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Feeling crazy because I can't understand if it's a biological choice, or it's something they aren't doing on purpose. Is it My Mind and My Body, or theirs?


ohmygosh

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I checked into my account, and saw that this web page is chalked-full of philosophers.  People who are finding some answers. 

I feel like the happier people in life just never venture into the weirdness of life.  Meaning, that's why I am here.  Is that insulting?  That this site is weird?  No.  Weird doesn't mean bad.  It is literal.  A site to go to for people who don't have other outlets... because it's weird to care about these things... real things.   I posted the Autism (is a dirt(y) word on this site question).  I was drunk and sad.  I guess that's as raw as you can get.  Maybe that's why so many people commented on it.   I am so raw, that it's hard for me to interact in this topic still.  Sorry about that.

 

But, I wrote this philosophy paper and wanted to share it, since I checked-in tonight and saw so many comments near to the topic.  I guess I am impressed by you guys/gals, and wanted to share one little thing I did create and was proud of..., and see what you think.

 

 

Here's the paper...

The Mind-Body Arguments puts forward a question that has been challenged since Plato, Aristotle and later Descartes, and has probably existed as long as there were people to ask the question: just how does the mind interact with the body, or is it merely a function of the brain and not an interaction at all?  Many philosophers have held the belief of Property Dualism, where the Mind and Body are two different properties.  This is an appealing view to hold since the “mind” seems to contain the essence of a person, and to hold the key to personalities and ambitions.  There is a sense of mystery and magic about this view.  I however, would like to explain that this view could just be that, magic and mystery.  I propose that the mind is merely the function of that part of the body that we know of as the brain.  I believe that the brain’s obvious limitations give more proof to the materialist’s argument, or more specifically, to the version of materialists called physicalism, as mentioned by Brie Gertler in her somewhat romantic essay in support of Property Dualism.

Before I continue to discuss the two arguments, allow me to paraphrase the opposing arguments of the two philosophers that will be the targets for our discussion.  I will start with the argument that Gertler puts forth in defense of property dualist, where in which she is a self-described naturalist, and does not think herself to be a person who believes in anything more mysterious than the next man/woman.  This is called the disembodiment argument.  It states that “in addition to the physical/ material body, there is an immaterial mind.”

1.        I can conceive of experiencing this pain while disembodied.

2.       What is conceivable is possible.

3.      It’s possible that this pain exists in immaterial being.

4.      If this pain were a physical state or event, it couldn’t exist in immaterial being.

5.      So, this pain is not identical to any physical state.

6.      So, physicalism is false.

She states that the person can feel pain, that is, that a person can feel the sensation of pain even in the absence of pain.  One can imagine something that is not there, so there must be a disconnection from the physical and the mind.  I would argue that her view of the phenomenon is no more than a memory. A physical memory that can be accessed by thought, which is a physical occurrence.  That this urgency to think this or any other decision can be a natural force that is a result of the energy that is existent in any living person. 

Let’s take a look at the argument that states that there is only a mind.  In our discussion we looked at the casual argument by D. Papineau’s.  Papineau argues that:

1.      Conscious mental occurrences are have physical effects.

2.      All physical effects are fully caused by purely physical histories.

3.      The physical effects of the conscious causes aren’t always over-determined by distinct causes.

Physicalism is “the belief that the mind and body are both entirely physical.”   This is a stronger argument as I will explain by the discussing the incident of mental defect. 

I argue that the person has life and that life is the causal factor for having brain waves.  Without delving into neuroscience, of which I have absolutely no idea about, I will explain why I believe that Papineau is closer to the truth in his argument for Mind-Body inclusiveness.

Brain waves are not the same as a nonmaterial conscious. They are a measurable weightless, but material occurrence that could still be called a conscience. 

Brainwaves are the same as thoughts.  They are limited to the physical structure of a brain, and are unable to function outside of the capacity of the physical brain.  That is, that a person can only draw from existing memories and that are accessible and not obstructed by broken or necrotic brain tissue.  Also, the brain is able to take existing memories and compile the memories into new memories.  All of the which, are explainable by physicalism. 

Consider the following thought experiment.  A person who is perfectly healthy goes to fight a war in Afghanistan.  There, they receive a shrapnel head wound.  The doctor who treats them looks at the physical damage of the wound and determines that certain abilities are expected to be lost, such as motor function.  If the person who was injured consisted of a body and a mind, could the mind think past this dilemma and make itself walk again?

Consider another example.  Almost 757yt% of the American population will inevitably become old, and at risk for Alzheimer’s or Dementia.  These diseases effect the physical brain.  It also effects the person who at one point was an artist, a politician, a business woman, etc.   The progressive nature of the disease causes a person to forget and even lose the ability to identify situations, faces, make decisions, etc.  The disease is the result of physical changes and/or cellular brain tissue death.  We would all like to think that grandma is “still in there” and that her essence is not something that could be effected by the external world, however, the truth is that grandma is disappearing.  More often than not, it is the family member who does the remembering for grandma.  The relative see’s grandma and projects memories of who she was, rather than the other way around, once Alzheimer’s has set deep into her brain.

This is not to say that the grandma is losing her soul.  To this point, I have made no mention of the soul.  That is unrelated to my point of the fact that there is very little room for the separation of the mind and body if you look at the devastating causal relationship between physical damage and personality changes.

Brie’s main point is that she can conceive of pain and that it must be immaterial. But, there is no account for the fact that she is conceiving of the pain within the limitations of her own physical construct.  If she had dementia, it is possible that you could ask her to conceive of the pain she felt when she gave birth to her eldest child.  She could essentially be unable to conceive of this or any pain-memory due to the brain damage.  There is just not a good enough case for the disembodiment argument to make me change my mind, or perhaps I couldn’t even if I wanted to… “thought-pun” intended.

 

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AmorphousBlob

Daaaaaang... I could never write something like that. Great job man (I call pretty much everyone man. Sorry if you're not a man)

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Hello! Nice work! I’m just trying to provide a complementary view here = )

 

Disclaimer: Am not a neuroscientist. However, I have an interest in the brain and the scientific method. And, honestly, much of philosophy scares me.

 

It scares me because many philosophers, like Gertler, who was mentioned in your post, seem to be more interested in putting forth their version of the world than in understanding it. Now, a quick word about testable hypotheses and the scientific method.

 

The problem that humans have when trying to understand something, anything about the world, whether we’re watching chimpanzees in Africa, rates of divorce in Japan, cells in a Petri dish or analyzing mind-body dualism, is that we, as humans, are biased. My interpretation of an event might not be the same as your interpretation. So, how do we deal with this? We get data, ideally demonstrable and reproducible. Data that everyone can more or less agree on. And, if we have a hypothesis about that data, we test it. It is important to test our hypothesis by trying to prove it /wrong/. (fun explanation here https://www.ted.com/talks/ben_goldacre_battling_bad_science )

 

That may sound counterintuitive. If I have an idea, wouldn’t I want to prove it right? Well, not directly. Because if you design a hypothesis that is true no matter what you say or do (eg. Freudian psychoanalysis, where you might have a good or bad relationship with your parents but it’s related to sex either way), then…then you don’t find out very much about the world. Or at least, you find out something that may not be universally applicable.

 

Science can only deal with what’s physical. So perhaps the idea of mind-body dualism is outside its scope. Nevertheless, you can use the scientific method to investigate a lot of philosophical questions, like ‘Was Buddha right about non-attachment being good for you because attachment is the root of suffering’. So I think a scientific point of view might be valuable, still.

 

Now. Back to philosophy. I think philosophy still plays a very valuable role today. In particular, I like the role of philosophers of science, who often bridge the gap between scientific disciplines. But I guess I can’t help but draw a distinction between philosophy as a science, and philosophy as a way of exploring belief systems.

 

It’s fine to explore belief systems. You don’t need the scientific method. Often it might be interesting, valuable, essential even, to live as if some things were true even if we cannot directly prove them. Eg. ‘life is worth living’, ‘It’s important to be considerate of others even if they’re different’, 'My country is important to me' etc. However, I don’t think that belief, on its own, can provide absolute, objective truths.

 

….I mean, let’s go through the disembodiment argument… I’m pretty sure it’s longer than that, and that some of the things that I make fun of are unwarranted within the larger context. Still, this is how it appeared for me at first sight:

 

1.        I can conceive of experiencing this pain while disembodied.

By ‘disembodied’, you mean in the mind? When dreaming? Phantom limb pain after amputation? Seems reasonable to me either way.

 

2.       What is conceivable is possible.

I can conceive myself falling towards Pluto as a frozen chunk of human meat, and breaking apart like glass when I hit the soil. Doesn’t mean it’s possible.

 

3.      It’s possible that this pain exists in immaterial being.

Science doesn’t deal with that, can’t argue one way or another. Equally, I can argue that tacos might also exist in the immaterial plane! Pain and tacos. Yum!

 

4.      If this pain were a physical state or event, it couldn’t exist in immaterial being.

I can imagine a couch. Does that make couches not real?

 

 

...To be honest, I wasn’t originally planning to be so harsh. But then I saw that Gertler is not some last-century’s philosopher, but still practicing (I assume she’s the same person)… And yes, it’s frightening to me. Because how can you write stuff like that, ignoring hundreds and thousands of years of research… not on something fuzzy like consciousness, but on something as straightforward (in many instances) as pain? I find it lazy when people go ‘oh, I don’t understand this [and I’m not going to bother looking into research articles, textbooks or /Wikipedia/] so it must be some vague immaterial stuff’

 

…sorry.  I guess I’ve ranted so much about this xD I think it’s good that you wrote that! I guess I just got riled up a bit by the argument you refuted.

 

*needs to be better at picking her battles*

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