Decoding the Soul

 I’ve had some ongoing discussions with friends and family about what makes us us, and nobody can nail down a concrete answer. Some say that the soul is us in our deepest forms, and others think that it makes of everything we do. None of us are even sure if the soul and conscience is the same thing! So, let’s look back at some of the most famous and influential philosophers, and see what their opinions of the soul and consciousness were. Let’s explore these ideas and try to find common ground across all these thinkers. I’ll add my two cents as well, as I read and reread a lot of shit for this. Strap in, folks. This will be a long one.

Let’s begin with the Greek notion of the soul. The Homeric poems use the word 'soul' in two distinguishable, probably related, ways. It is either something that a human being loses in death, or it is something that endures as a shade in the underworld. Homer never says that people act with their soul, though. Soul is only mentioned when someone's life is thought to be at risk, as their “life force”. In the sixth and fifth centuries, Greeks began to lose the Homeric connection, and the word 'soul' was used in a straightforwardly positive way. In the sixth and fifth century, it was attributed to every kind of living thing. It was also said to be present in every kind of way of acting and being acted on. By the end of the fifth century, people were referring to pleasure taken in food and drink, as well as sexual desire, as being associated with the soul. Perhaps this is where the idea of “soul food” came from. Moreover, the soul is also important for boldness and courage, especially in battle, and courageous people are said to have enduring or strong souls. The soul is then considered to be something that engages in activities like thinking and planning. If the soul is responsible for courageous acts, it must also grasp how and what to do in order to act courageously. There is no clear-cut difference between being in an emotional state of fear and having a terrifying thought or perception. Therefore, it is natural to refer to the soul in both situations.

In non-philosophical Greek of the fifth century, the soul is treated as the bearer of moral qualities, and responsible for practical thought and cognition. It is attributed a wide variety of activities and responses, cognitive as well as emotional, and is thought of as the bearer of virtue. Even still, Homer lacks a word to pick out the soul.

Now we can move into the Presocratic opinions. In the sixth and fifth centuries, the semantic expansion of the word 'soul' is reflected in the writings of Empedocles and Pythagoras. They thought that plants have souls and that human souls can animate plants. It’s very possible that Pythagorean speculation contributed to the semantic expansion of 'soul'. Pythagoreanism stated that a person continues to exist after death. To make the continued existence of a soul significant, the actions and attributes of the person have to be linked to the soul. This is also discussed by Heraclitus, who was involved in Pythagorus’s work. He says that a drunken person stumbles because their perception has been impaired, and this impairment is due to a tainted soul. Heraclitus thought that the soul had substance, but was composed of an imperceptible matter like air. This allowed him to avoid explaining how the soul and body are connected. Greek thinking still had its proverbial toes in this salad of thought (Number teeen: Burger King Foot Lettuce (please tell me you get this reference)). This resulted in a very complex notion that is not dissimilar to fourth-century philosophical theories. In mainstream fifth-century Greek culture, people weren’t sure if there was an afterlife, or even a soul for that matter. Socrates' arguments for the immortality of the soul were accepted hesitantly, at best. Many still believe that the soul is destroyed upon death.

Now, for Plato and Socrates. Plato's argument confronts head-on the widespread worry that the soul, at or soon after death, is destroyed by being dispersed. It begins by distinguishing between two kinds of things: things we can see, and things we can understand but can’t interact with. The argument leaves room for the idea that souls are not forms, but are instead simply intelligible. We can’t do anything to harm souls, as they are impossible for us to interact with. Socrates thinks that the soul is intelligible and that the body is perceptible and perishable. The argument leaves it open whether the soul is a perfectly respectable member of intelligible reality, or whether it can be dispersed in ways out of mortal control. Socrates then asserts that the soul is immortal, and shares its natural function with the divine. Although the soul can interact with perceptible things, it is most pure when interacting with imperceptible, or intelligible, things. He argued that this purest state is wisdom when the soul interacts with concepts alone. So, all souls are immortal because they have life essentially, the way fire has heat essentially.

Socrates takes the soul to be responsible for all the activities that constitute or are crucially involved in any living organism's life but also takes the soul to be responsible for a restricted subset of these activities. Socrates' view that the soul is responsible for all life activities is compatible with the view that the soul is responsible for desires. Socrates needs an articulation of the different ways in which the soul can be said to be responsible for the relevant activities of a living organism. The soul can be responsible for activities in its own right. Let’s look at some examples.

Phaedo, a book by Plato, does not include all of a person's desires, nor does it include all emotional responses or even all beliefs. The Phaedos, although representing Greek philosophy well, doesn’t address how desire and cognition seem to be part of one body of intelligence. For example, you may be engrossed in a YouTube rabbit hole, but your search for knowledge is interrupted by a need for some lunch. Those are two separate motives. It is plausible that Plato recognized these issues, and perhaps why he addressed them in Republic.

The Republic, another book by Plato, integrates a number of central features of the ordinary (Greek) notion of the soul, including responsibility for the life of an organism, cognitive and intellectual functions, and moral virtues. It functions on the idea that things perform their function well if they have the virtue appropriate to them, and badly if they have the relevant vice. A good soul cares and lives well, whereas a bad soul does these things badly. Socrates says that the soul has the function of living, which includes caring for the right sorts of things in the right way, ruling or regulating oneself and others, and deliberating about how to act. A person can be better or worse at doing these things depending on the condition of their soul. The soul, then, accounts for the life of an organism as well as for its cognitive and intellectual functions. It is also the bearer of virtues and accounts for the individuality of each and every person.

Now, for Aristotle. He finally addresses how we interact with our souls, and why having a soul is vital for life. The soul of an animate organism is nothing other than its system of active abilities to perform the relevant activities, from breathing to thinking complex thoughts. Aristotle does not think that there is an organ of thought (ummm), but he does think that for us to perceive things, we need to use a certain area of our body. So, the brain does have a use after all (lol). In this way, thoughts are no different biologically than any other somatic happenings in our body. He believes that once one has a proper understanding of how to explain natural phenomena in general, thoughts and feelings follow the same path. Although we know this isn’t true now, this idea could include some differences in thought and action, if need be. He just didn’t see a reason to separate them without the knowledge of the brain that we have today.

The Hellenistic schools of thought (Epicurus' Garden and the Stoics) were quite different. They believed that the soul is the body, diffused through the flesh and blood of the being. Epicurus thinks that the soul is dispersed at death along with its “atoms” as a part of the body. Epicurus' theory of the soul includes different types of atoms, each with its own purpose and properties (fire atoms, air atoms, sensing atoms, etc.). Epicurus thinks that sensing atoms are a more complex substance, which relates to cognitive processes via preconceptions and experiences. Preconceptions are pre-discovered ideas, and experiences are interpreted and articulated in terms of preconceptions (as far as I understand). These sensing atoms relate to our preconceptions, and therefore our experiences. Therefore, sensing atoms are intertwined with our experiences, and therefore our actions in those experiences. Epicurus and his followers believe that sensation is extremely important, but that rationality doesn’t require sensing atoms. Instead, they believe that the soul is a composite of two parts, one rational, and the other non-rational. The rational part is responsible for cognition, emotion, and desire, while the non-rational part is responsible for creating emotional impressions. The sensory atoms only come into play when signals from the rational part reach them, in which the soul can then interact with the world and perform their functions.

Finally, let’s look at the Stoics. Their theories describe three forces of life: inanimate objects, plant life, and animate beings/their impulses. According to the Stoic theory, the body of an animal has all of these forces, with the inanimate kind responsible for parts like teeth and bones, growth and the like, and the soul accounting for its mental functions. The Stoic theory departs from the Greek theory of the soul as well, as they don’t highlight it as a special part of the mind. They also insist that the adult mind is homogenous, and the minds of animals and children can only create impressions and impulses, not thoughts. Only adults, in their minds, have a reason, which is how reason then allows impulses to become rational impressions. According to the Stoic theory, the areas of the mind are simply things that it can do, and an impulse cannot exist without an act of assent to a practical impression. This theory also conflicts directly with the Platonic conception of the non-rational soul.

With this, the Stoics were able to explain why passion can conflict with reason. Posidonius, a famous Stoic, gave up at least part of the classical Stoic theory of the soul and introduced the idea that even the minds of adult humans include motivationally relevant forces that do not depend on assent or reason at all. Adults are able to act on emotion, of course, and that was the crux of his argument. (This is funny because he is a politician, not just a philosopher. Really highlights why people act the way they do in the current American political climate).

With all of these conflicting opinions, where do we end up? It’s not been nailed down whether the soul has different parts, whether it controls our emotions, or if it is even tied to us in non-dire contexts. Here’s my attempted synthesis of these ideas:

1. The soul is a general force of being, born out of living, self-aware consciousness. In this way, any animal with complex thoughts can have a soul, such as mammals and other large-brained animals. I wouldn’t mark insects and creatures incapable of thought as having a soul. This aligns with the Stoics’ philosophy.

2. The soul contains the id, ego, and superego, and is born out of the development of the id. In this way, it governs realistic/moral thought as well as instinctual desires. This aligns with the Hellenistic views.

3. Souls can be mostly good or bad, and this changes based on the actions of the individual. Like Plato’s philosophy, souls primarily driven by vice are disproportionally affected by the id. As such, “good” souls balance the id with the ego and superego to make kind and rational decisions.

1. In the same vein, the soul can guide and prompt our decisions based on what we want and need. This aligns with Socrates.

4. Although the soul doesn’t have “atoms” like Hellenistic thought, it is created by the structure and functions of the brain. It is an intelligible, not perceptible, force like Plato believes. 

5. The soul is created like a house. The congenital tendencies and preferences of the individual are its foundation, and it is built by forming preconceptions and habits to act on situations and to reflect on oneself. This aligns with Aristotle.

6. The soul develops to contain our moral qualities and opinions like the Greeks imagined. It is not just the life force; it is our deepest wants and desires articulated into complex form.

Do you agree with all of this? Probably not. Everyone’s opinions differ greatly on what the soul is, so it comes down to how you want to regard it. How you imagine your own subconscious is neither here nor there. Frankly, being a morally sound and kind person is more important. 

Citation:

1. Cooper, J. M. & D. S. Hutchinson, (eds.), 1997, Plato: Complete Works, Indianapolis: Hackett.

2. Barnes, J., (ed.), 1984, The Complete Works of Aristotle, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

3. Long, A. A. & D. N. Sedley, (eds.), 1987, The Hellenistic Philosophers, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [=L&S]

4. Smith, M. F., 1993, Diogenes of Oenoanda: The Epicurean Inscription, La Scuola di Epicuro, Suppl. 1, Naples: Bibliopolis.

5. Annas, J. E., 1992, Hellenistic Philosophy of Mind, Berkeley: University of California Press.

6. Bremmer, J., 1983, The Early Greek Concept of the Soul, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

7. Burnet, J., 1916, “The Socratic doctrine of the soul”, Proceedings of the British Academy, 7: 235–59.

8. Sullivan, S. D., 1988, Psychological Activity in Homer, Ottawa: Carleton University Press.

9. Barnes, J., 1982, The Presocratic Philosophers, London: Routledge.

10. “The Pythagorean Conception of the Soul from Pythagoras to Philoloaus”, in Body and Soul in Ancient Philosophy, D. Frede and B. Reis (eds.), Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

11. Hussey, E., “Heraclitus”, in Long 1999: 88–112.

12. Bostock, D., 1986, Plato's Phaedo, Oxford: Clarendon Press.

13. “Republic 2: Questions about Justice” in Plato 2, G. Fine (ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press.

14. Lorenz, H., 2008, “Plato on the Soul”, in The Oxford Handbook of Plato, G. Fine (ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press.

15. Lorenz, Hendrik, "Ancient Theories of Soul", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2009 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). (2009)

16. Frede, M., 1992, “On Aristotle's Conception of the Soul”, in Nussbaum & Rorty 1992: 93–107.

17. Everson, S., 1999, “Epicurus' psychology”, in Algra, Barnes, Mansfeld & Schofield 1999 (Bibliography/Section B): 542–59.

18. Annas, J., 1992, “The Stoics”, in Annas 1992 (Bibliography/Section B): 37–120.

19. Cooper, J. M., 1998, “Posidonius on Emotions”, in The Emotions in Hellenistic Philosophy, Engberg-Pedersen, T. & J. Sihvola, (eds.), Dordrecht: Kluwer, also in Cooper 1999 (Bibliography/Section B): 449–84.

20. Long, A. A., 1999, “Stoic Psychology”, in K. Algra, J. Barnes, J. Mansfeld & M. Schofield 1999 (Bibliography/Section B) Cambridge: 560–84.