Substance Dualism

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  • Created by: Freyae99
  • Created on: 03-01-18 20:31
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  • Substance Dualism
    • Key terms
      • Substance: something that doesn't depend on anything else to exist. it possess properties and persists through change.
      • Property: they cannot exist on their own - they depend on substance to exist; they can change even when the substance persists.
        • Mental properties include mental states such as belief and mental events such as pain.
        • Physical properties are properties of objects that can be investigated by the natural sciences.
      • Ontologically distinct: things that exist separately from each other e.g. the mind and body.
    • Descartes Conceivability
      • The mind is something that thinks and the body is something that is extended.
      • P1. It is conceivable that the mind can exist without the body.
        • IC1. Therefore it is possible that the mind and body are distinct substances.
          • C. Therefore the mind and body are distinct substances.
      • In this, our clear and distinct ideas of the mind and body must be complete and exclusive.
        • The mind is nothing but a thought and the body is nothing but extension and we know this to be true because of our clear and distinct ideas.
    • Descartes Indivisibilty
      • If two things are identical, then they cannot have different properties, however the mind and body do - the mind had thought and the body has extension.
        • Descartes claims that extension is the essential property of physical objects and what is extended is divisible.
          • Something as small as a wave of light cannot be divided, but this is a fundamental part of the universe so it must be physical
      • The body is spatially divisible and the mind is not. You can divide the body into pieces but the mind you cannot.
        • Many physical properties aren't divisible e.g. being able to fly is a property of a bird, but this cannot be divided. Only spatial properties are spatially divisible. Therefore bodies could possess mental properties.
      • The mind and body have a very close relationship.
      • Liebniz and his principle of the indiscernibly of identicals supports this: if two things are identical (one and the same) then they share all the same properties.
  • The divisibility argument only succeeds if we assume that the mind is a substance.
    • If the only substance in existence is matter then there are no minds - only the mental properties of our brain (grey matter).

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