There are millions of stories of ghosts, people being "visited" by dear friends or family members just after they passed away, etc. Those stories all share enough similarity to make the probability nonzero that they are true.

You can believe those stories might be true and still not believe:
The universe was created in 6 days.
A talking snake tricked a rib-woman into eating a magic apple.
An omnipotent being that created a universe of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars 15,000,000,000 years ago decided to knock up a teenage Jewish girl 2000 years ago.

A soul is nothing but the thoughts and emotions of a working brain. When the brain stops working there's nothing left. We've been brainwashed so long, it's hard to believe that we're not some passenger riding around in these bodies, but the truth is we are our bodies. That's all there is.

Probably not.

I do not see how you can believe in consciousness at the quantum level. I do not see any basis for such a belief.

I wonder the same thing sometimes.

Also, @ksmartines I LOVE your profile picture. What kind of artifact/piece is it and where did it come from? I’m extremely curious about it.

If a soul exists it is no more relevant after death than it is before life. No one seems to worry about the pre-life existence of their soul,so why the fixation on the post-life existence of a soul? It is ego.

Our consciousness may be a form of energy. Energy cannot be destroyed, only transformed.

Nah, Nyet, No.

I'd like to know what you mean by "on the quantum level". Seems like anything with "quantum" in front of it instantly becomes either cool or mysterious or both. I had quantum oatmeal for breakfast!

You do not need religion to believe in souls, but souls are a claim and claims must be proven with evidence.

Well some people have argued that that the word soul is basically the same word for integrity. The one part of you that remained constant your entire existence.

However if you mean in the sense of continuing after death well there isn't any evidence that it does so I wouldn't make any plans like that. If you want some part of you to remain after death focus on projects that do that.

It seems to me as though the study of NDE's gives us the greatest insight into whether we have, for lack of a bettet word, a soul or not.

What this all really boils down to is the question of whether those processes which make us conscious and aware continue on after brain death.

Scientific studies conducted at the moment of death tell us that the brain dies from the top down. The first parts of the brain to go are those which are responsible for higher thinking skills; critical thinking, the ability to take in, evaluate and react to stimuli. The last to go is the part of the brain responsible for the perception of light.

Skeptics will say that once the process of brain death is complete, that's it. Every bit of knowledge and experience we've accumulated over a lifetime simply discipates, and the experiences described in NDE's are merely the last embers of a dying brain.

But there's always that light at the end of the tunnel, isn't there? In order to explain this away, skeptics need to be able to answer why those who have experienced NDE's are even able to recall and describe a light at the end of a tunnel at all. After all, the parts of the brain responsible for taking in, evaluating and reacting to stimuli are no longer functioning, right? At that point, we should have no more ability to take in, evaluate and react to stimuli than a rock does.

Then there's the stories of NDE's where people report out of body experiences where they are able to describe in graphic detail events going on around them which they shouldn't even have the ability to perceive, let alone evaluate and react to.

Given these variables, I would say that there is a very good chance that our consciousness carries on in some fashion after brain death. What happens after that is anybody's guess.

Several responses have mentioned “evidence” provided by people who have had near death experiences to prove that humans have a soul. Their “proof” amounts to, “I believe it, therefore it is proven.” This is a theist’s version of proof. People who have gone through a NDE experience only their PERCEPTION of the event, which may be affected by stress, presence of drugs in their system, presence of comorbidities affecting perception, or many other factors. Humans may or may not have a soul, but for sure the proposition is not proved or disproved by someone merely relating their perceptions of an event.

There a Tee shirt I have , with Miyamoto Musahi on it . He states. There is nothing outside yourself that can enable you to get better, quicker , smarter . Everything is within. Everything exist. Seek nothing out side yourself.For some this could be the concept for the soul and for some the concept of god

There a Tee shirt I have , with Miyamoto Musahi on it . He states. There is nothing outside yourself that can enable you to get better, quicker , smarter . Everything is within. Everything exist. Seek nothing out side yourself.For some this could be the concept for the soul and for some the concept of god