For all the atheists here, I was wondering if there were any good arguments against the existence of the soul or life force (I equate the two). I am writing a philosophy which revolves around the existence of a life force that makes possible all forms of consciousness (including unconsciousness and non-consciousness) and I am trying to come up with arguments against the existence of said life force and I am drawing a blank. I am also looking for arguments against reincarnation and pantheism (which I will specify to mean the belief that there is a higher power, and that higher power is the sum of everything).
I think the best way to iron out kinks in a philosophy is to hear all the opposition to the philosophy first. So if anyone here has some good arguments against the existence of a soul or life force then please feel free to debate me. I would like to start with common arguments against the existence of a soul and afterlife, and then arguments specifically made against my philosophy. I am leaving out below a large portion of my philosophy regarding life force since I first want to debate whether the soul/life force exists before I get into the technicalities and explanations of why I think there is a life force, what it does, and how it exists. Some of this will undoubtably come out in my responses in this thread from which further debate can be had in the future.
So here are the basics of my philosophy so that you can have something more specific in mind when coming up with arguments.
First and foremost, going by the principle that matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed, I have come to the conclusion that since everything is made of matter and/or energy, nothing can be created or destroyed. I extend this way past just matter and energy, and include also consciousness, life, and form. Therefore, consciousness cannot be destroyed, nor can the form in which any consciousness takes. This is not to say that a consciousness cannot take a different form, but only that the form in which it has taken cannot be destroyed. Keep in mind that rearrangement and destruction are two different things. To be clear, in this philosophy when I use the words “destruction” "or "destroy"I could mean complete and total annihilation, or rearrangement of a form into a less recognizable form depending on the context. The concept of destruction is in fact an abstract one. When a common person says they have destroyed something, they really mean that they have changed its form into something less recognizable.
The next important piece to my philosophy deals with the fact that nothing can be created. Since nothing can be created, it is impossible for a “new life” to be born. Of course babies are born every day, but there is a logical explanation for this which does not involve creation of new life. The simplest answer is that already existing life has changed form to become “new life”, but it is only new in the sense that it has changed recently. Since nothing can be created, creation is also an abstract concept. What most people mean by creation is the rearrangement of a form to make a “new” form which they have not previously observed or thought of before. Again for clarity, in this philosophy when I use the word “creation” or “create” depending on the context I could mean to cause something to come into existence/something which has come into existence, or something which has recently changed into a form which was not previously observed or thought of by one, or more, or all conscious beings. The main point in asserting the fact that life cannot be created is to logically prove that reincarnation is the only method of creating new life that makes sense.
The third important piece to my philosophy involves theology. I have found that pantheism is the only theology that makes any logical sense. Since the general goal of any theology is to explain the existence of our universe (or megaverse) then monotheism, polytheism, and atheism have obvious flaws. In mono and poly theism it is assumed that it is impossible for something to pop into existence all on its own. I partially agree with that, but I would extend that to say that it is impossible for something to pop into existence on its own, under the command of another force, or with the aid of another force. In short, it is impossible for something to pop into existence. Period. So the first problem with mono and poly theism is that it requires a God or multiple Gods/Goddesses to create our universe/megaverse. The second flaw in these two theologies is that to avoid explaining our universe’s existence beginning by means of popping into existence on its own, the existence of a deity or multiple deities which themselves popped into existence on their own is postulated. So there becomes an obvious problem with this. If this deity or deities could have popped into existence on their own (which is against the laws of the universe to begin with, as is the creation of the universe) then the universe could also have popped into existence on its own. Therefore the postulation of the existence of this deity/deities is completely frivolous and unnecessary. Even if you assume that this deity/deities was/were always in existence and have no beginning or end, then the same argument can be made since the universe/megaverse could have also always existed and never began/ended. Therefore, which ever way you look at it you are postulating something which breaks a natural law in order to avoid breaking the same natural law. To me this makes no sense.
Then there is atheism. The essential belief of Atheism is that the universe popped into existence suddenly. Problem is, not only is the universe defying its own natural laws, but there is no reasonable explanation of how this is possible. Since atheism is the “scientific” theology then it makes sense that it would follow the natural laws of the universe according to the natural sciences. However, it does not. One of the main laws of the natural sciences is that matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed. But the whole premise of the theology (or atheology if you will) is that matter and energy were suddenly created. Therefore, I think that this theology is the least scientific of all of them. Mono and poly theism at least attempt to adhere to the natural laws of the universe/megaverse even though they ultimately fail. Atheism makes it a point to break the laws of science and the universe/megaverse right off the bat. So it is indeed very unscientific.
So, I propose that those who are science minded, and really anyone who believes in logic at all, ought to move to a more scientific theology. I believe that this theology is pantheism. Pantheism does not break any natural laws of the universe or science for that matter as I am about to explain. According to my version of pantheism, there is no deity that created anything, nor was anything created, nor has anything been destroyed, nor will anything be destroyed. Due to the fact that humans are finite creatures, it becomes hard to accept infinity in any form. We live, and we die. So because of this we seem to think everything else must be finite too. However, there is absolutely no evidence to support that theory, and that theory itself would mean that every single thing in the universe/megaverse breaks the laws of nature including the universe/megaverse itself. There is no law that says nothing is infinite. In fact as far as we can tell, the universe IS infinite. Not only in time, but space too. There is no visible end to the universe. That is evidence against an end to the universe. There is also no visible beginning to the universe either. That is evidence against the universe beginning. The same thing applies to time as well. We cannot perceive a beginning or end of time, therefore there is evidence that time does not begin or end. Granted it is not a lot of evidence, but put together with the fact that matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed, and the universe consists of matter and energy, then it is the only theory that A. Has any physical supporting evidence to back it, and B. Follows the natural laws of the universe/megaverse.
So my theology goes like this: God exists, always has existed, and always will exist. God is the universe. Everything is part of God. It even fits with some of the Christian theology. For instance, God is everywhere becomes a true statement. God is all knowing becomes a true statement. God is omnipotent also becomes a true statement. That is, God is omnipotent so long as God stays within the parameters set by the natural laws of the universe. So God cannot create or destroy matter or energy. By doing so s/he would effectively be creating or destroying his/her self anyway. So even if you try to debunk omnipotence with the classic “Can God create a stone that is too heavy for him to lift?” becomes easily answerable. No, God cannot create anything as that defies his/her natural laws, therefore God cannot create anything. God can only rearrange his/her self thereby rearranging the universe into forms which have not yet been perceived by one, multiple, or all consciousnesses that are a part of him/her. Also to be noted, God is the rock, and the lifting, and the question, and the inquisitor, and the answer, and the answerer. There is nothing that God isn’t.
Okay, so there is quite a lot more to my philosophy then that, but those are the basics. Everyone please feel totally free to comment, criticize, debunk, whatever. I tried to include definitions to specific common words which I am using in an uncommon manner to avoid semantics. However, if there is a question or argument regarding technical semantic aspect of this philosophy then I prefer to just clear up the meaning by using different words to describe my intended meaning or redefining the word or words according to how I intended to use it/them rather then arguing over the word/words themselves.
Thanks to all for your time and energy reading this.
Enjoy!