mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86 
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Post by mcc1789 on Jan 5, 2016 3:16:07 GMT
If dualism is true, why does brain damage affect mental states such as memory and personality? Assuming the brain is interacting with an immaterial mind, why is the brain needed at all? An immaterial brainless mind would presumably not be affected by material things such as brain damage.
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Post by ignorantianescia on Jan 5, 2016 8:15:46 GMT
It honestly makes a lot of difference what kind of psychical dualism you have in mind, but most would consider both the material brain and the immaterial soul crucial aspects for a functioning mind. For a Cartesian dualist both would be needed for humans to be hybrids whose minds could interact with the physical world, as the two substances are supposed to be so different. That's why the intersection between soul and brain was held to be so special.
That said, I don't think there are a lot of card-carrying, all-out Cartesian dualists here.
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Jan 5, 2016 13:43:05 GMT
I suppose that makes sense. So how do different varieties of dualism view this? I knew Cartesian dualism isn't in vogue anymore. So how does what I've heard them call "substance dualism" differ?
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jonkon
Master of the Arts
Posts: 111
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Post by jonkon on Jan 5, 2016 18:02:48 GMT
Try to think of it as trying to drive a motor vehicle with a blown piston or a broken axle. Car and driver are separate entities, but the interaction in the form of driving goes kablooie.
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Post by unkleE on Jan 5, 2016 21:03:40 GMT
It honestly makes a lot of difference what kind of psychical dualism you have in mind, but most would consider both the material brain and the immaterial soul crucial aspects for a functioning mind. For a Cartesian dualist both would be needed for humans to be hybrids whose minds could interact with the physical world, as the two substances are supposed to be so different. That's why the intersection between soul and brain was held to be so special. That said, I don't think there are a lot of card-carrying, all-out Cartesian dualists here. I'm sure I'm a dualist, but I'm not sure I'm a Cartesian one. If the mind lines on after death, then one would have to be a Cartesian dualist, is that not so? But if one believes that the body (and mind) is resurrected after death (which I regard as the correct understanding of the New Testament), then one could even be a monist, I think, or some other type of dualist. Is that how you would see things? |
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Jan 6, 2016 1:23:38 GMT
I've read of Christians who were monists, saying people are simply resurrected at some future point. They claim the idea of a soul separate from the body is an importation from Greek philosophy. I don't know whether that's true, but monism seems compatible with Christianity in their conception.
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Post by unkleE on Jan 6, 2016 5:31:12 GMT
I think we need to remember there's more than one form of dualism - e.g. mind-brain and body-soul. I am a dualist about the first but a monist about the second if soul is defined as a separate entity, but a dualist about the second if soul is defined as mind.
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Jan 6, 2016 5:41:07 GMT
I guess it can get pretty complicated.
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Post by himself on Jan 30, 2016 1:56:44 GMT
Cartesian dualism IIRC is substance dualism. In the Scientific Revolution, Descartes defined the mind as a separate substance from the body, which he called res cogitans and res extensa, resp. This led to things like the "problem" of the qualia, the mind-body "problem", and so on. For Descartes and others in the cult of the cerebral, the res cogitans was the "real" person and the body a sort of encumbrance. He was somewhat in the tradition of the gnostics in that regard.
The earlier (medieval) understanding was that the soul (anima) was the substantial form of a living being. The word "anima" simply means "life" or "alive" and it is simply whatever a living being has that its corpse does not. The soul and the body together made up a single substance, so mind-body is no more a problem than (for the inanimate) the sphere-basketball problem. There were several grades of souls: vegetative, sensitive, and rational. Naturally, their powers were exercised by means of physical organs. Memory, for example, seems to be seated in the brain. This is a sensitive power, one of the "inner senses" and is what makes animals trainable: they can remember that this action elicits that treat. An argument can be made that a portion of the rational soul, viz., the intellect and will, might persist after death and the decay of the matter.
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Jan 30, 2016 2:22:45 GMT
I agree, it seems to be a false dilemma. How interesting the earlier Christian philosophers didn't take that view, and is perhaps even closer to the modern one. However, it what way would it persist after death however? That seems to require an immaterial soul. Isn't that just more dualism?
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Post by himself on Feb 2, 2016 23:42:21 GMT
I agree, it seems to be a false dilemma. How interesting the earlier Christian philosophers didn't take that view, and is perhaps even closer to the modern one. However, it what way would it persist after death however? That seems to require an immaterial soul. Isn't that just more dualism? But not substance dualism. One of the reasons the Christian creed holds to the resurrection of the body is that the rational soul requires a material body to be complete: dhspriory.org/thomas/Compendium.htm#151 See also: dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles2.htm#79 for the incorruptibility of the intellect; though it is part of a longer chain of reasoning found here: dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles2.htm |
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Feb 3, 2016 0:07:15 GMT
I've read Christian materialists recently arguing that an immaterial soul isn't necessary, as God could just resurrect people's bodies. Naturally if you hold their views that seems true, so perhaps this whole dispute is beside the point.
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Post by James Hannam on Feb 4, 2016 7:41:38 GMT
I've read Christian materialists recently arguing that an immaterial soul isn't necessary, as God could just resurrect people's bodies. Naturally if you hold their views that seems true, so perhaps this whole dispute is beside the point. I am not a materialist particularly, but this seems to me to be true. There are interesting thought experiments about teleportation that lead to similar conclusions. Chrisitan materialists say God remembers us and can put us back together, while also repairing the damage of dementia etc. Our immortality is thus preserved by the pattern of our minds being reflected in the mind of God. I find this does lead to fewer metaphysical difficulties than any form of dualism. But also depends on materialism being true, which seems a stretch to me. Best wishes James |
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mcc1789
Bachelor of the Arts
Posts: 86
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Post by mcc1789 on Feb 4, 2016 13:55:17 GMT
Yes, it seems unnecessary to have an immaterial soul if one has already posited an all-good, all-knowing and all-powerful God. This scenario would still seem to support dualism anyway-I don't see them positing this God is material as well. However, why does materialism seem a stretch? Granted, a better term is probably physicalism or naturalism, since everything being "matter" seems to be wrong according to modern physics.
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