On the contrary, I believe that the fact that it is a mystery begs scientific investigation for the truth. To the ancient and prehistoric man, for example, the stars were a big mystery. They thought that the night sky, being so mysterious, lent itself to be considered within only religious confines.


Although I may disagree with the nonphysical self, I respect what it is trying to explain, albeit it does so in futility.

I guess the fundamental idea is that we associate emotions and thinking as non-mechanical. I understand that, but I think neuroscience has effectively shown us that emotions and thinking are still subject to the same physical mechanisms that govern what we perceive as the physical universe within space-time. Emotions are induced by chemicals in the brain for example. And it's become quite everyday knowledge that depression and addictions (real mental feelings) can be caused and effected by chemical mechanisms.

By no means, at least in my philosophy, does this reduce the concept of mind to unromantic terms. On the contrary, I've developed a better appreciation of the brain and the wounder that it is, and awe at the intangibly long evolutionary process for something so magnificent to emerge. I personally believe that simply reducing the mind to concepts such as the 'soul' or otherwise non-physical "magic stuff" that somehow interacts with my body is rather unromantic and dissatisfying. To put it bluntly, the truth is more exciting than fiction. I'm struck with more awe by reading a book on neuroscience or the brain rather than some simplistic religious conception of soul or spirit.