eliminate unknowns and provide itself with some comfort in a hostile environment. We invented soul, something apart from our physical being, to provide us with the escape valve to non existence. We no longer needed to fear death because we would go on in one form or another for eternity. Some go through various reincarnations until they get it just right. Some buy a ticket at the cost of part of their lives and a portion of their thinking ability. Others.... Yet we still fear it. We recoil from the idea of not being in spite of whatever escape clause we have bought into.
For those of us who have managed, through whatever means, to extract ourselves from such thinking, we no longer need to devote our energy to creating paths out of the dilemma and are free to devote that energy into more productive efforts. We have not eliminated the concern over not being, not by any measure. After all, being is all the self knows. What we have done is eliminated most of the machinations folks go through to find their 'rewards' for having lived a good life. For me, immortality is measured by what I leave behind that others may benefit from, even if all that amounts to are good memories for family and close friends. We live on through what we leave, not with what we believe.
With that, brothers and sisters, I move on to build more memories to preserve my 'soul.'
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9 comments
Feel free to reply to any comment by clicking the "Reply" button.I like to think of soul as an old word for what we would now call personality.
Word
Level 8
Apr 27, 2020
0
@Word -- What is self but personality?
Word:
@evidentialist Self not but personally would seem to exclude the "hardware". Is self only the seemingly intangible traits that is ourself -- e.g. mannerisms we uniquely display, or would it be why people chuckle after telling me they like my beard and I tell them, "Thanks, I grew it myself".
@Word -- Yep, self be that there person what other folk see and make assumings about. 
The self I'm talking about is that blend of body and external world inputs that make us who we are.
When you're offering an opinion, you should place 'I think' at the start of the sentence.
brentan
Level 8
Mar 11, 2020
0
You mean it's that hard to remember from the two word headline to the first line?
i mean nothing in the content is stated as an opinion despite the headline. Go on, be honest, you were asserting all that wishful-thinking as fact.
@brentan -- No, I wasn't, and that's a fact, Jack. Hence the headline: An Opinion Piece
I read that it was Sam Cooke who invented soul.
DenoPenno
Level 9
Mar 8, 2020
4
As an editor, have you heard about Shakespeare's quote from Hamlet, brevity is the soul of wit?
Mofo1953
Level 9
Mar 8, 2020
4
@Mofo1953 -- That I have.
@evidentialist didn't really listen then.
@Mofo1953 -- Nope.
@maturin1919 obviously Shakespeare was not referring to the writing but to the writer. Perhaps this quote illustrates the point much better: "Writing is 1 percent inspiration, and 99 percent elimination."
Louise Brooks
@maturin1919 so you consider yourself at par with Homer? Wow. Sure your name ain't matrumpin?
@maturin1919 you claimed Wit was not the intent of Homer and Herodotus, it is implicit when you claim that wit wasn't your intent either. But do not worry, nobody here would believe that.
@Mofo1953 Less is More
That is a hard lesson in writing I find, we grow attached to those turns of phrase
@Davesnothere agree.
@maturin1919 again you assume wrongly and are just being defensive of your way too boring and excessively lenghty posted piece. I've read all the greek classics and also the romans, you sir are no Homer much less even an Ovid, you might be closer to historian Herodotus who was no writer.
@Mofo1953 It wasn't even his piece. He's just saying that sometimes, when you feel you have a lot to say, you have to say a lot. Take Moby Dick, for instance. It's considered a classic, but I couldn't wade through all the chapters on the whaling industry and finally just skipped to the end. Melville obviously had a lot to say, but at the time, I didn't have the patience for it.
And by the way, if you consider 4 paragraphs "excessive", what do you consider the ideal length? A meme?
Kudos for calling this "An Opinion Piece".
Fit50something
Level 7
Mar 8, 2020
2
@Fit-50something -- I calls 'em what they is, sir.
Another possibility is that the sense of self as an individual body is nothing but illusion. We have to strive mightily to maintain that illusion, projecting the imaginary self into a “soul”, supposed to live on after death.
Could it be that our bodies are nothing but dumb robots with no awareness and no free will? Perhaps what we experience as conscious awareness is an extension of universal consciousness that is primary and all pervasive.
WilliamFleming
Level 8
Mar 8, 2020
2
This is not an attempt at Science Fiction or philosophical treatise. It is merely my opinion stated as clearly as I could at the time. This thing was written way back in my youth. I'm guessing it was around 1960 or thereabouts. However, yes, what you said could certainly be another possibility, though I highly doubt it in about the same way I doubt the holographic universe.
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