The idea to create this topic came from reading the OP of this thread.
After reading it, I find it amazing that people take for granted, that humans have ''souls'', without actually delving deeper into it:
The idea that man is made of both matter and something insubstantial has been around for thousands of years. Since the advent of religion, and the concept of an afterlife, people have held the belief that there is a physical and non physical aspect to each and every person - dualism. Despite the fact that it is riddled with fallacies, more people seem to believe in dualism than monoism, despite the fact that the latter is more supported by logic.
The first problem with dualism is the interface between the two forms of existence (physical and non physical.)
Dualism presupposes that a connection exists between the non physical mind and the physical brain and body. It does not, however explain in any way how this connection exists, or in which state this connection exists.
The idea that there is a connection between the physical and non physical relies on one of two fallacies.
Firstly, that there is a third state of being, somewhere in between physical and non physical which obviously moves away from the idea of dualism by creating a third state of being. Logically however, we must then create more states of being to connect the new state of being to the original states, andthen continue this pattern ad infinitum for the infinite amount of states that will eventually occur.
This idea falls prey to the second fallacy of the dualistic connection, being that if there is a connection between these two states of existence, it must be either physical or non physical, which then fails to accomplish any sort of connection, (or a non physical connection) to connect the physical existence to the non physical existence, nothing is being accomplished, and no connection is being established. Once we accept this second fallacy we require a new connection between this physical connection and non physical existence, and the fallacy comes full circle, returning to the original goal. The idea that any connection can exist between the physical and non physical presupposes either a third form of existence, or a non existent connection, and therefore, the idea of a connection between the physical and non physical fails.
Now that it is apparent that there can be no connection between the physical and the non physical existences, and we are limited to our physical experiences for our data and input, how can we have any knowledge or data about this non physical existence? It is obvious, of course, that we are limited to our physical experiences for our data and input, as all of our senses are physically based. If we have no real knowledge of the non physical existence, we cannot justify anything about such an existence. Because we have no true knowledge about a non physical existence, dualism is shown again to be intrinsically flawed.
A common argument for dualism consists of the idea that the mind and body, an admittedly physical entity, can continue to exist without the ''life'' of the mind, and therefore they are two different types of existence. Unfortunately, because we have no real way to know about the non physical existence, we have no way to truly tell if the mind has died. Aside from this, brain death does not necessarily constitute mind death either, in the dualistic view. Because of this, the argument, that the body can exist without the mind is not necessarily true, as we have no way to know when the mind has died, and brain death does not necessarily equate to mind death. Therefore the argument that dualism is logically consistent because the body can live without the mind and thus they are two separate things, fails.
I think Occam's Razor is completely ridiculous. It does not base itself on any logical interpretation.
I see what you mean here, Drace. But doesn't it at least seem intuitively plausible? Sure there's nothing intrinsically correct about a simpler theory, but if two theories equally explain an event, and one is simpler and more cohesive, doesn't that seem to be more "right"? I think Occam's Razor is a valid consideration here, although not applicable for reasons given above.
A chair just is what it is, but again there's this context that seems unique to the mind.
I think that is more down to human thought processes in general, than anything to do with the mind or 'soul' itself. Studies have shown that children seem to attribute non physical characteristics to most objects. For example, they were aksed various questions about a picture of a dead mouse, such as 'can it move?', 'can it hear?', 'can it see?' etc. However, when they were asked more, I suppose spiritual questions, like 'can it feel pain', the answers were yes.
The reasons gave for this were genetic. Paul Bloom, the psychologist on whose theories the article was founded, found evidence that this belief in 'souls' and the non physical is genetic, and is hard wired into our brains because it helps societies survive. I actually find this quite convincing.
But I digress, my main point being, our ability to non physicalise (is that even a word?) physical objects, is nothing more than an evolutionary mechanism.
The article is here: , although unfortunately, it seems you need a subscription to New Scientist to view it.
As for the first problem, I am struggling to think of a way in which this attribute could be incorporated into monoism.
Is it a bigger problem?
It's pretty hard to quantify what's a bigger problem to the respective theories. Suffice to say it's my opinion for this reason:
Even though physicalism seems to be the most intuitively plausible solution to me, that might just be my disinclination for the "spooky stuff" of dualism.
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At any rate, I think the solution rests in the arguments alone, and not by applying the Razor to the problem.
On reflection, you are probably right. Given the aforementioned difficulty of quantifying what is a bigger problem, I guess it goes back to one Drace's points (although slightly out of context here), that it is essentially down to opinion. Occam's Razor seems to me to be applicable, because monoism seems to create less assumptions.
Disregarding the arguments for one second, on how monoism/dualism would function, if we assume dualism to be a perfectly plausible theory, this has quite a lot of implications that are unanswered and quite unprovable. I guess that's another reason why I choose monoism.
Paul Bloom, the psychologist on whose theories the article was founded, found evidence that this belief in 'souls' and the non physical is genetic, and is hard wired into our brains because it helps societies survive. I actually find this quite convincing.
This almost, but not quite, totally screams 'creator' to me, at least from the phrasing. Because for belief in souls to be hard-wired into our brains to help societies to survive, there would have to be either a creator who knows about the existence of society or some sort of instinctual thing that wills us toward building a society - because civilization isn't something thought to be part of our genetic code. What I'm saying is that humans aren't instinctively going to start building mud huts and establishing a religion to have a society. So for it to be hardwired into our brains, there would have to be some other condition we don't know of, like a creator or an aspect of our genes we haven't discovered. But we'll never know
I really wish you didn't need to be a subscriber so that you could view the whole article.
Essentially, what the article says, is that evolution is responsible for religion (ironic no?) In early societies, groups that worked together were far more successful at outcompeting small scattered groups for scarce resources. The binding force was religion. Thus a belief in some sort of God was hardwired into the human psyche and passed down through the generations.
Ah, thanks for telling me about the rest of the article.
I so think that it's interesting that it's used as a way to encourage teamwork in tribes and such so they do a better job and end up with all the resources. Interesting~~
But I digress, my main point being, our ability to non physicalise (is that even a word?) physical objects, is nothing more than an evolutionary mechanism.
I don't think your point here quite has the force it does when we're talking about the problem of intentionality. I see what you're saying - we say computers "think" even though we know they don't. We attribute non-physical stuff to physical things all the time, and we do so fallaciously. But with this problem we're not attributing non-physical properties to a physical structures fallaciously. We have reason to think that our thoughts can be "about" certain things - simply because they are! That I'm thinking about typing right now is something that I cannot doubt. It seems to be an intrinsic part of thought (and thus, the mind) that it can have intentionality, that it can be about things. But here, the dualist isn't arguing that a physical structure has a non-physical property (i.e. "aboutness". It's the physicalist that has to come up with how a purely physical structure can be about things. Otherwise, it's hard to see how the mind can be something physical. And keep in mind the motivation for this claim. Aboutness isn't something we can doubt. It's simply a matter of fact that our thoughts are about things. But how can a chair or a rock be about something?
I don't think your point here quite has the force it does when we're talking about the problem of intentionality. I see what you're saying - we say computers "think" even though we know they don't. We attribute non-physical stuff to physical things all the time, and we do so fallaciously. But with this problem we're not attributing non-physical properties to a physical structures fallaciously. We have reason to think that our thoughts can be "about" certain things - simply because they are! That I'm thinking about typing right now is something that I cannot doubt. It seems to be an intrinsic part of thought (and thus, the mind) that it can have intentionality, that it can be about things.
I do agree with you here.
So it seems that monoism and dualism both have their faults and their strengths. I think it is difficult to distinguish which theory is more ''right'' as it stands. Going back to your point a few pages back, the ''spooky stuff'' of dualism isn't really the type of thing I generally buy into. Plus as there is no way to verify it as a theory, because you cannot gather any data about the 'soul', I'll stick with monoism.
What's the other half of this dictohomy: physical?
I'm not sure what you're asking here, but I'll try to better explain my quote from above to see if that answers your question. To become acquainted with physical things, we need empirical observations (at the very least). I don't know what color the Eiffel Tower is unless I see it, or a picture. But I know the content of my mind through introspection alone. I know what mood I'm in, what I believe, what I hope for. And this is certainly something unique, and something disanalogous from the physical world.
I have no issue acknowledging dualism between object and concept. But that dualism does not automatically translate to a dualism between physical and supernatural. Previously in the thread, we were talking about the latter. So I ask, what dichotomy are you operating on?
Oh! Well, from the classical view: the physical and the mental. While the mental can be considered to be a distinct substance from the physical world, I'm more focused on the dichotomy of properties of the substances.
Oh! Well, from the classical view: the physical and the mental. While the mental can be considered to be a distinct substance from the physical world, I'm more focused on the dichotomy of properties of the substances.
The problem I have with that terminology is that it seems to say that, that which is mental is not physical. But it is physical. The two much cleaner ways to say it are ''object vs concept'' and ''objective vs subjective.''
I would also like to note that distinct does not mean separate or apart from, particularly in cases of hierachy. A floor is still part of a room, though it is distinct from the room.
But it is physical. The two much cleaner ways to say it are ''object vs concept'' and ''objective vs subjective.''
This seems to beg the question. I think rejecting the terminology because it implies a non-physical mind just won't work.
I would also like to note that distinct does not mean separate or apart from
That's a good point and I really like your example. What's cool about dualism is the mind can certainly be a part of the physical process. You don't have to believe in a soul, or the consciousness existing without a brain in order to be a dualist. Just like the floor has distinct properties from the rest of the room (i.e., being on the ground, made of different material, a unique spatial location, etc.), the mind has its own distinct properties which we've been discussing. What distinctness does imply, however, is nonequality. If substance A and substance B are distinct from each other, then there must be some way of distinguishing them. Thus one or more of their properties are different and they are not identical. All this shows is that the mind is not identical to the physical.
That's a good point and I really like your example. What's cool about dualism is the mind can certainly be a part of the physical process. You don't have to believe in a soul, or the consciousness existing without a brain in order to be a dualist. Just like the floor has distinct properties from the rest of the room (i.e., being on the ground, made of different material, a unique spatial location, etc.), the mind has its own distinct properties which we've been discussing. What distinctness does imply, however, is nonequality. If substance A and substance B are distinct from each other, then there must be some way of distinguishing them. Thus one or more of their properties are different and they are not identical. All this shows is that the mind is not identical to the physical
I have been thinking over what you said for a while, and suffice to say, have not come up with an argument against it. I still haven't been convinced by the argument though.
The Conceivability Argument: 1) If I can clearly and distinctly conceive of x as separate from y, then x is a separate entity from y. 2) I can clearly and distinctly conceive of my mind as distinct from my body. / Therefore, my mind is a separate entity from my body.
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In any case, I thought I'd address this argument with an example, as I ommitted to do so before:
I can conceive of a program as being a separate entity from the computer it's running on, but that doesn't mean I'm wrong about it. On a physical level, the program does, in fact, exist, as a series of electrical signals in the circuitry of the computer it's running on. It's not floating out in an imaginary incorporeal space (or rather there's no reason to believe that it is).
