A challenge to Materialism

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Cartesian Dualism Challenged
In this paper, I will examine the issues of individuation and identity in Descartes’ philosophy of mind-body dualism. I will begin by addressing the framework of Cartesian dualism. Then I will examine the problems of individuation and identity as they relate to Descartes. Hopefully, after explaining Descartes’ reasoning and subsequently offering my response, I can show with some degree of confidence that the issues of individuation and identity offer a challenge to the Cartesians’ premise of mind-body dualism.
Before diving into a critical examination of these two issues, it would be wise to first discuss the basis of Descartes’ philosophy. Descartes begins his discussion of mind by first disregarding everything that he can call into doubt. After this mental cleansing, Descartes is left only with the maxim that ‘I cannot doubt that I am doubting.’ From this conclusion, Descartes states that some entity must be doing this doubting, and claims that this entity is his mind. The Cartesian mind has only one property: thinking. Consequently, Descartes establishes a distinction between mind and body. The two share no characteristics, as the body does not indulge in thinking, the mind’s solitary function. Further, mind and body are independent of each other; mind can exist even in the absence of body. At the same time, Descartes does not doubt that “the mind begins to think as soon as it is implanted in the body of an infant.” Yet the mind does not need the body to engage in introspection, the action of thinking about thinking. Only introspection is immune from illusion, confusion, or doubt. Information about the world outside of mind is prone to these hazards. We cannot conclude with certainty that other minds exist. Thus, the Cartesian is left to what I would dub a lonely existence: “Even if [a Cartesian] prefers to believe that to other human bodies there are harnessed minds not unlike his own, he cannot claim to be able to discover their individual characteristics. Absolute solitude is on this showing the ineluctable destiny of the soul. Only our bodies can meet.”
Now I will critically examine Descartes’ mind-body philosophy by addressing the issues of individuation and identity. First, I need to be clear about the issues I am addressing. In order to fully understand the problem of individuation, we nee...

... middle of paper ...

...owed in my earlier example, consider bodies the same. Strawson argues that even if a Cartesian claims to be directly experiencing his mind through introspection and therefore has no need of explaining the identity of his mind, he still cannot rule out the possibility that a thousand different minds may occupy him during the next moment. As with individuation, Strawson and his fellow anti-Cartesians can correctly identify minds in the same manner that I identified myself as the same girl I was 9 years ago. Those operating under Descartes’ philosophy cannot identify the same mind over time, and consequently cannot speak “coherently” (as Strawson puts it) about mind.
Using Strawson’s analysis of Descartes as a guide, I have attempted to demonstrate how two issues—individuation and identity—threaten to dismantle Descartes’ philosophy of mind-body dualism. I have stood behind the anti-Cartesian argument that in order to associate one mind with one body—which Strawson claims is a vital principle to both Cartesians and anti-Cartesians—we must think of mind as something dependent on a person and not as something separate altogether, as Descartes would argue.

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