Dualism (Identity)

by dhw, Sunday, March 15, 2015, 20:07 (3540 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Dhw: I'd still like to know what you think IS the source of consciousness: materials, or something else?-TONY: I do not believe that the consciousness survives the death of the body. My belief is, to use my computer analogy again, that a back up is made to a spare disk at death. ECC 12:17 says that "the spirit returns to god". But, it is important to not that the word that is translated as spirit is not referring to some consciousness that continues existence, literally translates as 'wind' or 'energetic/active force'. It is my belief that on death, the 'spirit returns to God', returning the energy to where it originated and carrying with it a backup of the data of that individual.-I am bewildered. Consciousness is spirit or energy or wind, and therefore NOT the product of materials. And yet it dies (does not survive) when the materials die. But the data of which it is conscious and which form the identity of the person who had them continue to exist independently of the materials and are somehow attached to the blob of energy that has returned to God, although the blob is not aware of them. Individual consciousness has died, but it has survived. Your computer analogy of a back-up disk really doesn't help, I'm afraid. How does your blank spirit have and not have its individual data? 
 
In your response to David on the subject of NDEs, you say “the spiritual realm is said to actively interact with the material realm that we are all familiar with” and perhaps “we also receive information from the world around us that is routinely drowned out by our known five senses.” I find the latter quite an attractive explanation, but it cannot constitute interaction between the material realm and the spiritual if the five senses are drowned out and consciousness is spirit. Then it can only be interaction between spirit and spirit. Furthermore, if NDE spirits communicate with other spirits, they have all kept their identity, independently of the materials that embody the five senses. You can't have your NDE spirit communicating with blanks! 
 
Xxxxxx-To David: in your response to Tony on the subject of NDEs (which chimes in with much of my own), you say that I giggle at the idea of the soul expressing the appearance of the dead person. I don't. (See above.) I take NDEs very seriously, and I would only giggle at the idea of an afterlife in which the dead person does NOT retain his/her identity. There has to be recognition. I don't have an explanation for NDEs, and am quite open-minded on the subject.