Getting closer to the "soul"...

[Dmitri]

A person's moral judgments can be changed almost instantly by delivering a magnetic pulse to an area of the brain near the right ear

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... 48&ps=cprs

[Darth Rock&Roll]

I don't believe in individual soul.

I believe we are granted individuality as a gift vis a vis life.

The energy that we are, aside from our physical form which is also energy btw, is returned to the whole upon it's completion of a life. That energy is either refined by life, left coarse, used up or damaged by it and those processes determine where in the whole the energy returns to.

Every aspect of the human condition can otherwise be effected from the external.

[Bär]

[Darthwing Teorist]

"If something as complex as morality has a mechanical explanation, Green says, it will be hard to argue that people have, or need, a soul."

A philosophical conclusion from a scientist. It shows his bias. Although everyone is entitled to their opinion, science is about facts and theories and philosophy/religion is about their interpretation.

[Dmitri]

I believe there will ALWAYS be something we don't know. That's the fun part, in all this mess.

[Darthwing Teorist]

Of course. I was just pointing out one of the sources of disagreement: the misuse of philosophy by scientists and the misuse of science by philosophers.

[Dmitri]

Yup. As they always do.

[Ron Panunto]

Of course morality is "just" a brain process - what the hell else could it be? Morality is not just a human trait, behaviorists have long known that many animals, like dolphins, wales and chimps exhibit moral values, and it's also well known that many drugs, including alcohol can alter moral values. The brain is just one big chemical/electrical analog computer, some species just have a more sophisticated operating system than others.

[Steve James]

I think I know what you're getting at, but I disagree that animals can exhibit "moral values." For ex., many, if not most, animal mothers will fight larger, stronger opponents on behalf of their offspring. Some animals might protect members of the same species with no relation, or even members of different species. But, selflessness isn't, in itself, an exhibition of any particular moral value. Well, are "homicide bombers" exhibiting moral values? Anyway, I think for someone/thing to exhibit moral behavior, it has to know that what it is doing is moral or not. Mothers protecting their children is instinctual behavior. Iow, a dolphin can rescue a drowning swimmer, but to qualify as a moral act, the dolphin must at least know that saving swimmers is the "right" thing to do. In fact, that might be true ... but we can't tell.

[Darthwing Teorist]

This experiment reminds me of the other one, where a scientist was creating the feeling of "another" presence with electromagnetic impulses directed at the brain.

Of course, if you mess up with the brain, either directly (surgery/drugs) or indirectly (electromagnetic waves), you're going to get some strange results.

[Dmitri]

I guess what amazed me was the level of "detail" of influence they managed to exhibit... It's not like "oh look, if I push here, his left arm twitches!!" -- it's more like, "if I push here, his market investment strategies will become less aggressive" That's pretty damn subtle (and therefore impressive), what they did there, -- at least to my uneducated eye...

[Interloper]

Medical researchers have know for decades what stimulating or suppressing certain areas of the brain can do, in a general sense. For instance, a full frontal lobotomy changes a person's degree of motivation and will. Now science seems to be getting down to subtler layers of behavior within that larger, more general understanding of neurochemical/electrical processes.