The soul, regarded as the immaterial self which most ordinary people initially believe in, is often discussed in the context of religion, theology, psychology and philosophy. According to Stewart Goetz, anthropologists and psychologists have found that ordinary humans interculturally have distinguished between souls and bodies.
The soul may also be considered to be the animating force ("spirit") of a person,
including that person's personal identity, personality, and memory. Many people believe that a soul (an immortal soul), as an immaterial aspect of a living being, can survive physical death. In the Abrahamic religions, the concept of a soul generally applies only to humans, although other worldviews, such as animism, may assign souls to other living
and non-living entities.
In modern sciences, psychology, and philosophy, belief in souls comes under criticism. Evidence from the fields of neurosciences suggests that all mental processes correlate to a brain-function and thus, there might be no additional soul beyond matter. Proponents of the idea of a matter-independent soul have argued that the soul may exist parallel to brain activities or is a byproduct of the brain. Others have written defenses on interactionism, the view that the soul interacts with the body as a separate instance.
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