Intergalactic Summit

Recently the Theology Council has released an edict on cloning that states that clones "embody souls in communion with the Imperial Rite as the flesh of their birth would speak to us."

Having read through the previous discussion on this matter, I think there has been some confusion on the issue. Pilots seem to have understood this as a statement that clones as a whole are not different than non-clones from a religious standpoint.

This is not at all what the edict says.

The first words specify that clones embody souls. This is worth some discussion on its own as it is a rejection of simplistic “soul is lost on first cloning” interpretations of the issue. It is not, however, a rejection of more complex interpretations that have souls being degraded by cloning. The evidence for the latter is clear and all but undeniable when we examine the activities of the nullsec barbarians. Clearly the act of cloning causes damage.

The rest specifies that the embodied souls that are in communion with the Imperial Rite are like the flesh of their birth. The Imperial Rite is the key to understanding this. The Amarrian Imperial Rite causes the souls of faithful Amarr who are actively participating in the holy rituals to avoid the damage that is normally caused by cloning. The news report that said clones and non-clones were the same from a religious standpoint is a product of media commentators failing to understand theological nuance.

Clones and original bodies in general are not the same. It is only the clones who are in good standing with the Faith and active participants in the Rite that have had their souls restored to their original pre-clone state.

Break the heart, free the soul.

Something something something, Voluval tattoos, something something, Minmatar accusing others of 'magic' height of hypocrisy, something something.

Anyway, it is indeed well known, that cloning is, at best, a high 99.9% reliability. There are always bits that aren't transferred. Memories, ability to play musical instruments, various other things. Given however that the spaceship-related memory retention has been perfected to 100%, then the loss of other memories or aspects of the personality are considered acceptable losses.

Over time, this would indeed represent damage to the soul, and, if adherence to Imperial Orthodox rituals can repair this damage, such that each cloning incident does not further degrade the personality, then, well, that's good.


Of course, I am obliged, as one of the most compassionate Sani Sabik missionaries in New Eden, to point out, that other rituals that can repair the soul, do in fact exist.

It is interesting that you believe that brutality is solely what I was speaking of in my statement. Though I would agree that I should have added an "among others" after "nullsec barbarians."

There are several signs of soul damage that seem to be unique to the cloned.

Caveat lector: Having been raised as an adherent of the Ida, and still in some ways being an adherent of the Ida, my opinion upon this subject may be biased.

The concept of the soul dates from a time when human culture had no access to medical knowledge on the workings of the nervous system and the brain. For atheists this fact is illustrative and for theists it's coincidental. People saw that some injuries would, without being fatal, cause a person to lapse into a state of unconsciousness from which they would not wake. Certain behaviours would manifest from certain people without apparent cause. Some explanation was needed as to what the animating force of a human was.

As science peeled away layers of mystery from how the human body worked, we understood that the seat of human consciousness was the brain and that damage to it could damage or destroy what we conceived of as the person. Yet we were never able to dispense entirely with the idea that there's an element of human consciousness that cannot be accurately described or measured by science, which religious individuals would call the soul and contemporary science blithely terms the "infomorph."

Consciousness is not merely an arrangement of neurones or a specific brain chemistry balance, things that the transneural burning scanner can accurately measure and transmit. You have a continuous experience of being you, a sense of something that looks out from behind your eyes. That is - so far as we can know - an indivisible and inseperable characteristic of a functioning, sentient human being. This entity begins to exist upon birth and, depending on your beliefs, either ceases to exist upon death or goes somewhere else beyond the capacity of science to measure.

For baseliners this is a simple issue. For infomorphic humans - capsuleers, clone soldiers and if rumours are to be believed, other professions as well - less so. My first death as a capsuleer was in an asteroid belt in Uemon, more than ten years ago. Do I have true continuity of consciousness from that point? The issue is that the only entity that could ever know that is the "soul" of the person whose body died that day. If they continue to exist in this world - through inhabiting a succession of bodies that, ultimately, has become me - only they could possibly know that. If not, there is absolutely no way to tell, because I certainly feel like I am that same "soul."

A properly-prepared body injected with the memories and neural structure of Andreus Ixiris will experience life as Andreus Ixiris, functionally indistinguishable from Andreus Ixiris. But is he actually Andreus Ixiris, the original, the one that was born on Intaki thirty four years ago, or is he an impostor so perfect even he can't tell he isn't the original?

"What of the immortal soul in these transactions? Can this machine transmit and reattach that as well? Or does it leave a soulless body, to wonder the world in despair?"

- Anonymous Hedion University student, Commentaries on the Empyrean, YC 110

I would suggest that maybe it isn't the interpretation of the Theology Council's judgement that needs to be addressed. I'd suggest it's their methodology and the validity of the judgement itself.

The TL;DR version:

The Theology Council jumped through ecclesiastical hoops to legitimize Jamyl Sarum after the Drifters killed her in her pod, thus exposing her status as a Capsuleer. But you must not ask questions because otherwise you're a BAD PERSON.

Or even both. Given the context, I'm sure you can see why I felt certain things were clearly implied, even if you weren't intending to be.

Language is a precise tool, when you let it be. And you haven't addressed the second part of my response. I'm an engineer. If you want to tell me something's being damaged, then great, let's find a way to fix it. But first, you've gotta demonstrate that it's there to be damaged, or you might as well be telling me that stargate travel causes internal bleeding in wolves. There ain't no such critter—other than than the frigate class, of course—so gate travel can't make 'em bleed.

We cross posted on your second point. I won't be engaging with this line of discussion. There is plenty of literature on this forum and in libraries everywhere on the question of whether souls exist, we do not need to rehash it.

I think the question of how to interpret the Theology Council's ruling rests directly on the twin questions of intent and language. As I said, language is a precision tool. However, as our previous statements illustrate, what is intended can often be other than what is communicated. And so for to correctly interpret language through the lens of intent, it's important to understand and be able to judge the mental state of those making the statement.

And that raises potential issues with a ruling like this. If I were to gather a bunch of people and issue a completely serious ruling about gate travel and the internal distress of a mythological creature, and expect people to give that ruling significant weight within their awareness of animal cruelty, all without being able to supply a shred of evidence that my subject matter even exists, the way to interpret that 'ruling' would be clear: I'm insane.

So, i put it to you that in order to work with the basic premise of seriously considering the Theology Council's ruling, one must establish the existence of the subject matter. Otherwise, the only interpretation would seem self-evident.

This is not, and should not be considered to be, a blanket statement on the validity of all Theology Council rulings, either: the Theology Council's rulings have significant effect on accepted Amarr morality, internal order, discipline, and the very structure of Amarr society, often with clear philosophical underpinnings that—while they may ultimately include a mandate from unsupported suppositions—do not rely upon such questionable foundations.

What is your proof that cloning causes damage? Do you have a device that can measure soul strength and produce a reproducible study on that?