Do Souls Exist?

Every person's Soul is unique to that individual and differs from one to another. But what is it? To me, souls are the essence of who we are as individuals. But who we are as individuals is based on our own experiences we have with the world. So do humans have souls? The thought has pondered me for some time. I have come to the conclusion that humans do possess souls, but that they cease to exist once we die.

Basically, I believe our souls develop within our lifetime from our exposure to the world. To break it down further, we develop our "essence" through our sensory interactions in life. What makes souls so distinct from one another correlates to the fact that every human lives a life unlike any other human. We all have unique experiences and perceive them in our own way. Thus as no two humans can have the same life, no two humans can have the same soul.

Aristotle disagreed with Plato's notion that we are born with innate ideas. He argued against Plato's Theory of Ideas by posing the following dilemma: how could anyone know what the "idea" (or perfect) chicken looks like if they have never seen a chicken before? Aristotle believed that we form these "idea" chickens, or so forth, only after we have been introduced to them. So how could we be born with an innate idea of a Soul if we don't know what a Soul is until someone else has introduced us to the concept? We can't. Therefore our notions of a Soul must be formed during our lifetimes, not before them.

Now, imagine a cow is standing right next to you as you read this blog post. You can see it has brown fur with white spots, for example, and in addition does not smell pleasant. Just to be sure you reach out. You can feel its bristly fur. It is a real cow. Now, this cow's existence can be broken down into two categories. Form and substance. The cow's "form" is the specific characteristics of the creature we use to classify it as a cow. One characteristic, for example, would be that cows are mammals. After all, they produce milk and give birth to live offspring. Humans are also mammals. The cow's "substance" on the other hand is what the creature is physically composed of, or its body. Now keeping that specific cow in mind, imagine that all of sudden it kneels over and dies. The cow's body is there but it can no longer move. It can no longer produce milk or give birth; it is no longer a mammal, but simply a corpse. While its substance still exists, the cow's form does not. Without a form, is there any meaning left in substance aside from the memory invoked by those who witness its familiar features? This is why I believe our Souls can only prevail when both our form and substance coincide together.

Nothing lives forever, neither cows nor humans can escape this inevitable fate. When we die, just like any other species, we will loose our form. We will no longer be a mammals, we will no longer be able to produce milk or procreate. We will also no longer have a Soul. This theory - however - does not take away from humanity, but rather bestows more value to each human life. Take limited edition Legos for example. Each limited edition Lego set could be described as having two different types of building blocks. The first are the universal pieces; the basic building blocks necessary to form the foundations of the box's potential structures (see figure 1). The second type of building blocks, however, are distinctly different. These are the pieces unique to your particular limited edition set. Without them the box would be void of any individuality. Such as the battlement on top of a castle tower (see figure 2), or a friggin' sweet futuristic-looking window. These pieces dazzle the imagination with a fresh and creative look that you take delight in knowing... are all yours. But as we all know, limited editions don't last forever.

So while our days with our Souls are numbered, we should embrace their "limited edition" life-span and make the most of our essence while we still have 'em. For as I'm sure everyone agrees, its one of the saddest things in the world when Legos disappear.


Figure 1: The standard four hump, one row Lego block.

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Figure 2: The not-so-standard battlement of a Lego tower.
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