Dualism versus materialism (Identity)

by dhw, Saturday, July 01, 2017, 11:52 (2701 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: I don’t want details. I want a straight answer to a straight question. Since this whole discussion revolves around that one question, I am skipping the rest of your post, as you repeat your concept and I would only repeat my objections to it, as above. You have expressed your belief in an immaterial conscious self, which survives the death of brain and body. We all agree that we have a material brain. Under “Consciousness: a neurosurgeon’s observations” (thank you for this excellent essay) there is a quote from Francis Crick:
“A person’s mental activities are entirely due to the behaviour of nerve cells, glial cells, and the atoms, ions, and molecules that make them up and influenced them.” Do you accept this view?
If not, do you accept Aquinas’s view that our mental activities (e.g. ideas) are the product of an immaterial soul?

DAVID: Yes. Consciousness is soul. The newborn's brain receives consciousness ae Ensoulment.

“Yes” would have helped considerably, but since your additional comments have nothing to do with the question, I’d better make sure you are not equivocating again. Apologies for my annoying desire for clarity. Once more: do you believe that our mental activities (e.g. our ideas) are the product of our material brain (as per Crick) or of our immaterial soul (as per Aquinas)?