Week 1: Dualism Flashcards
What is the mind-body problem?
The mind-body problem refers to the question of how mental processes and states (e.g. thinking) relate to the physical states of our bodies and brains
What is substance dualism?
Substance dualism argues that humans are made up of two parts: A material body and an immaterial soul. The mind and body are seperate substances that can interact. The body is an extended thing whereas the mind is a thinking thing.
What was Descartes’ argument of doubt?
It can be argued that “X and Y are equal only when they share all their properties”. One can doubt the existence of their body but one cannot doubt the existence of their thinking. Therefore, body and mind (thinking) cannot be the same thing.
Based on argument by Leibniz: X=Y when sharing all properties.
What counterarguments were there to Descartes’ substance dualism?
- Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia argued: “How can an immaterial substance act on a material substance?” The interaction problem. Descartes tried to clarify this through an explanation that the pineal gland transfers light energy into movement. But Elisabeth argued that this is nothing more than speculation.
- The morning star, which can only be seen in the morning, and the evening star, which can only be seen in the evening, are in fact the same star. Thus, the argument that because they cannot be seen at the same time so they are different, is not true. The doubtability of something is not an inherent property of that thing.
What are the two features of substance dualism?
- The immateriality of the soul (often discarded by anti-Cartersian’s).
- The separation of the outside world and the inner mind: the mind is separated from the outside world and only connected indirectly though the senses (input) and behaviour (output) (anti-Cartesian’s often maintain this view but exchange the mind-body problem for a brain-body problem).
The second feature does not necessarily presuppose the first
What is ontology?
Ontology is the study of what really exists.
What is epistemology?
Epistemology is the study of what we know and how we can know it.
What is a problem with Descartes’ arguments?
Ontology vs. Epistemology
What someone is entitled to think about x (whether or not they can doubt x’s existence) should not be considered a property of x in the sense of Leibniz’s principle of the identity of indiscernible. When and how something is perceived is not a property of that object.
The idea that the mind and the body are distinct entites is an ontological thesis. The distinction between the mind and the body in terms of what we can doubt is epistemological, it is about the mind and and the body as we know them. Thus, Descartes has an epistemological claim and he acts as though there are ontological properties.
What is property dualism?
There is one type of thing in the world, which are physical things, but a physical thing in the world (e.g. the brain) can have mental properties (e.g. consciousness) as well as physical properties (e.g. shape and weight).
What is predicate dualism?
Predicate dualism is about the language we use to talk about the mind-body problem. Mentalistic terms are required for a full description of the world, the world cannot just be reduced to physical terms.
E.g. Using the term H2O (in terms of physical predicates) instead of the term water, we do not lose any information about the thing we are speaking of. However. when using neuronal terms instead of mental terms, we do lose information about the thing we are speaking of. We cannot always replace mentalistic predicates by physical predicates.
