If the mind is not spatial, how can it be continuous with the body, and thus how can it cause it to do anything?
2 of 12
Descartes response
Mind-body union will help us understand how the mind interacts with the body
3 of 12
Occasionalism: No Interaction
Malebranche: Every time I raise my hand God intervenes
4 of 12
Mind-Body Union
Standing on the nail I feel the pain in my foot. I do not have a mental sign that my foot is injured. My mind is right there in my foot. (Modern Philosophy: this is an illusion)
5 of 12
But Descartes can revert back to normal psychology very easily and thus the idea of a mind body union is unstable.
When 'the nerves of the foot are violently shaken', a sign to the mind on which it experiences a sensation of pain, as if it were in the foot, so the person can remove it
6 of 12
Critics
Descartes hasn't explained anything with this appeal to ideal of union.
7 of 12
Gassendi
You still have to explain how that 'joining and intermingling’ or ‘confusion’ can apply to you if you are, incorporeal, un-extended and indivisible. If you are no larger than a point, how are you jointed to the entire body, which is so large?
8 of 12
Descartes response to Gassendi:
Gassendi is using the imagination to think about things that can’t be imagined. Gassendi is trying to use the imagination to do philosophy, you can’t use the imagination to do philosophy.
9 of 12
Gassendi repsonse to Elizabeth:
There are three categories, mind, body, and mind body union. You don’t get mind body union b adding up mind and body, they are something different.
10 of 12
Is Descartes a dualist?
There is more than one Descartes: a ‘dualist’, and a ‘unionist’
11 of 12
In contemporary philosophy, a stronger idea of the ‘lived body’
My body is not an object, as it for, say, the doctor examining it. My body has its own kind of intelligence and is not just a machine responding to stimuli
12 of 12
Other cards in this set
Card 2
Front
If the mind is not spatial, how can it be continuous with the body, and thus how can it cause it to do anything?
Back
Princess Elizabeth
Card 3
Front
Mind-body union will help us understand how the mind interacts with the body
Back
Card 4
Front
Malebranche: Every time I raise my hand God intervenes
Back
Card 5
Front
Standing on the nail I feel the pain in my foot. I do not have a mental sign that my foot is injured. My mind is right there in my foot. (Modern Philosophy: this is an illusion)
Comments
No comments have yet been made