Exploring Qualia: The Scientific Case for the Human Soul
Materialists face a dilemma: deny materialism or self-awareness. A rational person cannot deny the existence of the soul.
- דניאל בלס
- פורסם כ"ח סיון התשע"ז
(Photo: shutterstock) #VALUE!
An article that explains qualia - is my green the same as your green? Click here.<\/a><\/strong><\/p> Material, by definition, can be explained through physical attributes: shape, quantity, size, mass, etc.<\/p> Science is materialistic, meaning it serves as a research tool for acquiring information about the physical world. For this reason, if science attempts to describe the essence of a person, it is forced into a reductionist and entirely incorrect approach, defining all human traits (senses, instincts, and actions) as one would define those in a machine. In other words, science views a person as a robot and cannot recognize the concept of experience, known as "qualia."<\/p> "Qualia" is a term describing any internal experience, not just obtaining physical knowledge about the world but the essence of experiencing this information through sight, sound, touch, etc. Qualia is not a description of information in the brain but a description of consciousness experiencing information in the brain.<\/p> For this reason, science cannot define qualia. The world of phenomena includes only phenomena; thus, science cannot acknowledge the existence of a "witness" to these phenomena. A robotic researcher would recognize "thirst" only as the phenomenon of fluid intake and retention but would not understand the experience of being thirsty.<\/p> Analytical philosopher David Chalmers proposed a thought experiment called the "philosophical zombie": René Descartes asserted: "I think, therefore I am," but it should be corrected to "I experience, therefore I am." But the fact is: we are here, and we experience. There are countless qualia arising from consciousness experiencing vast amounts of data in reality. It turns out that consciousness is not material. This subject has very practical implications, as it provides the rational justification for fundamental concepts like the value of life and human dignity. Understanding that humans are distinct from matter and experience it as spirits within the machine is what grants them an individual importance (holiness) unattainable by any material machine. It is a primary reason for the quest for life’s purpose and adherence to the Torah and its commandments, as King Solomon said: "The end of the matter, all is heard; fear Hashem and keep His commandments, for this is the whole of man. For Hashem will bring every deed into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether good or evil" (Ecclesiastes 12:13).<\/p>
Imagine successfully cloning a person but removing their consciousness. This person's body would be complete in all its parts, the brain would receive information about the physical reality through senses and act accordingly—in essence, a perfect robot. As a body that requires sustenance, it could eat, drink, move, and logically speak to achieve its survival needs and avoid danger. However, since it lacks consciousness experiencing reality, there would be no one home; this person would not feel or experience anything.
Thus, David Chalmers sought to prove dualism (the belief in body and soul), the fact that humans have consciousness experiencing qualia, and that the body alone cannot explain its existence. See also the "Chinese Room Thought Experiment" in my article.<\/a>
In other words, if humans were purely material, there should not be any "observer" experiencing qualia. In a wholly material reality, only material data, transmission, and conduction of information could exist, without any form of internal reality separate from the material world. And this must be understood: if consciousness were merely an illusion, there would be no one to experience it...!<\/p>
A person does not need words or thoughts to encounter sensory reality; they feel, see, and experience even when not thinking, just as a baby experiences hunger and the desire for maternal embrace even before knowing how to speak or think in words.
In a reality composed solely of matter, no "observer" should dwell in the brain.
Similar to the philosophical zombie, a person should be no more than an emotionless machine. Physical impulses like pain, hunger, and thirst would propel them like an insect but offer no internal experience.
Billions of neurons would still generate impulses, causes, and effects in the biological machine of the material body, functioning for survival and avoiding dangers like a plant or insect, but it should not produce any kind of qualia for those impulses.<\/p>
Our brains are not empty of an observer. The images are projected on a screen in our minds, and science can explain this well, but there is someone watching that screen. There is someone at home: someone who sees, hears, feels pleasure, desire, and pain—not just as data—but as experiences of that data. Qualia.<\/p>
[Not because science cannot yet explain it naturally, but because it cannot even recognize its existence! This conclusion is not dependent on the level of scientific advancement, already adequate in explaining sensory experiences like sight and sound, but stems from utter neglect of the mental reality of an observer that science cannot encompass since it is not part of the material reality.
Even if and when scientific research succeeds in transmitting information to the human brain, producing complex electrical signals within it and creating false sights and sounds, along with sensations of pleasure and pain, it will still offer no insight—a single, thin explanation for the consciousness experiencing that false information inside the brain.
As is known, drugs can produce sensory experiences and affect emotions by influencing information conduction in brain neurons, a chemical process no different from seeing and hearing, but this fact does not address at all who feels those sensations and emotions that the drugs evoke.
In this aspect, the brain is similar to a screen on which a movie is projected; science can decide which movie is shown, but it can never explain who is watching.
One must understand that in the eyes of materialistic science there is no observer, because materialism cannot include in its explanations the reality of a non-material observer. However, we, who know the observer exists within us, actually discover the existence of the spirit within the machine].
Who we are—our consciousness, is an immaterial entity residing in the material body. We are spiritual beings experiencing material reality through our bodies and minds like a driver in a vehicle.
And that is precisely the definition of a soul: a non-material reality existing and operating within a person's material body.
Materialists must deny one of two things: either materialism or conscious reality.
And since no person can deny their own reality, a rational person cannot deny the existence of the soul.<\/p>
