The "soul" is the form (in the Aristotelian sense) of the body. [Aristotle on Substance, Matter and Form]
Interesting. Still, we're discussing the Cardinal's statement: "Can matter create intelligence? That is a question we can't answer scientifically, because the scientific method cannot grasp it."
Now, sure, anyone can claim that there's an extra-natural something that explains why we have thoughts. And they can keep on claiming that no matter how much evidence keeps piling up showing that the mind is indeed the work-product of the physical brain. But without any positive evidence for such a supernatural entity - "soul", "hylomorphic form", or whatever - that claim becomes vacuous.
there's a ton of evidence that thoughts are always accompanied by electrochemical changes in the brain, and there's a lot of clinical evidence that damage to the material brain causes many (usually damaging) effects to the nonmaterial mind.No one's arguing with that. The Church objects to reduction of the mind to matter alone, which is utterly incoherent.
But if a rock falls to the ground & breaks up into 3 pieces, we now have four entities: Three smaller rocks and one triangle. Is the triangle material? If not, then where did it come from? It wouldn't exist if not for the 3 rocks sitting in a plane.
The triangle is a higher-order system than the rocks themselves, but there's nothing supernatural about it. It's perfectly material, in that it's made up of the three material rocks & nothing else. And yet it has exactly zero mass. It is indeed incoherent (or at least it's useless) to say that the triangle is "merely" the three rocks. Yet it is a form that's created by the three rocks & nothing else.
Not extra-natural; extra-material. You're unnecessarily conflating matter and nature.
Aristotle's arguments for the existence of the soul are the best positive proof for its existence. The soul (or form) provides a coherent explanation for many difficult philosophical subjects, such as universals, the problem of change, and our ability to know things with certainty.
And they can keep on claiming that no matter how much evidence keeps piling up showing that the mind is indeed the work-product of the physical brain. But without any positive evidence for such a supernatural entity - "soul", "hylomorphic form", or whatever - that claim becomes vacuous.
The existence of the soul can also be argued negatively, by disproving materialist accounts of the mind.
The materialist may scoff at this approach, but as Lewis relished in pointing out, the materialist has his own problems: The materialist who debunks everyone else’s ideas as the subrational products of their brain chemistry or environment cannot avoid being debunked himself. If he is honest, says Lewis, the materialist will have to admit that his own ideas are merely the "epiphe-nomenon which accompanies chemical or electrical events in a cortex which is itself the by-product of a blind evolutionary process." If all thoughts are merely the products of non-rational causes, this includes the materialist’s own thoughts. In other words, there is no reason according to materialism for materialism itself to be regarded as true.Materialist accounts of the mind are self-refuting, necessitating an ultimately non-materialistic account of the mind.
But if a rock falls to the ground & breaks up into 3 pieces, we now have four entities: Three smaller rocks and one triangle. Is the triangle material? If not, then where did it come from? It wouldn't exist if not for the 3 rocks sitting in a plane.
[Note that the notion of "triangle" is an abstraction, since we can know "triangle" (without seeing a physical representation of one) as a three sided, closed geometric figure.]
This is the problem of change. How can one substance (a rock) become another substance (a triangle composed of three rocks)? Aristotle argues that the original rock possessed "triangle" in potency. When the rock broke apart, the triangle came into existence, or into "act." So the change can be described as beginning with a rock in act (possessing triangle in potency and three pieces in potency), to a triangle in act composed of three rocks in act.
This explanation may sound arcane, but it is the only coherent explanation for the problem of change that I know. The history of the problem and Aristotle's solution are very interesting. (See the link above)
The triangle is a higher-order system than the rocks themselves, but there's nothing supernatural about it.
But there's nothing material about it either. "Triangle" is a principle.
It's perfectly material, in that it's made up of the three material rocks & nothing else.
Not so. A triangle is a closed, three-sided geometric figure. I can know "triangle" without experiencing one through my senses, just as I can know a "sixteen-sided, closed geometric figure" without experiencing one through my senses.
And yet it has exactly zero mass.
Because it's a non-material principle which is apprehended by an (ultimately) non-material mind.