The Emergent Threefold Self: : A Respons to ‘Are We Ghost or Machines?' by Roger Trigg

Anne Leona Cesarine Runehov

Abstract

Are we ghost or machines? Roger's title reminds me of my own book in which I asked the question whether religious experiences are Sacred or Neural. The answer was they are both, sacred and neural (Runehov, 2007). Analogically, could the answer to Trigg's question perhaps be that we are both ghosts and machines? According to Roger Trigg "there are two orders of reality", a physical/material reality, which science can investigate and a non-physical/non-material reality, which science cannot by their means alone study and therefore explain in terms of the physical/material or simply ignore it. I agree with there being (at least) two orders of reality, however, I disagree with the limits posed on science. Hence, my response, though in agreement with many ideas forwarded by Trigg, will argue for a non-dualistic comprehension of the self and the God-world relationship based on contemporary neuroscientific research on the self, the two orders of reality taken into account. The suggested model is monistic in nature, i.e. as Trigg argues, there is "only one kind of stuff", however, this stuff will be shown to be threefold.
Original languageEnglish
JournalCambridge Scholars' Press
Publication statusAccepted/In press - 2008

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