“are You A Brain, Or A Mind And A Brain?”

I believe that I am a mind and a brain. This view is from substance dualism, popularised by Descartes. This is because the two interact, and need to work together to carry out tasks. If the mind was separate from the brain, it wouldn t make the sense of pains or itches possible, because they are mental states of the soul and yet they seem to be located across our bodies. The dualist can explain this by co-locating the soul with our bodies. Descartes found that the seat of consciousness was in the small pineal gland, though this solved nothing. [1]I shall survey the views of Descartes, JJC Smart and Kim to come to the conclusion that the mind must work closely with the brain, and that we must be both.

The Epistemological Argument is as follows: where one finds knowledge, truth and belief intersect. In an abstract example, A can exist apart from B, and vice versa, A is really distinct from B, and B from A. etc. Cartesian substance dualism presents the Epistemological project to find indubitable knowledge. Descartes Method of Doubt rejects as false, any belief that can possibly be doubted. Arguably his most famous phrase, I think, therefore I am (cogito ergo sum says that I exist as a mind. Even if a malevolent demon were feeding me every thought, there would still be a me to whom he was feeding them. The Mind-Body problem questions how the mind and body relate to each other, as these two substances need to interact as according to dualism, your mind is connected the extended body even though the mind is non-physical and the body is physical. Your body belongs to you and is very connected with you. We are biological (Homo Sapiens), so we have a physical body, and a mental state capable of reasoning, deciding and experiencing. The mind is very important in transmitting signals to the body, and interacts with every feeling we have and creates a bodily reaction to this. For example, your stomach may hurt if you eat too much food, and you ll feel lethargic.

Substance dualism is an ontological position, the study of being. But we come across The Problem of Interaction when pairing them together. This asks, How can a non-physical thing have a casual effect on a physical thing? . If the mental and the physical are distinct, how do the two interact, as they obviously must in order for a human being to be functional? The causal-pairing objection is arguably one of the most powerful objections to substance dualism. Jaegwon Kim s Pairing Problem is a strong criticism of interactionist substance dualism. Interaction between two things requires the correct, physical locational relationship. Some physical things pair with others because they re in the right physical relationship. In Dualism, the mind has no location, so it cannot be in the correct physical, locational relationship with the brain. If the mind is non-locational, then it cannot pair accurately with the right brain. To counter this problem, we can reason that souls are extended in the same location as our bodies because they appear to be. Pains, itches, and dizziness are mental states of the soul and yet they seem to be located across our bodies. The dualist can explain this by co-locating the soul with our bodies.[2] Substance dualism is intuitive, as we may know how your body might react if we are saddened.

JJC Smart s Identity Theory deals with behaviouristic physicalism and pairs the mind with the brain. Fred Jackson produced a thought experiment about an imaginary scientist called Mary who grows up in a room filled only by black, white and grey objects. She is taught everything about the theory of colour, but when she steps outside of her enclosure and actually sees a coloured object for the first time, our intuition is that she learns something utterly new, for which she is not prepared. Our intuitions are often wrong about the world.

Studies of individuals damaged in parts of their brains have revealed how specific physical structures are directly involved with fundamental mental experiences: the amygdalas and hypothalamus are essential so that we can feel emotions and use the emotional content of an experience as a guide to what s important or not in our lives. [3]

More empirical evidence is gathering about the way the mind works as we evolve in the 21^st century of science. We may be closer to understanding how the mind works - it may not have to be separate from the brain. The mind and body are distinct substances, but are mixed together closely. I must be a mind and a brain, since the brain is how I interact with the world, and the mind is me the thinking thing.

[1] Philosophizing about the Mind | Issue 36 | Philosophy Now

[2] There are no good objections to substance dualism

Author: JOS GUSM O RODRIGUES, Source: Philosophy, Vol. 89, No. 348 (April 2014), pp. 199-222

[3] There are no good objections to substance dualism

Author: JOS GUSM O RODRIGUES, Source: Philosophy, Vol. 89, No. 348 (April 2014), pp. 199-222

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