THE MATERIALITY OF THE SOUL: A provocative new theory on the nature of the soul

"The existence of a soul that survives the death of the physical body is a tenet of most religious teachings, and it is likely that a majority of human beings believes in a soul, in one form or another. Modern science, however, despite its impressive accomplishments in elucidating the workings of the world, has not shown that the soul exists; many scientists would probably say that the weight of scientific evidence is against its existence. This is one of the major factors that maintain the divide between science and religion. For some, either science or religion is simply not true. For others, such as some scientists who hold religious beliefs, both are true, but refer to completely separate realms of truth about the world. But this is an illogical dichotomy, and to hold it implies a serious limitation of human reason. Another option, accepting that there is one world and that all truths about it must be related, is to say that science simply has not achieved the development and subtlety necessary to encompass spiritual questions, such as the existence of God or of the soul."

perhaps there is a gap in my understanding of this, but by not being able to find something, ie evidence of a soul, or a god, or whatever, does it mean it doesn't exist in scientific terms? i always found that argument strange, perhaps i am missing something.

i've always been fascinated (and admittedly, at first, felt disbelief) when i hear of people professing their absolute belief in the existence of a god, but also feel the same for atheists. how can you profess for sure that you know something does not exist? unless of course you are professing to be someone with complete knowledge of all there is in the universe and beyond. objectively, there is no such person.

also, i think there are more ways than one to experience the same thing. for one, i always thought my dog saw things the same way i did. but i found out the other day that dogs see in a much smaller range of colours and in duller tones because of the number of "cones" in their eyes. but they see many more shades of grey (50 shades ~) than we do. which means we could be looking at the same object, but he sees it in colour x, and i see it in colour y. neither of us are wrong, we just experience the object differently.

i wonder if its the same thing with religion. which is why i love observing these religious vs atheist debates that revolve around god's existence...where they both earnestly believe that the other is hopelessly wrong. i don't know why people spend time on these pointless endeavors.