Brother Parvus' problems:
if the Wersgorix have souls, then it is the Christians' duty to try to convert them;
if they do not have souls, then it is blasphemous to administer sacraments to them although provisional baptism can be given if requested;
an authoritative definition of doctrine is required;
when asked whether he has a soul, Brantithar replies only that scientists lack sufficient data to answer the question whether personality is a pattern that can be transferred to another matrix.
Such a pattern would not be a soul. Parvus acknowledges that the Wersgorix can reason. I was taught, although I no longer believe this, that the soul comprised precisely the combination of intellect/reason and will. If this were true, then it would follow that the Wersgorix have souls. However, in Anderson's The Merman's Children, medieval Catholics believe that merpeople can reason yet lack souls.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Brother Parvus' anxiety about the existence or not of souls in the members of the Wersgor race amusingly touches on ideas discussed by Brother Guy Consolmagno in his booklet INTELLIGENT LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE? and my own article "God and Alien in Anderson's Technic Civilization."
And I do believe the "soul" is precisely what results from that combining of intellect, reason, and will. I simply don't believe materialism can convincingly account for the existence of physically incarnate rational beings.
I also get the impression that the Wersgor had little, if any, interest in philosophical questions and problems. Because otherwise Branithar would probably have mentioned what some Wersgor philosophers thought of such questions. Thus, it seems likely human thinkers were more advanced than the Wersgor at least in philosophy.
Sean
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