While the concept of a soul representing the essence of an individual and living on after death is central to many religions its existence is not supported by modern neuroscience which states that consciousness, the spirit and the soul are the product of neuronal activity and die when the person dies. This has major consequences for religion since without a soul there is no cosmic consciousness, no afterlife, no hell, no heaven and thus no reward in heaven for good behavior. In the same sense that some have said “evolution is real, accept it,” we must also say that “the neuronal basis of the soul is real, accept it.” [p285]
Consciousness and the soul
Consciousness, the spirit and the soul are all inter-related concepts. The consciousness described above can exist independent of the soul. The concept of a soul, as an entity that represents the essence of a person and that lives on after death, plays a prominent and central role in many religions.
..in the introduction to The Astonishing Hypothesis Francis Crick states:
The Astonishing Hypothesis is that “You”, your joys, and your sorrows, your memories, and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity, and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules. As Lewis Carroll’s Alice might have phrased it: “You’re nothing but a pack of neurons.” This hypothesis is so alien to the ideas of most people alive today that it can truly be called astonishing. [p284]
