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Plato's idea of body and soul distinction
What is descartes argument for dualism
Plato's view of body and soul
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The Relation of Consciousness to the Material Worl
The relation of consciousness to the material world is puzzle, which has its origin in dualism, a philosophy of mind which posits their fundamental separation. Dualism, in turn, has its roots in folk wisdom. The belief that humans are more than bodies and that there is something in human nature that survives bodily death has its origins in prehistory; it becomes explicit in the mythology of Ancient Egypt and Assyria and was formulated into a philosophical position in the Platonic thought of Ancient Greece. But the contemporary view that the interaction of consciousness with matter poses a problem which may be beyond scientific understanding can be traced to a clearer formulation of dualism proposed by Descartes.
According to Descartes (1644) the Universe is composed of two fundamentally different substances, res cogitans, a substance which thinks, and res extensa, a substance which extends in space. Res extensa is the stuff of which the material world is made, including living bodies and brains; res cogitans is the stuff of consciousness. Descartes maintained that, in humans, res cogitans and res extensa interact via the pineal gland, located in the center of the brain. However, even in the seventeenth century, the causal interaction of substances as different as these was thought by some to pose an insuperable problem.
Leibniz (1686), for example, argued that only physical events could cause physical events and only mental events could cause mental events. Fortunately, he thought, God has arranged physical events and mental events into a pre-established harmony so that given sequences of mental and physical events unfailingly accompany each other ("parallelism"). Co...
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... matter to forms of existence in the mind, for example to argue along with Berkeley (1710) that material events only exist in so far as they are perceived to exist (idealism). Idealism has its modern defenders, for example in some interpretations of the observer effect in quantum mechanics (the view that the Shrodinger wave equation only collapses into an actuality once an observation is made). In the macroworld it may also be true that the world as-perceived only exists if there are perceivers (Velmans 1990). However, as a general theory of the ontology of macroevents this position has its own well-known problems. It might be that the material world cannot have an appearance without perceivers, but it seems counterintuitive that its very existence is similarly vulnerable. Closing one's eyes, for example, does not seem to be enough to make unpleasant events go away.
Outline and assess Descartes' arguments for the conclusion that mind and body are distinct substances.
Richard Taylor explained why the body and the mind are one, and why they are not two separate substances. In the article “The Mind as a Function of the Body”, Taylor divides his article in a number of sections and explains clearly why dualism, or the theory that the mind and the body are separate is not conceivable. In one of these sections it is explained in detail the origin of why some philosophers and people believe in dualist metaphysics. As stated by Taylor “when we form an idea of a body or a physical object, what is most likely to come to mind is not some person or animal but something much simpler, such as a stone or a marble”(133). The human has the tendency to believe a physical object as simple, and not containing anything complex. A problem with believing this is that unlike a stone or a marble a human (or an animal) has a brain and the body is composed of living cells (excluding dead skin cells, hair, and nails which are dead cells). The f...
The mind-body problem can be a difficult issue to discuss due to the many opinions and issues that linger. The main issue behind the mind-body problem is the question regarding if us humans are only made up of matter, or a combination of both matter and mind. If we consist of both, how can we justify the interaction between the two? A significant philosophical issue that has been depicted by many, there are many prominent stances on the mind-body problem. I believe property dualism is a strong philosophical position on the mind-body issue, which can be defended through the knowledge argument against physicalism, also refuted through the problems of interaction.
René Descartes was the 17th century, French philosopher responsible for many well-known philosophical arguments, such as Cartesian dualism. Briefly discussed previously, according to dualism, brains and the bodies are physical things; the mind, which is a nonphysical object, is distinct from both the brain and from all other body parts (Sober 204). Sober makes a point to note Descartes never denied that there are causal interactions between mental and physical aspects (such as medication healing ailments), and this recognition di...
In his Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes states “I have a clear and distinct idea of myself, in as far as I am only a thinking and unextended thing, and as, on the other hand, I possess a distinct idea of body, in as far as it is only an extended and unthinking thing”. [1] The concept that the mind is an intangible, thinking entity while the body is a tangible entity not capable of thought is known as Cartesian Dualism. The purpose of this essay is to examine how Descartes tries to prove that the mind or soul is, in its essential nature, entirely distinct from the
In arguing for the distinction between mind and body, Descartes seeks to show that the two are independent substances and can exist separately. It will be useful to outline Descartes’ argument based on clear and distinct perception by listing his premises and conclusion. The essay will then analyse each premise in turn, arguing that the argument fails because his premises are faulty. The argument, found in the Sixth Meditation, runs as follows
To try to explain Dualism through God, we must talk about corporeal bodies and our knowledge of them. Regarding the nature of corporeal bodies and what is known about them and given Descartes premises, the conclusions he draws in Meditation Six are generally the correct ones. He again invokes the causal to argue that the ideas...
On the dualism side of the argument, psychophysical parallelism and psychophysical interactionism have been advanced as explanations for the workings of mind and body. Parallelism has it that mental and physical events are independent of one another but occur simultaneously. Philosophers such as Leibnitz, for example, held that the activities of the mind and body were predetermined, and that both simply ran their course in a carefully orchestrated, synchronized, yet independent fashion. Interactionists, on the other hand, hold that mental and physical events are related in a causal way, such that the mind can influence the body and vice-versa. Descartes championed this idea with his notion that humans are "pilots in a ship;" mental beings who guide physical bodies through the world. Both psychophysical parallelism and psychophysical interactionism agree that the mind and body are of two different natures, and disagree over how closely those natures may interact.
The desire to avoid dualism has been the driving motive behind much contemporary work on the mind-body problem. Gilbert Ryle made fun of it as the theory of 'the ghost in the machine', and various forms of behaviorism and materialism are designed to show that a place can be found for thoughts, sensations, feelings, and other mental phenomena in a purely physical world. But these theories have trouble accounting for consciousness and its subjective qualia. As the science develops and we discover facts, dualism does not seems likely to be true.
Descartes once said, “I think, therefore I am.” He believed this to be true whenever put forth in our own mind because of the fact that in order to think or doubt, our mind must be doing the thinking or doubting. This idea gives us enough reason that we cannot doubt our own mind. Descartes also believed and studied the idea of mind-body dualism. This is the idea that the mind and brain are two distinct things. He came up with this idea by stating that the brain is made of matter, and the mind is not physically real. The mind is not a physical property in the world, but the brain is a physical object. From this, he determined that the brain and mind are two distinct things. I agree with this statement because the mind is not dependent on information from the body. I believe that Descartes would favor the side of mental phenomena not being able to be explained by reference to physical phenomena because he believes that the mind can live without a body, and he doubts the existence of the minds of other people. I disagree with Descartes about this idea because I believe that the mind needs a body to work, but I agree that the mind is still separate from the body. This idea states that the mind and body are separate, and if they are separate, mental phenomena cannot be explained by physical
The pursuit of knowledge has led many a philosopher to wonder what the purpose of life truly is, and how the material and immaterial are connected. The simple fact is, we can never know for certain. Arguments can be made, words can be thrown around, and rationale can be supported, but we as mere humans are not capable of arriving at the perfect understanding of life. Nonetheless, in the war against our own ignorance, we seek possible explanations to explain that which science and math cannot. Philosopher 's such as Plato and Aristotle have made notable contributions to our idea of the soul and its role in the grand scheme of life, while some, such as Descartes, have taken a more metaphysical view by pondering the impact one 's mind has on
Every since Plato introduced the idea of dualism thousands of years ago meta-physicians have been faced with the mind-body problem. Even so Plato idea of dualism did not become a major issue of debate in the philosophical world until the seventeenth century when French philosopher Rene Descartes publicized his ideas concerning the mental and physical world. During this paper, I will analyze the issue of individuation and identity in Descartes’ philosophical view of the mind-body dualism. I will first start by explaining the structure of Cartesian dualism. I will also analyze the challenges of individuation and identity as they interact with Descartes. With a bit of luck, subsequently breaking down Descartes’ reasoning and later on offering my response, I can present wit a high degree of confidence that the problems of individuation and identity offer a hindrance to the Cartesians’ principle of mind-body dualism. I give a critical analysis of these two problems, I will first explain the basis of Descartes’ philosophical views.
...of the body, and no problem arises of how soul and body can be united into a substantial whole: ‘there is no need to investigate whether the soul and the body are one, any more than the wax and the shape, or in general the matter of each thing and that of which it is the matter; for while “one” and “being” are said in many ways, the primary [sense] is actuality’ (De anima 2.1, 12B6–9).Many twentieth-century philosophers have been looking for just such a via media between materialism and dualism, at least for the case of the human mind; and much scholarly attention has gone into asking whether Aristotle’s view can be aligned with one of the modern alternatives, or whether it offers something preferable to any of the modern alternatives, or whether it is so bound up with a falsified Aristotelian science that it must regretfully be dismissed as no longer a live option.
Since ancient times, philosophers have debated on the relationship between how mind and matter relates, and interact, if at all. One such view became known as dualism, where the mind and body (matter) are two distinct, non-identical entities. Under dualism, lies interactionism, or mind-body interaction; a type of dualism where the physical world causally affects the mental world and vice versa. A strong supporter of dualism was Descartes who believed that physical and mental phenomenon only affects what goes into the brain, but opponents heavily criticized such view claiming it is not humanly conceivable and inconsistent with known laws of science. Yet, despite such arguments against the mind-body interaction, of all views, interactionism
While the great philosophical distinction between mind and body in western thought can be traced to the Greeks, it is to the influential work of René Descartes, French mathematician, philosopher, and physiologist, that we owe the first systematic account of the mind/body relationship. As the 19th century progressed, the problem of the relationship of mind to brain became ever more pressing.