Soul, Mind and Body 2

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KEY WORDS
KEY WORDS
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Soul
often understood as the non-physical essence of a person
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Consciousness
awareness or perception
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Substance
a subject that has different properties attributed to it
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Dualism
the belief that reality can be divided into 2 distinct parts e.g. good and evil/ physical and non-physical
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Substance dualism
the belief that the mind and body both exist as two separate and distinct realities
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Scepticism
a questioning approach that does not take assumptions for granted
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Materialism
the belief that only physical matter exists, and the mind can be explained in physical terms as chemical activity in the brain
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Reductive Materialism
otherwise known as identity theory. The view that mental events are identical to physical occurences in the brain
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Category error
a problem of language that arises when things are talked about as if they belong to one category when in fact they belong to another
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Monism
human beings are made of one substance, the body
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THE SOUL
THE SOUL
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What is the soul often referred to as?
the 'self'
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The 'soul' usually means one particular aspect of the 'self', what is this?
the part that is capable of having a relationship with God and carries the possibility of a life after death
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The soul is the part of the person that deals with...
mental and spiritual events
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PLATO
PLATO
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What were Plato's views on the body?
temporary, physical, material part of the person
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What were his views on the soul?
essential, immaterial aspect of the person. it is temporarily united with the body
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What was Plato?
a dualist
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In which work does he put forward his views about the soul through the mouth of Socrates?
Phaedo
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What did Plato want to show about Socrates?
he had not failed on his mission to educate people- his soul would continue to immorality after death
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What did Socrates argue about the soul after it separates from the body?
it is undisturbed by distractions of constant bodily demands so it can reach its highest state
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Why did Plato and Socrates think that it was contradictory for the soul to die?
it is the life-giving essence so it must always have life itself
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When did Plato think the soul was embodied and disembodied?
Embodies on earth in the body and disembodied in the Realm of the Forms
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How did Plato think that every quality comes into being?
from its own opposite
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Give an example of this
something is big because there are 'smaller' things
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Plato uses this argument to draw the conclusion that...
life comes from death, and death comes from life in an endless chain of birth, death and rebirth
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Plato uses an argument in which dialogue to support this?
'Meno'
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Explain what happens in this dialogue
a slave boy with no education is given a geometry puzzle to solve, he is able to work out the answer to the problem
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What does this show?
he must have been using knowledge he already had before birth. Therefore his soul must have once lived in the perfect world of Forms
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When Plato wrote about the soul which metaphor did he use?
a chariot
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What are the two horses and why do we need them?
apetite and emotion which pull us along and motivate us
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What is the charioteer and what does this ensure?
reason, it makes sure that appetite and emotion work together in a rational direction
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What could happen if we let our emotions or appetite get the better of us?
if emotions take control we could act inappropriately and if our appetite takes control we could over-indulge
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Plato view on the soul is therefore called a...
'tripartite view'
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At the end of Republic which story does Plato introduce?
the 'Myth of Er'
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This story is told through whose mouth?
Socrates
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What happened to Er on the battlefield?
he died, 10 days later his body had not decomposed. On the 12th day his body was placed on a funeral pyre and he suddenly came back to life
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What did he tell to the listeners? 1/2
in the afterlife he appeared in front of judges. The morally good were rewarded and the immoral were punished with pain 10x what they had inflicted. Some were so bad they were never to be released from underground punishment
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2/2
He saw how souls choose themselves a new life on earth before being reborn. Once they had chosen they drank a special liquid which made them forget the afterlife and their previous life
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Only which people benefited from the circle of life and why?
The philosophical who understood the importance of choosing a life of peace and justice
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What did the others do?
they ricocheted between happiness and misery, reward and punishment
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ARISTOTLE
ARISTOTLE
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What was Aristotle in regards to soul, mind and body?
materialist/monist
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What did he think the soul was?
a 'substance'
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What problem did Aristotle see between a newborn baby, toddler and adult?
he asked how we can consider them all the 'same person'?
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What did this lead him to believe about the 'substance' and physical body?
the physical body changes but the substance remains the same- it is a continuing identity
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How is his argument more materialistic than Plato's?
he thought the soul was not an invisible part of the person, but it included the matter and structure of the body along with its functions
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Which cause of the person did Aristotle think the soul was? explain this
the soul is the formal cause of the person- it gives living things their essence
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How does he think living and non-living things are distinguished? how does this relate to the soul?
by their capabilities e.g. move, breathe, grow, reproduce etc. these capabilities define the soul. the soul is what distinguishes a living thing from a dead thing
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In De Anima what did he say about the soul/psyche?
'the soul is in some sense the principle of animal life'
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What 3 types of souls did Aristotle believe in?
vegetative/'nutritive', appetitive/'perceptive' and higher degree/intellectual
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What has vegetative souls and what are they capable of?
Plants, they are able to get nourishment and ensure reproduction
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What has appetitive souls and what are they capable of?
animals, they can react to stimuli and distinguish between pleasure and pain
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What has intellectual souls and what are they capable of?
Humans, ability to reason, tell the difference between right and wrong and we can decide and think
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Explain Aristotle's view on the soul using his metaphor of an eye
If the eye were a person its soul is the capacity to see. The capacity to see cannot exist without the eye just as the soul cannot exist without the body
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Explain his metaphor of a block of wax
the soul is inseparable from the living body just as a shape stamped into a block of wax is inseparable from the matter of the wax
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THE MIND-BODY PROBLEM
THE MIND-BODY PROBLEM
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How are machines fundamentally different to humans?
humans have consciousness
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What awareness do animals have that machines don't have?
self-awareness
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Explain how self-awareness and emotions are interlinked
we know when we are experiencing certain emotions, we can remember the last time we felt an emotion and we can imagine what it would be like to experience an emotion
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How could machines support a dualist argument?
we differ from machines because we have a mind. even if we perform the same physical actions as a machine we have thoughts and intentions behind them
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THE MIND AND BODY
THE MIND AND BODY
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What is often understood as the mind?
part of person has has thoughts, feelings intentions. Allows us to make choices and judgements and have memories
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What does the mind enable us to interpret?
data from our senses that we can experience
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What is often understood as the body?
the physical matter that humans are made of
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SUBSTANCE DUALISM
SUBSTANCE DUALISM
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SUBSTANCE DUALISM
SUBSTANCE DUALISM UBSTANCE DUALISM
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Substance dualism is the name given to the view that the mind and body are...
separate substances which both exist
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What is a substance? Give the example of a rug
A subject which has various properties. For example a rug is a substance and has the properties of being soft and red
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Can properties exist on their own? Give the example of a rug
No, e.g. there is no such thing as the property of being soft which exists separately from soft things like rugs
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Substance dualists see the mind as a substance, what are its properties?
thoughts, intentions, feelings, emotions
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They only see the body as a substance, what are its properties?
tall, young, freckled
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The body is different from the mind because it has the property that philosophers call...
'extension'
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What does extension mean?
it takes up space and has measurements
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DESCARTES
DESCARTES
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When did Rene Descartes live?
1596-1650
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When was he profoundly influential?
'Scientific Revolution'
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What was this?
a time when the conventional medieval tradition of thought were losing their popularity. Being replaced by experimental methods and reasoning
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What did he claim in his earlier work 'Le Monde'?
all matter in the universe is essentially the same type of thing. There were no 'earthly substances' in contrast to 'heavenly substances' as medieval thinkers had said
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What did he say about the earth?
the earth was not uniquely special in it's construction. it was one small part of the universe which all operated on the same fundamental physical laws of nature
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Why did he have to be careful about the things he said?
In 1663 Galileo Galilei was condemned by the Catholic Church for saying the sun, not the earth, was the centre of the universe
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Which book did he release anonymously?
Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting Reason and Reaching the Truth in Sciences
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When did he release it?
1637
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Which book did he release in 1641?
Meditations on First Philosophy
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What was Descartes aim of this book?
demonstrate a clear distinction between the 'soul' (mind) and body
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Which method did he adopt of extreme questioning?
'hyperbolic doubt'
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How did he use this hyperbolic doubt?
he thought of all the things that he thought could be known, and rejected them if there was any doubt over their certain truth
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Why did he reject our sense experience?
our senses can deceive us, there are times we think we can hear or see things that aren't really there
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Why did he reject mathematical axioms?
our reasoning could be faulty or God could be tricking us
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What was the only thing that he could be sure of in the end?
the fact that he was thinking sceptically. He could not doubt his existence as a thinker because he would have to exist as a thinker in order to do the doubting
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What did he call this?
'first certainty'
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What was his most famous conclusion at the end of this argument?
'I think therefore I am'
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what is this first certainty in Latin?
cogito, ergo sum
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how does the 'first certainty' support his dualist views?
he knew for certain he had a mind, but he could not be certain he had a body. Therefore they must be two different substances
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Where did he think had something do with the connection between the mind and body?
the pineal gland
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He thought the pineal gland contained...
air-like 'animal spirits'
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What did he think these animal spirits controlled?
imagination, sense perception, bodily movement and memory
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In a letter in 1640 what did he describe the pineal gland as?
'the principle seat of the soul'
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Why did he think the pineal gland was so special?
he observed other parts of the head are 'double' e.g. 2 eyes, 2 ears. But we have just one pineal gland which is central
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PROPERTY DUALISM
PROPERTY DUALISM
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What do property dualists hold?
There is only one kind of physical substance, but it has 2 distinct kinds of properties; mental and physical
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What are the physical properties of the brain?
size, mass and shape
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What are the mental properties?
opinions, emotions, memories
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What is one popular kind of property dualism?
'emergent materialism'
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What is this?
the idea that physical things become more complex, and new properties 'emerge' from them which cannot be reduced simply to the material
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Who held this view?
John Stuart Mill
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REDUCTIVE MATERIALISM
REDUCTIVE MATERIALISM
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What other names does reductive materialism have?
identity theory and type physicalism
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It is a theory which says that the mind is not distinct from...
the physical brain but is identical with it
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How does it say that mental states correspond to the brain?
mental states can be classified into different types e.g. memory, pain, happiness, etc. These correspond to different activities in different parts of the brain
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What happens when chemical reactions happen in a particular part of the brain?
we feel an emotion, make a decision or remember a fact depending on the type of mental event that corresponds to that part of the brain
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What did Boring assert and give an example
mental and physical events of the brain are identical. e.g. its not the case that when X happen in the brain we feel Y, but that X and Y are the same thing
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GILBERT RYLE
GILBERT RYLE
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When did Gilbert Ryle live?
1900-76
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Which book did he put his views of the mind and body in?
The Concept of Mind
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He argued that any talk of the 'self' or 'soul' existing beyond the physical body is...
a mistake in the way that we use language
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What example did he use as an example of mistake in language?
someone watching a cricket match and asking where the team spirit is as if it was something extra to the observable game, when it is actually just the way that the people in the game interact with each other
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He criticised Descartes and said that talk of a separate mind and body was like a...
'ghost in the machine'
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What did Ryle call the traditional mind and body distinction?
a 'category mistake'
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Why does he call it this?
because it tries to treat the mind and body as if they are different things of a similar logical kind when intact they are not in the same logical category
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RICHARD DAWKINS
RICHARD DAWKIN S
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What was Richard Dawkins in relations to the mind/body problem?
a materialist
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What did Richard Dawkin's say is the only thing to exist?
matter
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What did he say humans are in The Selfish Gene (1976)?
'survival machines- robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes'
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Why did he think humans were similar to animals?
they are vehicles of genes which are only interested in replicating themselves to survive to the next generation
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How did he distinguish between different ideas of the soul?
he wrote of a 'soul one' and a 'soul two'
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What is 'soul one'?
viewpoint that claims the soul is a spiritual supernatural part of a person which is capable of knowing God
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What does Dawkin's think about this view?
he rejects it
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What is 'soul two'?
Aristotelian understadning- relates to someones personality and individuality
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What does Dawkin's think about 'soul two'?
he accepts it
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What does he say about life in his book River Out of Eden (1995)?
'Life is just bytes and bytes and bytes of digital information'
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OTHER PEOPLE
OTHER PEOPLE
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Peter Geach
how can a disembodied soul see the Forms? Isn't experience linked to senses?
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G.E.M Anscombe
'bodily act is an act of man qua spirit'- description of bodily act show how things are working and not why. Eg typing fingers are moving but doesn't explain why. Mind is part of the body- we can't have one without the other
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Skinner
Behaviourist. Human thoughts are learned behaviour due to conditioning and reinforcing. if an action leads to a good result it will be rewarded and repeated, and vice versa for a bad action
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What was Watson and Rayner's experiment?
Little Albert not scared of white rat but cried when metal bar was struck behind his head. The white rat was introduced overtime the bar was struck. In the end they only had to show him the rat and he would burst into tears
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What does this experiment show?
emotions such as fear can be conditioned into people,
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What are Anthony Flew's views?
any talk of life after death is nonsensical. Eg Lewis Carroll Alices Adventures in Wonderland the cheshire cat disappears and only its grin is left- this is humorous because a grin cannot exist without a face for it to be on
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How does he attack substance dualism specifically?
to speak of a mind or soul as a 'substance' is a misuse of the term. To refer to the mind or personality is to refer to the behaviour of the physical person.
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In which book does Richard Swinburne explain his beliefs on the soul?
The Evolution of the Soul (1997)
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What does he argue?
we have fundamental truths that cannot be explained physically. Our most significant aspects that give us our identity are not physical. It is because of the soul that we know right and wrong and make free choices. Souls can survive death
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What is Keith Ward's book called?
Defending the Soul (1992)
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What does Ward argue?
without a belief in the soul morality becomes a matter of personal choice. We need to recognise God given soul to achieve special dignity of being human rather than animal. without the soul we lack a sense of final purpose
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What does the anglican priest Brian Hebblethwaite say about artificial intelligence?
it 'has shown no signs whatsoever of manifesting even rudimentary forms of awareness, still less affection, imagination, rational thought, or volition
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Card 2

Front

Soul

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often understood as the non-physical essence of a person

Card 3

Front

Consciousness

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

Substance

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

Dualism

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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