Lesson 9 – Consciousness, Soul, and the Afterlife[i]


The process of thought requires a genuine enduring “I”.
-- Immanuel Kant

I give eternal life to them and they shall never perish.
-- Jn 10:28


I – THE CHALLENGE TO EVOLUTION

How does evolution explain human consciousness?

Evolution cannot account for my self-conscious awareness. I am aware of many things at one time – colors, sounds, feelings, etc. but this does not result in a “heap of awareness.” My mind integrates these things into one experience that I call my own self-conscious awareness. Atheist Professor Colin McGinn asks, “How can mere matter originate consciousness? How did evolution convert the water of biological tissue into the wine of consciousness? Consciousness seems like a radical novelty in the universe, not prefigured by the aftereffects of the Big Bang. So how did it contrive to spring into being from what preceded it?”

The content of our thinking is not limited of the way to the “natural world only” with its boundaries of space and time (see figure in Lesson 3). Our minds also conceive of abstract universal notions such as truth, goodness and beauty which do not take up space or time; and can exist in multiple minds all at once. Whatever that kind of thinking is -- it is “outside the box” of naturalism. It is not explainable in terms of material reality and evolutionary processes only.

Imagine the history of the universe without God. Up until the appearance of living creatures all we have is dead matter without consciousness – there are no thoughts, feelings, sensations, free actions, choices, or purposes. There would be merely one physical event after another, all behaving in accordance with the laws of physics and chemistry. How then can we ever even imagine something as radically different in essence as consciousness evolving from physical entities? That’s getting something from nothing, which is against every known law of science and logic. All you get from applying physical processes (such as mutation and natural selection) to physical matter is a different arrangement of the starting physical stuff. Consciousness is a jump of a totally different kind. However, if you start with an Intelligent Designer and Creator you can explain how minds with consciousness come into existence.

How does evolution explain the soul?

In naturalism (the natural or material world is all there is), nothing survives the grave. Death ends all of me. This view was seldom held before the so-called Enlightenment, but it is now the majority view held by the intellectually elite and one of the major axioms of naturalism. But the Bible says that human beings are a unity of two realities -- body and soul (Mk 8:36). There is that part of me which extends in 3-dimensions taking up space that we call “matter.” But there also is that part of me of a “different kind” which we know as “soul.” It is the soul that animates matter and gives it its vital energy. Scripture says that God breathed life into lifeless matter (Gen 2:7). And, it is the soul that possesses eternal life beyond the grave (Lk 16:22).

One of the driving forces behind the universal acceptance of Darwinism by the intellectual elite nurtured by the Enlightenment is the fact that if one believes in God, then a naturalistic view of the world is not a viable option. If one believes in a designer/creator God, evolution thorough variation and natural selection could be seen as superfluous. If one believes that God intervened by special creation of organisms, then Darwin’s theory could be seen as superfluous. If the soul exists, it would be beyond the reach of evolutionary theory and would threaten its very possibility. So, like creationism and intelligent design, the soul’s existence has been rejected by the dogma of naturalistic evolution which has become the intellectual pacifier of secularism.

How can evolution “explain” anything?

Evolutionists claim that their doctrine is true. They expect us to consider their arguments and agree with their conclusions – just as I expect them to do with mine. But to judge anything -- to engage in critical thinking -- one must be free to consider and weigh the merits of the things we’re judging. No courtroom judge, for example, would ever be one of the prisoners on trial. It is my mind that does the judging. But a mind that thinks has a transcendent reality to the brain which is material. Therefore, my mind must be non-material.

Why would an evolutionist trust anything that originated in an evolved brain that was formed by random forces and natural selection? Would you trust a printout from a computer that was programmed by random forces? (I have a hard enough time trusting printouts programmed by intelligent forces.) Theoretical thinking (which takes place in the mind) does not contribute directly to survival value. So how can evolution be a plausible hypothesis of the mind as it is the center of theoretical thinking? British evolutionist J. B. S. Haldane acknowledged that, “If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of the atoms in my brain, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true … and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain [mind] to be composed of atoms.”[ii] In one of the most bizarre murder cases of 2004 (and perhaps the century), the crime scene investigator was asked, “Why would she (the murderer) commit such a heinous act?” to which the investigator promptly replied, “You can’t think rationally about irrational things.”

Darwinist philosopher Michael Ruse admits that there is no evolutionary answer to the question, “Why should I, even as I now write, be able to reflect on what I am doing; and why should you, even as you read now, be able to ponder my points, agreeing or disagreeing, with pleasure or pain, deciding to refute me or deciding that I am just not worth the effort? No one, not the Darwinian as such, seems to have any answer to this.”[iii] Yet many evolutionary-minded techno prophets predict that computers in the 3rd millennium will be capable of the intellectual capacities of human beings; some claiming those capacities to include the full range of emotional and spiritual experience as well – even surpassing their human counterparts and achieving consciousness! These Darwinian naturalists contend, as Harvard sociobiologist E. O. Wilson puts it, that “Conscious experience is a physical and not a supernatural phenomenon.”[iv] Francis Crick said that we are no more than physical beings with our behavior determined by our “vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.” Creationists and many brain scientists contend that computer consciousness is an absurdity. All computers will “ever be able to do is shuffle symbols,” as evolutionist John Searle at U. C. Berkeley says. After a century of Darwinian optimism, many researchers today are starting to agree with him. Evidence is accumulating, and becoming overwhelming as we shall see below, that human beings have a dual nature (dualism): one immaterial (mind, soul, consciousness), and one material -- brain, body, and physical nature.



No hope for Darwinism

As evolutionary theory fails at every turn, there will never be a complete scientific account of the nature and origin of mankind as long as the evolutionary paradigm reigns supreme among the intellectually elite. There will never be a scientific explanation for the emergence of mind and consciousness. Alvin Plantinga, perhaps the greatest living American philosopher, concludes, “Things don’t look hopeful for Darwinian naturalists.” Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize winner in physics, said scientists may have to “bypass the problem of consciousness” altogether because “it may just be too hard for us (Darwinists).”[v] In other words, evolution fails to give us the answers we want. Darwin said in his notebooks that if there was anything in his theory that could not be explained by naturalism, then there would have to be a creationist explanation. Darwin’s theory has met a complete dead-end when confronted by explaining consciousness and the soul. It’s time for science to escape the shackles of Darwin’s general (macro) theory of evolution and face-up to the reality of the non-material world. As long as science continues to confine its scope to “inside the box” of naturalism, it will remain cut off from the full spectrum of reality and from pursuing truth wherever it may lead.

Philosopher Robert Augros and physicist George Stanciu, who have explored the depths of the consciousness and soul controversy conclude that “physics, neuroscience, and humanistic psychology all converge on the same principle: mind is not reducible to matter” They added: “The vain expectation that matter might someday account for mind … is like the alchemist’s dream of producing gold from lead.”[vi] And yet, “The most censored speech in the United States today is not flag-burning, pornography or the press,” according to Phyllis Schlafly. “The worst censors are those who prohibit classroom criticism of the theory of evolution.” Renaissance thinker Michel Montaigne had it right when he said, “Nothing is so firmly believed as that which is least known.”

II – WHAT IS THE SOUL?

The Mind/Body Problem

We live in a culture so saturated with scientific naturalism that we are indoctrinated every day to view human beings as nothing more than having one nature: that of an evolved animal in a physical machine. The conscious “I” is nothing more than physical and chemical animations of our brain -- and the soul and life after death is just a myth for those in need of believing that sort of thing. But is a human being composed only of matter – a body and a brain and nervous system? Or does a person have an immaterial part as well – a mind and soul? In scientific research this study is known as the Mind/Body Problem. The two main views held are that human beings are either:

1. A brain/nervous system (matter) only. This materialistic-only view is known as Physicalism. or,


2. A material part (body, brain) and an immaterial part (mind, soul, spirit). This view is known as Dualism.

According to physicalism, a human being is merely a physical entity consisting of matter, physical properties of the matter (those items about matter listed in a physics or chemistry handbook, e.g., size, shape, volume, hardness, electrical, chemical or magnetic properties); and physical events (the coming or going of those properties over time). Everything in the body can be explained in terms of certain electrical and chemical events happening in the brain and the central nervous system. My conscious mental life of thoughts, emotions, and pain are nothing more than physical events in my brain and my nervous system. Consciousness can be explained in merely physical terms.

Dualists disagree with physicalists. Consciousness and mental states cannot be explained in merely physical terms. For example we have:

• Sensations, through which we experience various phenomena such as color, sounds, smells, tastes, textures, pains and itches. They all have a different conscious “feeling” that isn’t physical.


• Attitudes, through which I can hope, desire, fear, dread, wish, think, and believe about things. I hope that it will rain tomorrow. I dread spiders, etc. My attitudes are not physical entities.


• Purposing, i.e., acts of will: intentional acts that I commit, or try to bring about. There is no physical explanation for volitional acts.

The brain is a physical substance that has physical properties and the mind or soul is a mental substance that has mental properties. When I am in pain, the brain has certain physical properties (electrical, chemical), and the mind has certain mental properties (the conscious awareness of pain). The mind and the brain interact with each other, and their functions are highly correlated, but they are completely different entities. Also, since the soul is not identified with any part of the brain or with any particular physical experience, the soul (mind) survives the destruction of the body.

If physicalism were true then everything that was true about the brain would also be true about the mind and vice versa. If only one thing were true of one and not the other, then dualism is established. The mind is not the brain. Even if scientists could find a physical activity in the brain for every mental state, that only establishes correlation, it does not establish identity. The identity of the mind and brain could only be established if each and every aspect of the brain and the mind were true of each – and it’s not.

The nature of the soul

A person has two natures – a physical nature which is material (body, brain) and a non-physical nature which is immaterial (soul, mind). The mind is the source of the mental abilities of the soul. The Bible teaches the duality of human nature: a human being is a unity of two distinct natures: body and soul. More specifically, I am a soul and I have a body. The soul (which is the same thing as the self or the “I”) is an immaterial, invisible entity that makes me a conscious, living human being. The soul is what I am cognizant of when I engage in various acts of introspection. It is that which I am aware of when I ponder what is going on “inside” me. The body is only the material (physical) container for the soul. If my soul leaves my body, “I” leave my body because I am my soul. You can search in vain throughout your body and you will never find your soul, i.e., the physical place where your thoughts, feelings, sensations, and your “I” resides.

Mental states of the soul

There are at least five of them:

Sensations – a state of awareness; a mode of consciousness. I “see” with my mind, not my eyes. My eyes are a physical instrument that detect physical electromagnetic waves (physical phenomena) in the “visible” spectrum (the limits of the eye’s detection capability). My eyes (and my body in general) are the instruments my mind (“I”) uses to experience the external world.

Thoughts – are the mental content of the soul. Even if they are expressed in words, the thoughts in the mind of a speaker are invisible. They are not physical.

Beliefs – are a person’s views, held to varying degrees of strength, as to how things really are. My thoughts exist only while they are being thought, but my beliefs are the basis on which I act.

Desires – are a certain inclination to do, have, or experience certain things. They may be conscious, or they may be unconscious, but are distinct mental experiences of the soul.

Will – is a volition or free choice; an exercise of my power; or my endeavoring to do a certain thing. When I act freely I am the “first mover”; i.e., there is no event that necessarily compels me to act. I must will it. My desires, beliefs, thoughts and sensations may influence my choice, but my will is not necessarily caused by any of these things.



Faculties of the soul

The faculties of the soul are those mental and spiritual capacities with which we have been endowed. We have faculties of sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. Taken together, these are the sensory faculties of the soul. However, we also have emotional faculties of the soul which include our abilities to experience love, fear, joy, etc. My will is a faculty that contains my abilities to choose and act.

The mind is that faculty of the soul that contains my thoughts and beliefs along with the abilities to have them. It is with my mind that I think, and my mind contains my beliefs.

The spirit is that faculty of the soul through which I relate to God:

• Ps 51:10 – O God, renew a steadfast spirit within me.


• Rom 8:16 – The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.


• Eph 4:23 – And that you may be renewed in the spirit of your mind.

Before the new birth my spirit had limited ability to relate to God; most of the capacity of my spirit was dead and inoperative. When I was born again, however, God implanted new capacity within my spirit.

What does the Bible say about the soul?

In Scripture, “soul” (Hb: nephesh; Gr: psyche; Latin anima) is defined as the essence of being or life; the animating principle which ultimately is derived from God who “breathed” life into mankind (Hb: adam, “human being”). Likewise “death” is described as occurring when the breath ceases, i.e., when the nephesh departs. Gen 35:18 says that when Rachel died in childbirth with Benjamin, “her soul was departing.” Elijah prayed for the nephesh to return to the dead son of the Zarephath widow for, “there was no breath left in him (1 Ki 17:17). The OT states clearly that “life (nephesh) is in the blood” (Deu 12:23); and that the Suffering Servant’s “life’s blood” or “soul” will be poured out (Is 53:12) for our redemption. (See also Ps 116:4 and Ps 34:22). Nephesh is also used as the description of thought, memory and consciousness, as well as the full range of needs, desires and feelings (Ps 103:2; Lam 3:20).

In the NT, psyche carries over the same basic meaning of the Hebrew nephesh. Jesus makes clear that the psyche is the true person and is distinct from the body: “Do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Mt 10:28). At death a transformation takes place in which our body disintegrates, but our soul continues to exist in the afterlife (1 Cor 15:50-54; Rev 6:9; 20:4). To Jesus, our soul is priceless, “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul? (Mt 16:26; Mk 8:36; Lk 9:25). He gave His own psyche to redeem us (Mt 20:28; Mk 10:45). Jesus said that those who try to save their own soul will lose it, but those who will willingly lose their psyche for His sake will gain it (Mt 16:25; Mk 8:35; Lk 9:24). Jesus demonstrates His words by voluntarily dying on the cross for our souls. In His resurrection from the dead, our souls gain eternal life (Rms 5:6-9; 10:9; Lk 23:39-43).

A brief word study of “soul” in the OT and NT reveals

• All souls (life) are Mine, says the Lord (Ex 18:4)


• We are told to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength (Deu 6:5; 30:6; Josh 22:5; 2 Kings 23:25; Mt 22:37; Mk 12:30; Lk 10:27)


• The Psalmist says that his soul pants for God (42:1); his soul thirsts for God (63:1); his soul clings to God (63:8); his soul rejoices in the Lord (35:9); and the Lord restores his soul (23:3)


• Jonathan’s soul was knit to the soul of David as he loved David as his own soul (1 Sam 18:1)


• Job’s friend tells him that when man’s flesh and bones waste away, his soul draws near to the pit (Job 33:21-22).


• In the parable of the rich man, God says to him, “You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?” So is the man who lays up material possessions for himself and is not rich toward God. (Lk12:20-21)


• In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said that His soul was deeply grieved to the point of death (Mt 26:38)


• Peter tells us to abstain from fleshly lust which wages war against the soul (1 Pet 2:11)


• James tells us to put aside all filthiness and wickedness and receive the word of God which is able to save our souls (Jms 1:21).

Do animals have souls?

Scripture teaches that animals as well as humans have souls. In the OT, nephesh (soul) and ruach (spirit) are used of animals (Gen 1:30, Ecc 3:21). In the NT, psyche (soul) is used of animals in Rev 8:9. Moreover, it is a matter of common sense that animals are not merely unconscious machines. Rather they are conscious living beings with sensations, emotions (such as fear), and desires. And some animals apparently have thoughts and beliefs. The history of Christian teaching is widely united in affirming the existence of the “souls of men and beasts.”

Animals, however, do not seem to have moral awareness – the notion of virtue, of duty, or of another thing having intrinsic value and rights. Animals do not seem to entertain abstract thoughts. Augustine once noted that animals have desires, but they do not have desires to have desires. They don’t think about thinking. They are not aware of their awareness.

The Bible is not clear as to whether or not an animal soul survives death. There are no compelling statements for or against the idea. There are texts about animals in heaven, e.g., the wolf lying down with the lamb (Is 11:6), but it is not clear that these are animals resurrected from their earthly bodies.

When is the soul created?

Throughout the history of the Church there have been two competing views.

Creationists – believe that God creates the human soul directly on the occasion of certain physical events, e.g., the moment of conception when a sperm fertilizes an egg. However, God could create a soul at any other time of His choosing, e.g., upon cloning.

Traducians – believe there exists soulish potentialities within the egg and sperm so that a soul emerges during the normal process of fertilization. With regard to cloning? There may be soulish potentialities latent within living cells other than the sperm or egg.

III – EVIDENCE FOR THE SOUL

Evidence from brain research

The father of modern neurosurgery, Wilder Penfield, performed surgery on more than a thousand epileptic patients. In one of his experiments, he would electrically stimulate a motor function of the brain, e.g., the movement of one hand, and then challenge the patient to keep that hand still while the current was being applied. The patient would seize the stimulated hand with the other and struggle to hold it still as his mind fought against the stimulation. Invariably, the patient would respond by saying, “I didn’t do that; you did.” The patient thought of himself as having an experience separate from his body. No matter where Penfield probed the cerebral cortex he found, “There is no place … where electrical stimulation will cause a patient to believe or to decide.” Penfield came to believe in the existence of the soul based on his experiments and said what a thrill it was that as a scientist he could come to that point scientifically.[vii]

John Eccles, the eminent neurophysiologist and Nobel laureate came to the belief that, “there is what we might call a supernatural origin of my unique self-conscious mind, or my unique selfhood or soul.”[viii] Nobel laureate Sir Charles Sherrington, an Oxford professor of physiology declared, “For me now, the only reality is the human soul.” Many brain scientists have been compelled to postulate the existence of the immaterial mind even though they may not embrace an afterlife. No matter, hard core naturalists continue to have faith that evolution will eventually discover the naturalistic explanation. Given Darwinism as a non-negotiable starting point there really is no other choice for them.

Evidence from near-death experiences (NDE)

People who are clinically dead sometimes have a vantage point of an object or event “outside their body” and gain information that they couldn’t have possibly known if it was just an illusion in their brain. One woman died and she saw a tennis shoe on the roof of the hospital. As far back as 1965, an article in The Humanist stated that near-death experiences indicate “a dualistic world where mind or spirit has an existence separate from the world of material things … presenting a challenge to humanism as profound in its own way as that which Darwinian evolution did to Christianity a century ago.”

Evidence regarding artificial intelligence (AI)

There is great hope among naturalistic scientists that a computer will eventually be able to perform all the functions of the human mind. But much of AI research makes a fundamental error – it equates artificial intelligence (the kind of thing computers do) with intelligence itself. This is a mistake. Computers do not think, see, hear, feel, love, or have consciousness. They cannot think through a logical set of propositions and draw a conclusion. They just imitate mental states and intellectual activity.

To illustrate how computers imitate human thinking but cannot replace it, consider the following experiment.[ix] Imagine your job is to translate the Arabic language into the Chinese language, and you know nothing about either one of them. You are put in a closed room and are given instructions that when certain Arabic symbols are presented you are to map those symbols (translate) into a certain set of Chinese symbols. After a while you are very good at manipulating these symbols, and to an observer outside the room it appears that the “computer” (that’s you) is good at translating Arabic to Chinese. You (the computer) behave exactly as if you understand Arabic and Chinese, but you don’t have a clue about understanding the content of your “translation.” Computers and their programs are not minds – they fail to have consciousness, intentionality and real understanding of content. AI can merely imitate a mind; it cannot function as one. There’s an ancient proverb that says one will achieve real knowledge when one realizes the difference between the container and the content! In brain research that means to realize the difference between the mind (content) and the brain (container).

There is no evidence whatsoever that computers will ever achieve self-consciousness. Nobel Prize winner John Eccles said he’s “appalled by the naiveté of those who foresee computer sentience.” Computers have artificial intelligence, not intelligence. A computer has no awareness; no first-person point of view; no insights into problems. A computer doesn’t think, “Aha, now I understand what multiplication is all about.” Consciousness is not the same thing as behavior. A computer can be programmed to simulate behavior, but it cannot possess consciousness. Suppose we are able to build a computerized dog, and we were able to simulate everything physical about it – body structure, organs, behavior, etc. No matter how sophisticated we get there will always be one thing we will never be able to program – what it’s like to be a dog! What it’s like to hear, to feel, to experience sound and color from the dog’s subjective point of view. Computers may imitate intelligence but they will never be able to possess consciousness. We can’t confuse behavior with what it’s like to be alive, awake, and conscious. Consciousness is an immaterial reality apart from the brain.

Will anyone ever decode the human brain?

In an article, The Myth of Mind Control in the October 2004 issue of Discover magazine, brain scientists report on their attempt to decipher the so-called “neural code” – the brain’s “software” that allows it to “think.” One research team leader at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) says he ranks the understanding of the neural code right up there with the top two mysteries of the universe: the origin of the universe, and the origin of life. The neural code is the key to understanding the mind-body problem: “How that wrinkled mass of jelly in our skull generates a unique conscious self with a sense of personal identity and autonomy.”

The brain contains over 100 billion cells and each cell is linked via synapses to more than 100,000 other cells. The brain performs at least one million billion operations per second. And, the most vital components of transmission may be the electrical and magnetic fields generated by synaptic currents that constantly ripple through the brain and produce almost instant comprehension. For example, “When you pick up a phone and hear a voice, from the very first moment, even before you understand any meaning of the words, you know who you are talking to and what her emotional state is.”

Some evolutionary brain scientists have faith that someday they will ferret out the brain’s information processing abilities, but even most of these also believe that certain aspects will remain inviolable. Our most meaningful thoughts and memories are written in a code (language) that is unique to each of us; hence it will always be a mystery. No conceivable technology can discern all the memories, emotions, and meanings aroused in us by our perceptions, because these emerge from the experiential history of each individual. “You hear a stale pop tune, I hear my wedding song,” one brain scientist says. The uniqueness of each individual represents a fundamental barrier to scientific understanding and control of the mind. Even if AI ever succeeds in building a computer based on the neural coding scheme of the brain, we will not be able to read “its mind.”

IV – PHYSICALISM CANNOT BE TRUE

Recall physicalism is the name given to the belief that a human being is only a physical entity consisting of matter alone (has no immaterial dimension). Dualists (Creationists and others who believe in the dual nature of human beings – mind and body) disagree with physicalists. Consciousness cannot be explained in merely physical terms for several reasons:

Mental vs. physical events
Physical events that take place in my brain and nervous system, e.g., cortex stimulation, can only be described using terms of chemistry and physics. On the other hand, mental events, e.g., feelings of pain, episodes of thoughts, or sensory experiences, etc., can’t be described in physical terms only. My thoughts, feelings or sensory experiences don’t have any weight; can’t be found in a particular point in space; are not composed of chemicals and do not have electrical properties. I can picture a pink elephant in my mind, but you cannot find a pink elephant image anywhere in my brain. You can only “find” it, if I tell you it’s there. Sense images are mental entities, not physical ones.

Private access
I have private access into my own mental life and no one else does. My mental states, such as feeling sad, experiencing red, having a thought that “3 is an odd number,” are directly in my own thoughts and no one has access to them but me. That is not the case with physical objects, including my brain. Physical objects are “public” objects and no one is in a privileged position regarding them. A scientist can discover a lot about my brain, but he can never know about my mental life unless I tell him. I can even be wrong about the physical facts, but it doesn’t affect my mental state, unless I allow it to. For example, I can be wrong if I think that there’s a chair in the next room. But I cannot be wrong about the fact that I think the chair is there. Thus physical states are not identical to mental states.

Subjective vs. objective experiences
I experience sounds, tastes, colors, thoughts, and pains subjectively. It is my (and only my) point of view. It is not objective, i.e., accessible to public scrutiny. If the world were made of matter only, these subjective aspects of my consciousness would not exist. But they do exist! So there must be more to my “inner world” than just matter.

Is red nothing more than a wavelength?
We are led by naturalistic scientists to think so, but common sense tells us that the physical phenomenon of wavelength and my experience of the color red are two entirely different things. The first exists in the physical realm, and the second in the mental realm. My experience of red does not have physical properties, but the physical reality of red does (i.e., its wavelength).

Intentionality
Mental states involving intention point beyond themselves to other things, which don’t even have to exist physically: for example, the love of another person; even the fear of a spider. Intentionality is not a property of anything physical. Mental states are not physical states.

Awareness of self
We are aware of our own self (our ego, I, consciousness) as being distinct from our bodies. I have a direct awareness that I am not identical to my body. Rather, I am aware that I am a “self” that has a body and a conscious mental life. Physicalists cannot explain this. Remember Descartes: “I think, therefore I am.”

I am more than a “third person”
If the physicalist description of the world were true, everything could be described from a 3rd person point of view, i.e., in terms of objects, properties, processes, location, etc. But reality can’t be fully explained that way because there is always my point a view (1st person) as well. In physicalism there are no privileged 1st person perspectives. However, no amount of 3rd party description will ever capture my own subjective 1st person awareness of myself and the object I am describing. I can only express that awareness using the term “I” as I am in this sentence talking to “you.”

Am “I” the same person I was a moment ago?
Physically, each moment I lose hundreds of thousands of skin cells - and in my case hair cells as well. In fact, every seven years my cells are almost entirely replaced. Am I still me? Well of course I am. My “self” (my soul) remains constant throughout the change of my physical self - even the catastrophic change when my body dies. I am aware of the fact that I am the same self that continues to exist throughout my lifetime. The Bible tells us that we will continue to possess that awareness even after our physical body ceases to function. My soul will remain throughout eternity. In fact, when I enter eternity I will even get a new body -- an imperishable, resurrected one -- to re-unite with my soul (1 Cor 15:40-58).

Free will, morality, responsibility and punishment
If physicalism is true, then human free will does not exist. If I am just a physical body and brain, there is nothing in me that has the capacity to freely choose to do something. Instead all my actions and choices are pre-programmed (determined) by physical phenomena, including mutation and natural selection. In social evolutionary theory it’s my genes that “make me do it” rather than my immaterial self choosing to do it. How then do I ever make sense out of morality which must presuppose that I have real free-will choices to make? Physicalism requires a radical revision of our commonsense notions of freedom, moral obligation, responsibility and punishment. On the other hand, if these common sense notions are true, then physicalism is false and dualism is established.

Determinism cannot be true – logically
If determinism were true then the arguments for it are not real arguments, but only conditioned reflexes. If my mental processes are totally determined by physical means, then my arguments for it would be nothing more than conditioned reflexes, not real choices.

Philosophical arguments against naturalism and physicalism

As previously noted, the naturalistic indoctrination that our mind and our brain are the same thing is so pervasive in our society that we unconsciously speak and act as though the mind is just a complex computer made of physical components. But we have shown that physicalism (like the naturalistic philosophy that spawns it) is a cultural myth that is absurd and false no mater how widely it may be held. Naturalism and physicalism are limited subsets of knowledge that do not ascend other forms of knowledge. Naturalism fails to account for things we all know to have a factual basis outside the purview of science – ethics, politics, philosophy, theology, law, literature, art, etc. (“outside the box” in the figure in Lesson 3). Naturalism cannot be the sole arbiter of reality. Therefore, it must be either assumed a priori, or judged valid by the accumulation of the preponderance of the evidence when evaluated against other truth claims such as creationism.

Also, we have shown from the evidence above that dualism is a better explanation of reality than physicalism. A person is comprised of both a soul and a body (dualism), not just a body alone (physicalism). Physicalism is a statement of philosophy, not a scientific fact. Its pre-suppositions cannot be tested so it can’t be proven to be true or false; its truth must either be assumed, or judged “true” in comparison to competing theories such as dualism. The “scientific method” for deciding between physicalism and dualism is to collect the best information available and make the best inference based on the observable data. As shown above, dualism is the clear winner.

Likewise, naturalism (the philosophical basis of physicalism) rests on philosophical, and not scientific assumptions: that the universe is orderly, knowable and uniform; that truth and logic exist, and mathematics objectively models it; that our intellect and 5 senses are reliable tools for gathering truth; etc. If naturalism rules out “intelligent design” and “dualism” because they rest on philosophical assumptions, then it commits intellectual suicide itself as it rules out the foundation on which it is also based.

V – THE AFTERLIFE AND EVIDENCE FOR IT

In evolutionary theory and physicalism, life ends at the grave. Creationists, however, believe in dualism whereby human beings are comprised of two natures: a soul (mind) and a body (brain). Dualism makes eternal life plausible. If physicalism were true, then with the death of the body the person would become extinct -- annihilated. Dualism makes survival in an afterlife intelligible. The person in the after life is the same person they were in physical life because that person’s soul (self, I) survives the grave. Dualism breaks the stranglehold that naturalism and physicalism have on belief in eternal life because it supports a belief in God and a transcendent reality “outside the box” of naturalism. The existence of the soul provides evidence for the existence of the immaterial and eternal God who created it. Something cannot come from nothing, and an immaterial soul cannot come from mere matter alone. Dualism argues against validity of the theory of evolution.

Evidence for the afterlife from authority

Nearly all cultures, and the vast majority of all individuals who have ever lived, believed in life after death. Children naturally and spontaneously believe it unless they are conditioned out of it; they do not have to be conditioned into it. Critics say we believe this way because of fear, wishful thinking, social conditioning, or religious indoctrination. But consider – social and religious conditioning or indoctrination merely passes the buck back to an earlier generation without answering the question where the belief originated. And, if fear prevented us from believing in final annihilation, why didn’t it prevent us from believing in something much worse than annihilation – namely eternal life in hell?

Nearly all the wise sages of antiquity have believed in life after death – Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Zoroaster, Gilgamesh, Lao-tzu, Confucius, Buddha, Krishna, Muhammad, Maimonides, Augustine and Aquinas. And obviously the biblical sages – Moses, Job, the OT and NT prophets, and of course the Son of God Himself, Jesus Christ. Jesus’ belief in life after death is central to His teaching about the Kingdom of Heaven.

Evidence from reason

The Genesis account of origins shows the progression of creation from simple to complex in stages; the origin of human consciousness being the culmination. Evolutionary theory also portrays the same progression – from less to more conscious and complex organisms. Now if physical death is our final destination, then human consciousness for the evolutionist is Mother Nature’s abortion. Our progression is in vain. Nature conceives us only to kill us. For the creationist, however, God has a plan that culminates in the afterlife.

Life after death is the most natural and obvious worldview to even the most primitive of humans, and is assumed to be the case by most people today regardless of their religious belief. Suppose a primitive has two cows and one dies. He ponders – what’s the difference between the dead cow and the live cow? There’s no material difference (size weight, color, etc.) between the cow when it was alive, and now that it is dead. Yet something is clearly missing. Life! He ponders, “What is life?” and concludes that life is what makes the live cow breathe, or makes its heart beat, or makes it process food. He concludes that life is not a material thing, like an organ. It is something by which the cow lives. Bodies die by the removal of something immaterial called “life.” The immaterial he calls “soul” and readily concludes since it is not material it does not die – only bodies die. Bodies die because they have life taken from them.

What is mind over matter? When I am dead, my body responds only to its obedience to physical laws. But while I am alive, I can control physical laws with my mind. I can defy the law of gravity by jumping up. I can “levitate” by shear thought and will power; i.e., I can raise my arms at will. We can command our bodies to overcome the laws of physics when we are alive, but when I die, even though my arms, legs, muscles, nerves and brain still remain, there is no longer any “I” (mind) to control the material me.

I can know my body as an object only because I am more than my body. A “knowing” subject must be more than the known object, just like a projecting machine can project images on a screen because it is not merely an image – it is more than the image. The knower must transcend the known.

The evolutionist says we are no more than a bundle of “instincts” fashioned by natural forces and responding accordingly. But if there were only instinct in us, and not will, then the strongest instinct would always win – it’s the survival of the fittest. That is not the case, for I can, and sometimes do, choose contrary to my strongest instincts: For example, when I choose to follow the weaker instinct of compassion rather than the stronger instinct of fear and self-preservation; or when I choose to be altruistic rather than self-serving.

The evolutionist says that our mind and our brain are the same thing; that the brain is nothing more than random atoms cobbled together over time, and that its “programming” has been done by heredity (genetics) and environment (society). Ultimately, however, our programming has been accomplished by unintelligent, undesigned, random chance, brute forces and physical causes. There is no logical source of our reasoning ability. But this is an absurdity. If that were true we should have absolutely no reason to trust our brain when it “tells” us about anything, including itself and how it came to be. If materialism is not true, then there must be an immaterial reality – the soul – which is not subject to material reality, including mortality.

Evidence from our experience

If there is no ultimate objective justification for justice, then there can be no ultimate basis for morality. As Dostoyevsky said, “Without God (and immortality), everything is permissible.” Some intellectual elites argue against this and end up with moral nihilism – an untenable position for society and a self-refuting position even from the perspective of one’s own experience. The afterlife with its demand for justice sets the ethical standards for moral behavior in this life.

We all experience the need (demand) that our life must have a purpose, a goal, a final good. This is a primary need of mankind; and material wealth, power and pleasure will be sacrificed in order to obtain it. But if our life ends in annihilation, then life does not have a purpose worth living for. Atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell called us to build our lives on “the firm foundation of unyielding despair.” But this is psychologically impossible and logically contradictory. Despair is not a “firm foundation” but precisely the lack of one. The afterlife gives us the ultimate target to aim for in this life.

We all want happiness. And our experience is that happiness is more than our material possessions and the satisfaction of our desires. Joy comes from a peace within us, not from our materialism. Mark 8:36 puts it this way, “What profit a man if he gain the whole world, but loses his soul?”

We all long in our inward being for something that can’t seem to be satisfied in this life – a “longing” of some sort for “completeness.” Even the atheist Sarte admitted that: “There comes a time when we must ask, even of Shakespeare, even of Beethoven, ‘Is that all there is?’ ” This “something more” is what the Bible calls eternal life (“He has also set eternity in their heart” Ecc 3:11). Every innate desire in us, as distinct from artificial and conditioned desires, corresponds to a real life object which can satisfy that desire. If it’s thirst, then drink; if its eros, then sex; if it’s curiosity, then knowledge; if it’s loneliness, then it’s another person. But the “longing” I’m talking about goes beyond all of these. We are never completely satisfied with anything this world has to offer. Why else would we constantly complain? The world’s solution to any felt need is never enough. The solution to this continued innate hunger must exit, just as the innate hunger for food proves that food exists. However, inadequately we may understand what we are after; it is somehow characterized by terms such as “paradise,” “eternity,” the “divine life.” Augustine put it this way, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.”

We all want to experience true love. Not the love that is conditional; not the love that is for physical pleasure only; and not the love that treats me as an object. But true agape love that sees me as indispensable as I see myself: A love that is unconditional and not seeking something in return. But this kind of love requires that you choose to receive it. It is free and not a compulsion. But if you do not choose to love, you will not see it. If you really want to know about it, you must try it. The road to certainty to finding ultimate love and immortality is to reach out and not just think about it. In the Brothers Karamazov, Father Zossima tells the “lady of little faith” who wonders how to regain her lost faith in immortality: “Insofar as you advance in love, you will grow surer of the reality of God and of the immortality of the soul. This has been tried. This is certain.” The way is offered to all sincere seekers with the promise that if they travel the road, they will surely see it. C. S. Lewis traveled that road and when one of his closest friends, Charles Williams, died he wrote, “No event has so corroborated my belief in the next life as Charles Williams did simply by dying. For when the idea of death and the idea of Williams thus met in my mind, it was the idea of death that was changed.” The strongest evidence to Lewis for immortality was what Williams did and what he was. Death did not change the meaning of Williams; Williams changed the meaning of death.

Between 10-40% of all living persons have had some experience of the real presence of the dead: usually a family member – someone close to them, who they actually see with their eyes and/or hear with their ears. The presence is always sudden and unexpected, and usually in a specific and limited space and time: “Grandma was in my bedroom last night.” Even the skeptic rarely doubts the veracity of this experience when it happens to him or her.

More than 20 million Americans claim to have had near-death experiences (NDE). It may be occasioned by the anticipation of death (as in an auto accident or a fall), or by a medical crisis during which heart and/or brain death is reversed. NDE experiences have many things in common but one thing is always present: certainty about life after death, and the eradication of any fear of it. They have experienced first-hand, life outside the mortal body. Analysis has shown that the likelihood of this being caused by chemically or psychologically induced hallucination seems very small. Also, biblical writers have claimed similar experiences without being near death. Sometimes they even claim to see the life of heaven; or life after death. The Apostle Paul had such an experience (2 Cor 12:2-6).

Biblical evidence based on God’s character

God is just. Therefore His dealing with us must reflect that attribute. But there is great injustice in the world. Here the wicked flourish and the righteous suffer. Hence “here” cannot be all there is. The short-run cannot be identical with the long-run; there must be justice to redress and compensate for the injustice suffered before death. In Lk 16:19-31, in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Jesus tells us about the afterlife. Lazarus who had a miserable time while in this world is now being comforted in heaven, while the unrighteous rich man is in agony -- in hell separated from God.

We are made in God’s image (Gen 1:27) and part of that image is our creative nature which we routinely exercise. We yearn (have a will) for our “creations” (whatever they may be) to last, but we lack the power to make that happen. God does not lack the preserving power or the creating-will. Since we are the pinnacle of His creation, it follows that we (human souls) will exist with Him forever.

God is love (1 Jn 4:8) and love does not kill, for love is the fulfillment of the law. Therefore, God does not kill us; He gives us eternal life. If we want human life to triumph over death, how much more must God? He give us the prescription in Jn 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

Biblical evidence based on the resurrection of Jesus Christ

What would be the most convincing evidence for life after death? Skeptics would probably reply something along the lines of, “Only if I can put my hands into the wounds of a dead man who has risen from the dead and see for myself will I be absolutely sure” (see the example in Jn 20:24-29). But if the will is set against believing, even this evidence will not be enough to convince some (Lk 16:31).

The risen Christ was seen and touched by eyewitnesses (1 Jn 1:1-4); and Christians are assured of life after death, not by argumentation but through the first-hand witness accounts to the resurrection of Jesus Christ (see 1 Cor 15:1-58).

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you.
- 1 Pet 1:3-4

Death is swallowed up in victory. ‘O death, where is your victory, where is your sting?’ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through Jesus Christ.
- 1 Cor 15: 54-57

To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
- 2 Cor 5:8

Conclusion

Philosophical novelist Walker Percy poignantly surveys the state of affairs of the present day unbeliever’s avoidance of dealing with the reality of his own creation, personhood, and eventual death[x] …

The present-day unbeliever is crazy because he finds himself born into a world of endless wonders, having no notion how he got here, a world in which he eats, sleeps … works, grows old, gets sick, and dies … takes his comfort and ease, plays along with the world as if his prostrate were not growing cancerous, his arteries turning to chalk, his brain cells dying off by the million, as if the worms were not going to get him in no time at all.

And the godless academic …

The more intelligent he is … He reads Dante for its mythic structure. He joins the ACLU and concerns himself with the freedom of the individual and does not once exercise his own freedom to inquire how in God’s name he should find himself in such a ludicrous situation.

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[i] Much of this lesson on “consciousness and the soul” has been abstracted from the work of J. P. Moreland:
Beyond Death, Exploring the Evidence for Immortality, Gary Habermas, J. P. Moreland, (Crossway Books, 1998), ch. 2, 3, 4.
The Evidence of Consciousness: The Enigma of the Mind, an interview with J. P. Moreland, ch. 10 in The Case for A Creator, Lee Strobel, (Zondervan, 2004).
And, on the “afterlife” from the work of Peter Kreeft:
Life After Death, ch. 10 in the Handbook of Christian Apologetics, Peter Kreeft & Ronald Tacelli, (InterVarsity Press, 1994).
[ii] When I Am Dead, J. B. S. Haldane in Possible Worlds and Other Essays, (Chatto and Winduw, 1927).
[iii] Can a Darwinian Be a Christian, Michael Ruse, (Oxford University Press, 2001).
[iv] Consilience, Edward O. Wilson, (Alfred A. Knopf, 1998).
[v] Both the Plantinga and Weinberg quotes appear in By Design, Larry Witham, (Encounter Books, 2003).
[vi] The New Story of Science, Robert W. Augros & George N. Stancui.
[vii] The Mystery of the Mind, Wilder Penfield, (Princeton University Press, 1975).
[viii] The Soul and Its Brain, Karl R. Popper & John C. Eccles, (Springer-Verlag, 1977).
[ix] Adapted from the “Chinese Room” example in Minds, Brains, and Science, John Searle, (Harvard University Press, 1984).
[x] The Second Coming, Walker Percy, (Farrer, Straus and Giroux, 1980); quoted by Marvin Olasky in World magazine, January 1/8, 2005.