The mind-body problem Flashcards
mind-body problem overview
- What is the nature of the mind? What, most fundamentally, are
minds and mental states? - What is the nature of the human body? What, most fundamentally,
are bodies and bodily states? - How are our minds and bodies related to one another?
first proposition
THE HUMAN BODY IS A MATERIAL THING
- Our bodies certainly appear to be spatial and subject to physical law.
- The materiality of body is typically presupposed by the natural sciences.
second proposition
THE HUMAN MIND IS A SPIRITUAL THING
- Our minds do not appear to be in space or subject to physical law. (Where in space is your belief that it is 2024 or your desire for coffee or your visual experience of your notebook?)
- Our minds also clearly have consciousness and intentionality
third proposition
MIND AND BODY INTERACT
- Doesn’t taking aspirin make headaches go away?
- And doesn’t believing that there’s coffee at Second Cup and wanting a coffee from Second Cup typically make one walk over to Second Cup?
fourth proposition
SPIRIT AND MATTER DO NOT INTERACT
- If something is spiritual, then it isn’t in space. But matter is in space. So how could something not in space causally influence something that is in space (and vice versa)?
idealists
Philosophers who give up (1).
They believe that everything we take to be material is really spiritual
materialists
Philosophers who give up (2).
They believe that minds are material (perhaps they are brains).
dualistic options
- Philosophers who reject monistic solutions to the problem accept both (1) and (2).
- Of these, those who give up (3) usually fall into one of 2 categories.
1. Epiphenomenalist dualists
Who think that while body acts on mind, mind doesn’t act on body
2. Parallelist dualists
Who think that neither body nor mind act on each other - Those who deny (4)
3. Interactionist dualists - They believe that minds are spiritual yet nevertheless act on material bodies
descartes approach
Descartes argues for an interactionist dualist approach to the mind-body problem
- Dualist part:
There are two kinds of substances in the world…
-> Material substances (like your body)
Essentially extended (spatial and subject to physical law) and non-thinking (lacking consciousness and intentionality)
-> Mental substances (which he identifies with minds)
Essentially thinking (possessing consciousness and intentionality) and non-extended (non-spatial and not subject to physical law
substance dualism
Minds are wholly mental, immaterial substances
- Substantivalism
Minds are substances. To have a mind is for there to be a particular substance that is one’s mind.
- Immaterialism
If there are mental substances, then they are wholly immaterial
the conceivability argument
(P1) I can clearly and distinctly conceive of my mind existing without my body existing (or without anything else material existing).
○ Evil demon scenarios
(P2) What is clearly and distinctly conceivable is possible.
(C1). It is possible for my mind to exist without my body existing (or without anything else material existing)
(C2) My mind is not my body (or anything else material).
(P3) My mind is a thing with consciousness and intentionality, not different in fundamental kind from other human minds.
(C3) The human mind is a spiritual thing
arnauld vs descartes
○ Rejects P2
Claims a proposition’s being clearly and distinctly conceivable entails its being possible only if we have a ‘complete and adequate’ grasp of the essences or natures of the items the proposition concerns
ex. Sam understanding what a right angle triangle is without knowing that right triangles satisfy the Pythagorean theorem
hidden natures
- His point is that our minds might have ‘hidden’ essences/natures just the properties being a right triangle and being water.
- Then even if we can conceive of mind without body, it does not follow that this is a genuine possibility
