When Do Test Tube Babies Receive Their Soul? (priest, Muslim, believe)

[MontanaGuy]

I have never heard a good description of the nature of the soul. It's generally just thought of as being the essence of an individual that will survive bodily death and allow us to live forever wish I'm afraid is wishful thinking. Here's the problem, a soul can't be measured, photographed, weighed or detected by any means known to man and yet we're asked to believe that the soul is somehow linked to our physical bodies. Can someone elaborate on how that might work? If a soul is something from a spiritual realm that we can't detect it is still supposedly interacting with the physical body until that body dies. That would lead me to believe that if a soul was real it must have some means of attaching itself to the body and somehow enter into the physical world. Well we can transplant organs from one person to another, people can suffer all sorts of injuries, etc. so how does that impact this attachment that the soul has to the body? If we did a brain transplant in the future would the soul go along for the ride? Do you see what I'm getting at? Just saying that God will explain all of this after we're dead and then resurrected just doesn't pass the common sense test.

[Deb in VA]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

I have never heard a good description of the nature of the soul. It's generally just thought of as being the essence of an individual that will survive bodily death and allow us to live forever wish I'm afraid is wishful thinking. Here's the problem, a soul can't be measured, photographed, weighed or detected by any means known to man and yet we're asked to believe that the soul is somehow linked to our physical bodies. Can someone elaborate on how that might work? If a soul is something from a spiritual realm that we can't detect it is still supposedly interacting with the physical body until that body dies. That would lead me to believe that if a soul was real it must have some means of attaching itself to the body and somehow enter into the physical world. Well we can transplant organs from one person to another, people can suffer all sorts of injuries, etc. so how does that impact this attachment that the soul has to the body? If we did a brain transplant in the future would the soul go along for the ride? Do you see what I'm getting at? Just saying that God will explain all of this after we're dead and then resurrected just doesn't pass the common sense test.

Common sense test? No, you're right, it doesn't pass the common sense test. Just one of the many differences between a believer and an unbeliever...a believer doesn't have to have a logical, common sense explanation for every solitary thing in the universe .

I think it has something to do with the fact that as an atheist, you of course don't believe in any sort of higher power that is more intelligent than you are as a human being. I guess in a way you could say that you are your own god....and because of that, you think you have to have an explanation for everything in order for it to make sense to you. Because I believe in God and believe that He is far superior in intelligence to me I can put my faith and trust in Him and just rest in the fact that I do not have to have a logical explanation for everything while I am here on earth. In other words, I do not know everything, but I have a personal relationship with the One who does .

[chielgirl]

Purposely misinterpreting my statement, I see. An embryo cannot grow without a mechanical/electrical impulse or host body.

I didn't make a comment about the interdependence of living creatures. I do not consider an embryo/fetus to be a life since it cannot live without a host body or mechanical/electrical impulse.

[xino]

I personally believe the soul hovers in and out of the body, before deciding rather or not to incarnate. As long as the baby stays conscious, the soul stays in the body. Or, I could be wrong. Maybe the sperm and egg creates the spirit or soul.

[MontanaGuy]

Dev In Va wrote:

I guess in a way you could say that you are your own god....and because of that, you think you have to have an explanation for everything in order for it to make sense to you.

I don't think of it that way but nature does follow it's own rules and there really is an explanation for everything, it's just that many things are very difficult to grasp. I do try to understand what I can about the world I live in, it only makes sense to me, and I truly believe that the soul is not a real thing but something from the imagination of human beings. Being an atheist is where my logic leads me. In order to be religious there's a mountain of unseen and unproven facts that you've just got to accept on faith and the existence of the soul is one of them. I could never do that, reason and rational thought are what guides me, not faith.

[Oakback]

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but the original question seems to ultimatley search for the exact time that killing a human would not be murder.

Lets assume for a second that there is no such thing as a soul. There is either life or no life. And let's assume that terminating a human life is wrong.
Then the question might be: When is the human sufficiently "alive" to be spared annihilation?
An adult?
A teenager?
A child?
An infant?
A fully developed fetus?
A partially developed fetus?
A zygote?
A gamete?

Is even eliminating the possibility of life wrong or not?
For example, polluting a river? Or pesticides that destroy bird eggs?

Those that choose to believe there is a Soul, now need to quess where in the chain of life to plug it in.
Be careful, because if you believe in a Soul, you'd better be damn sure if there is a beginning, and where it is.

[chielgirl]

My response is that it would be when the fetus could live on its own without the aid of a host body or mechanical/electrical impulses to assist.

I believe I've said that three times now.

[MontanaGuy]

Oakback wrote:

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but the original question seems to ultimatley search for the exact time that killing a human would not be murder.

When I started this thread I wasn't even thinking about the abortion issue although I can see how it could lead in that direction. What I was really getting at is the absurdity of a soul popping into a fertilized egg that happened to be residing in a glass container. My reason for using that as an example is because even though religious people firmly believe in the existence of a soul there is absolutely no evidence for it and I've never heard a reasonable explanation that could describe the joining of a soul and a human body and at what time this might occur.

[freedom]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

In a neverending attempt to rile up my sidekicks in the religion forum I thought I'd throw out a confusing situation just to see what people think about it. We all know that the first so called test tube baby was born back in the late seventies in England and became instantly famous. This was the first time that an egg had been fertilized outside of the human body. This does raise certain religious implications because it creates an artificial humanly devised method to allow a pregnancy to begin in the first place. We've had a number of discussions about the soul and how it's implanted into the body. Well, if there's a soul does it pop into the test tube at the appropriate moment or does it hang out for several days until the multiplying cells have been put back into the human body? Ok, yes I know I'm being my usual overly analytical self but it really is a legitimate question. What do you think?

Man/Woman becomes a living soul, at the point of breath.
Life begins at conception, spirit enters at breath....
godspeed,

freedom

[Joe_Ryder]

Originally Posted by chielgirl

Purposely misinterpreting my statement, I see. An embryo cannot grow without a mechanical/electrical impulse or host body.

I didn't make a comment about the interdependence of living creatures. I do not consider an embryo/fetus to be a life since it cannot live without a host body or mechanical/electrical impulse.

The truth is whatever you choose to believe while facts don't require your approval.

If that rationalization works for you, that's great.