If we have no soul then why do dead bodies look empty?

I am a christian. I belive in christ and I belive we have a soul that will live forever either in heaven or hell. I belive that people are born knowing right and wrong.

Problem is I work with several atheists who don't belive these things. They don't even belive people have a soul. Now my question is for those of you who have seen dead bodies either in person or television, interenet, photographs etc. If we have no soul why does a body that is dead look empty? Even if the body isn't mangled you can tell there is no life in it. Take someone sleeping. They don't look the same. Take an animal that is dead. Why doesn't it have that same vacated look a person does?

I am sure this is proof of an immortal soul. You can clearly see when the life is missing from something. This something that is missing clearly has to be a soul.

at a persons death, everything shuts down. The Brain ceases function, and all electrical impulses ceases. This causes the intestines and bladder to flush as they cease functioning, the muscles to go limp, and the blood to stop pumping. As the blood stops pumping, the blood quagulates in key areas, and eventually the vascular viens kindof collapse. lack of blood to the skin causesthe body to look pale. As the body starts slowly decaying the fat starts wearing away, giving the skinny boney look of a dead body. Its not so much that a dead person looks lifeless because theyre "soul" left, but more so that the body just shuts down, the blood doesnt pump anymore, and they just start rotting away.

The Physical attributes of death are a lot different than saying that is proof we have a soul. A dead body is just that...DEAD! A person that is alive will constantly be breathing, and with slight motions all over the body such as Eye movement and twitching. A dead body does not breath and have nuances that make it alive...this alone is not proof of a soul.

Perhaps we do have a soul, perhaps not...anything is possible in this universe. However, this is quite circumstantial evidence to prove that someone has a soul, and I wouldn't jump to conclusions so fast. In fact, I doubt we will ever have answers to questions such as this, because if we did we would be close to whatever energy source created us, and that takes something away from "it". Maybe the answer lies in the quest to attain the knowledge of the afterlife, and not so much to actually find it, and all the while learning along the way.

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The soul is part of the living condtion. When you die you lose it to oblivion. That is why it is so silly that people believe all these ridiculous religions.

Kiddies if you want to keep/save your soul, stay alive.
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heat loss no breathing/ blinking/ palor change...no muscle control..this to me signals a "lifeless body"...but it is the unmoving eye that truely represents death..Notice how they always focus on the eyes in a movie when someone has been killed, to relay the idea that the person has expired.

I do believe in a transfer of energy from a person to the environment in the event of death..but I dont know if I consider this a "soul" as a religious person may.

From a person having been raised without formal religion, the idea of creationism was almost ridiculous, just as the notion of no god to you may be.

I have learned thru life experience that there must be more to it, because there is just to many unknowns.--The must be something else?

I'm not a religious person and im a very scientific thinker, yet I still believe the big picture is being covered up. The evidence slowly leaks through even if we don't notice it. I also don't need anyone else to prove to me my beliefs and I certainly don't need to convince others its right. Thats my problem with religion.

[edit on 30-8-2004 by Linux]

[edit on 30-8-2004 by Linux]

I would venture to say, you could not consistently pick out someone who is dead from someone who is pretending to be dead. Whether there is a soul, or a God, who knows. But I would question the author's original point.

A body looking dead and looking empty is 2 different things. A dead body looks vacated somehow. Sure there are processes that make up a living person that don't exist is a dead one. But look up a real picuture of a dead person and then compare it to one made up in a movie no matter how well it is done. There is still a difference.

Also take a dead animal. For some strange reason it doesn't have that empty look. Is this because we consider it less traumatic to see a dead animal compared to a human? I don't know. Maybe I see things differently being a christian.

Given the sophistication of the human body from the atomic level on up there is no way we could have just evolved. No evolving species has ever been seen or a fossil of an evolving species ever been found.

what about the half ape half human fossiles found in africa?

i think that shows pretty clearly that we came from apes.

but yeah dude, only reason you think a dead body looks vacated is because of your faith...dont blame you, i love jebus too

oh yeah and i think WolfofWar's explanation of what you percieve as a body looking vacated is spot on.....sorry jebus

[edit on 31-8-2004 by Azza]

Indeed a dead body looks 'empty' and 'vacated', the life that was once there has now gone. Our person, our living nature is no more, and now only the empty vessel that carried us through life is left.....empty.

Originally posted by Hoppinmad1
A body looking dead and looking empty is 2 different things. A dead body looks vacated somehow. Sure there are processes that make up a living person that don't exist is a dead one. But look up a real picuture of a dead person and then compare it to one made up in a movie no matter how well it is done. There is still a difference.

Also take a dead animal. For some strange reason it doesn't have that empty look. Is this because we consider it less traumatic to see a dead animal compared to a human? I don't know. Maybe I see things differently being a christian.

Given the sophistication of the human body from the atomic level on up there is no way we could have just evolved. No evolving species has ever been seen or a fossil of an evolving species ever been found.

I just think you're assuming too much based on your religious beliefs. You are entitled to believe what you want, but to say that the appearance of a dead body is proof that the soul has left is just going too far IMO.

Problem is I work with several atheists who don't belive these things. They don't even belive people have a soul.

Perhaps you should simply respect their right to their beliefs as they likely respect your right to yours. Most atheists, unlike most Christians, do not seek to convert others...they simply don't want religion to come into their daily lives (such as "In God We Trust" on money....or "Under God" added to the pledge, etc.)

I am neither an atheist, nor a Christian, but I respect others rights to their beliefs. In fact, I've taken quite some time on my own to learn of other religions, as it helps me to understand a peoples' outlook. One of my hobbies is theological debate with some of the biggest bible thumpers I've ever met. It never gets angry, but it certainly helps us both learn more about the other's position.

If we have no soul why does a body that is dead look empty? Even if the body isn't mangled you can tell there is no life in it. Take someone sleeping. They don't look the same. Take an animal that is dead. Why doesn't it have that same vacated look a person does?

A dead person seems empty because it lacks the emotional expressions associated with humans. These expressions are created by the brain.

A dead animal does not have a vacated look because it is not associated to emotional expressions while alive. In other words, dogs and cats don't smile to us. If they did, they would have the same vacant look as we have when we die.

I have lost pets, have seen the results of hunting. Those animals looked just as vacant and without the "spark" of life as did my mother, my grandmother, my grandfather when they died. I find personally repugnent that so called "christians" only seem to regard human life with any reverence at all, I do not say this specifically of you, but this has been my experience.

You ever seen the movie "21 Ounces"?

...they say that at the moment of death you loose 21 ounces, maybe that is your soul exiting your body

Originally posted by HumptyDumpty
You ever seen the movie "21 Ounces"?

...they say that at the moment of death you loose 21 ounces, maybe that is your soul exiting your body

It would be interesting if it was true: Urban Legends Reference Pages: A physician once placed dying patients upon a scale in order to measure the weight of the human soul.:

MacDougall's results were flawed because the methodology used to harvest them was suspect, the sample size far too small, and the ability to measure changes in weight imprecise. For this reason, credence should not be given to the idea his experiments proved something, let alone that they measured the weight of the soul as 21 grams.

Your just full of today aren't you....I just replied to you evolution thread......when I first saw this last night, I thought, "no...I'm not even gonna reply to such a post", but changed my mind this morning. It has nothing to do with the soul, spirit, or energy force that the body looks as it does at death I most definitely believe that we have an energy force....I could go into all the scientific aspects of what happens when the body passes, but it would be ridiculous as we all know this. Why does the body look empty? Well to state it simply and at the risk of sounding dumb, it's because the body is dead and organs are beginning to decompose, the blood pools to the part of the body that it's laying on.....has nothing what-so-ever to do with rather there is a soul or not....

Also take a dead animal. For some strange reason it doesn't have that empty look. Is this because we consider it less traumatic to see a dead animal compared to a human? I don't know. Maybe I see things differently being a christian

we relate to humans more than animals - fill a room up with black cats of similar size - would you be able to tell the difference? nope

yet if you fill a room up with dark haired humans of similar skin colour and build you would be able to tell small differences in their faces etc

its not that cats dont look empty - its that you dont look upon cats with the same physical detail that you look upon humans with, so dont notice the change with dead moggies as much

I belive we have a "soul" but not the whole god is a guy sitting around judging people, i think god is a man made creation, and is a way to make or guide people to do the right thing's in life (its fine by me) i belive our bodys do have an enternal energy that goes off some where but i dont think there is a heaven or hell.

To the original poster i see you kind of implied that dead animals dont have the same "empty" look, so are you in a sense implying that animals do not have a soul? If this where true where in the envolution process from ape to human did we get the soul? Did it happen over night, did god think "looks like its time to start handing out souls becouse they are smart now"?.



[edit on 31-8-2004 by zi2525]

don't they actually take your organs out when you die anyways?

I thought they did that at funeral homes as part of the whole embalming thing...

So technically, dead bodies look empty because they physically are empty...