Contents
- 1 We all do conscious reasoning. And therein lies the problem: We all think from different foundations, and the result is confusion.
- 1.1 Why so much Chaos with Conscious Reasoning?
- 1.2 Reasoning Exercise
- 1.3 A Landscape of Consciousness: Toward a Taxonomy of Explanations and Implications
- 1.4 Conscious Reasoning Based on the Bible
- 1.5 What Does Neshama Confer On Humans?
- 1.6 Conscious Reasoning Tells Us Who Possesses Consciousness
- 1.7 Dig Deeper into The Explanation
We all do conscious reasoning. And therein lies the problem: We all think from different foundations, and the result is confusion.
Why so much Chaos with Conscious Reasoning?
Exercise 8 of Bible Proverbs Therapy is related to conscious reasoning, the third of the five phases of consciousness, the others being Purpose, Conduct, Socialization, and Rulership. Within reasoning, the therapy focuses on one precise point for a week. In our first round of the five phases, we zeroed in on reasoning about a higher power. This week, we want to examine whether this Higher Power gave us a foundational document.
I want to Uncover the Nakedness Mystery
You can personalize your therapy by choosing another specificity of conscious reasoning with the exercises. But remember, your focus and exercises must help you regain or fortify your mental health using a Proverb. At UnlockBibleMeaning.com, search for subjects related to reasoning like: word, instruction, and hear, and find your weekly Proverb to work on. More details on the personalization of Bible Proverbs Therapy are at this link—our Proverb for this week.
(Transform Your Mind, Upgrade Your Life – Chapter 32, Exercise 8)
Every word of God is pure: he is a shield to them that put their trust in him.
Reasoning Exercise
This week’s exercise will compare two documents related to the discovery of consciousness. The goal is to realize that the document that reveals the answer to consciousness is the foundational document for conscious reasoning. Every word of God is pure. I advance this argument because the whereabouts of consciousness is an over 400-year enigma that science is not resolving; indeed, the waters are getting murkier than ever.
A Landscape of Consciousness: Toward a Taxonomy of Explanations and Implications
The complete document by Dr. Robert Kuhn is about 1100 pages long. His opening comment lays the groundwork for his monumental undertaking to document the scholarly views of consciousness.
Explanations of consciousness abound and the radical diversity of theories is telling. Explanations, or theories, are said to work at astonishingly divergent orders of magnitude and putative realms of reality. My purpose here must be humble: collect and categorize, not assess and adjudicate. Seek insights, not answers.
I’m very thankful for this massive work and acknowledge Dr. Kuhn’s thoroughness and integrity of presentation. It does reveal the radical diversity in the most fundamental subject to humans: How can flesh and bones think and have feelings?
I have followed consciousness studies in its various forms for my entire life. My PhD is in neurophysiology (thalamocortical evoked potentials). I am creator and host of Closer To Truth, the long-running public television series and web resource on science and philosophy, roughly one-third of which focuses on consciousness and brain/mind topics. I have discussed consciousness with over 200 scientists and philosophers who work on or think about consciousness and related fields (Closer To Truth YouTube; Closer To Truth website).
You can listen to this vast diversity of scientists’ and philosophers’ ideas on his website. Here is a graphic representing the categories and myriad ideas.
Conscious reasoning of thinkers tells us that consciousness exists. I could tell you to study all the above concepts and figure it out from that foundation. You will take ten lifetimes and be no further ahead. Let’s look at another source.
Conscious Reasoning Based on the Bible
In the first exercise about conscious reasoning, we showed an All-Powerful Higher Power. This second exercise goes one step further, revealing He has published the revelation of what it is to be human, the foremost element being that each of us is impregnated with consciousness.
This book, Transform Your Mind Upgrade Your Life, already developed this conscious reasoning, but I want to return to it here to show three straightforward Bible verses in contrast to 1100 pages of confused reasoning.
And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath (H5397) of life; and man became a living soul.
Breath of life is neshama in Hebrew, much more that just the air we breath. Here’s how we know.
נְשָׁמָה nᵉshâmâh nesh-aw-maw’; from H5395 (נָשַׁם); a puff, i.e. wind, angry or vital breath, divine inspiration, intellect. or (concretely) an animal:
KJV – blast, (that) breath(-eth), inspiration, soul, spirit.
The creation of the first human reveals breath-neshama, which includes inspiration and spirit. That’s dualism; the physical and non-physical realms are reality. Until science and all the other domains consider this fact, we’ll have reams of half-baked knowledge and thousands of pages of unconscious reasoning.
What Does Neshama Confer On Humans?
Let’s elaborate on this non-material aspect of neshama.
But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration (H5397-neshama) of the Almighty gives them understanding (H995).
This is the Almighty, the All-Powerful’s Neshama, which He shares with us. It alone imparts understanding to humans. This commodity encompasses a number of qualities that science has no clue about: where they came from, how we acquire them, and where they’re located. Here’s a list of those qualities conferred on us by God’s Neshama.
בִּין bîyn bene; a primitive root; to separate mentally (or distinguish), i.e.(generally) understand:
KJV – attend, consider, be cunning, diligently, direct, discern, eloquent, feel, inform, instruct, have intelligence, know, look well to, mark, perceive, be prudent, regard, (can) skill(-full), teach, think, (cause, make to, get, give, have) understand(-ing), view, (deal) wise(-ly, man).
Consider all these as characteristics of understanding. Each human has God’s neshama, which allows us to think and have feelings, to discern and be wise.
With two verses and a comprehension of the Hebrew word understanding-bain, we’ve used the Bible with conscious reasoning to solve the age-old problem of consciousness. It took just over 200 words, in contrast to 1100 pages of gobbledygook ideas.
So you decide if the Bible, the Scriptures, God’s inspired Words are the foundation of conscious reasoning. Every Word of God is pure as Pro. 30:5 states. Nowhere else do we find the succinct and straightforward revelation of what consciousness is.
Conscious Reasoning Tells Us Who Possesses Consciousness
I could end this expose about consciousness here, but I want to add a final point where science and philosophers are entirely in the dark. Who or what possesses consciousness?
And all the spoil of these cities, and the cattle, the children of Israel took for a prey unto themselves; but every man they smote with the edge of the sword, until they had destroyed them, neither left they any to breathe (H5397-neshama).
The Israelites destroyed everything with neshama, but they took all the animals to themselves. The limpid conclusion, using conscious reasoning, is ONLY humans possess neshama.
As The Explanation has developed throughout Mind-Body Problem Solved and its workbook, Transform Your Mind Upgrade Your Life, this portion of God’s neshama makes humans in God’s image. Humans, on their minimal level, have the same mental qualities as their All-Powerful Maker: Purpose, Conduct, Reasoning, Socialization, and Rulership.
1 The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel;
2 To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding;
Not only Proverbs but the entire Word of God is the foundation of all knowledge. God gave us conscious reasoning and wants us to use it correctly. When we straighten out our thinking and correctly differentiate between Godly and worldly wisdom, we’ll become wiser in our understanding and, by the same token, reduce our stress and anxiety, leading to much improved mental health.
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Dig Deeper into The Explanation
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