Living Things Have Souls, Essay Example

Cartesian reason concerning the trans-physical nature of the soul, which is essentially inspired by Descartes, presents the argument for the soul in the assumption that there is a separation between mind and body that underlies the essential nature of the world itself.  Due to the idea that material existence will decay over time while incorporeal material lasts forever, this idea presents the soul as something that must be a fundamental aspect of existence.  This is based in the assumption that there is, in fact, a dual nature of reality that is split between mind and body.

The Cartesian argument for the existence of the soul states, first of all, that thought itself is a personal, or private, aspect of a person’s reality.  While this is true of the mental realm, there can be no physical reality that is completely personal in this same way.  Thus, if there are is no material aspect to thought then, at the very least, humanity possesses at least this one non-material aspect to their existence.  Furthermore, the soul is a non-physical, immaterial, notion.“Thus because we have no conception of the body as thinking in any way, we have reason to believe that every kind of thought which exists in us belongs to the soul” (Gentile 8)  The ideas of thought and the soul are connected in some fundamental way.  If this is true, then the soul must exist, as this immaterial aspect of people’s existence would not decay in the way that material bodies do.  Therefore, humans do, in fact, have souls.

The ideas of immortality and the soul represent an understanding of the possibility that a person’s existence might, in some way, continue after they die.  While the idea of immortality can often represent simply this continuation, the idea of the soul is somewhat different.  While a person who was immortal might live forever in this world, the soul is seen as something that transcends this world.  In this sense, the advances of science could allow for a state of immortality, but would be difficult in discerning the idea of the soul and whether or not it exists.

Thus, the idea of the soul is directly related to the issues of immortality.  While the soul would allow a person to live beyond the realm of the material world, immortality would simply be the continuation of this same existence.  There has been a large amount of regard concerning the idea of immortality and the soul throughout various cultures in many different times and places.  These ideas have mainly focused on the issues of the continuation of the mortal body in some otherworldly sense, the continuation of the soul in and of itself, and the actual reestablishment of the physical body in a sense of rebirth after death.

Throughout a large part of philosophical history, thinkers have posited a dual understanding of the soul.  They argue that it is fundamentally separate from the physical body.  By basing their arguments on this dichotomy, philosophers have been able to establish that the aspects of mind and body are essentially separate.  This leads to the conclusion that human beings have a being that is separate from the physical world.  This is the basis for the argument that the soul is non-physical and, therefore, eternal.

It is not clear, in a universal sense, what a soul can actually be described as being.  Within the preeminent ideas of culture, it seems to represent a person’s actual identity, their thoughts, history, hopes, and understandings of the world.  In this sense, there is not a big difference between a person’s soul and their identity. “Descartes can be read as offering one kind of solution. On his view, the mind just is ‘the whole of the soul that thinks’; in other words, the relationship between mind and soul is one of identity.” (Pasnau 4)  The issue with this line of thought lies in its inability to account for the physical aspects of existence that work to create these essential functions of the human mind in order to create the sense of self that people often identify with.

The biggest issues that go along with the arguments put forth by Descartes involving the dual nature of existence, and therefore the existence of the soul, is that his philosophy is enamored in the medieval philosophical notions of being.  While he was able to use his reasoning abilities to overcome many philosophical and logical issues, he was able to entirely transcend a philosophy that wasn’t completely dependent upon the existence of God. “At this juncture, Descartes is only sure of the following: that he has mind; that whatever proposition he perceives clearly and distinctly to be true, must be true; that God exists; and that God cannot deceive him.” (Mohammed 99)  Here, it is evident that Descartes’ arguments are inherently dependent upon the notion that God, due his pure and true nature, would not allow mankind to be deceived.

The aspects of memory, cognition, and awareness that are often attributed to the continuation of the self in the sense of the soul are fundamentally dependent upon real world physical and biological functions such as brain activity and the connection of the nervous system.  If these systems are tampered with or altered, then there can also be essential changes to the way that people perceive the world.  Those who have been through drug or health problems often have an altered perspective due to damage that has been caused to the brain.

Scientific data points to the fact that these alterations occur throughout the medical community, and there has been a lot of documentation concerning the changes that take place in these situations.  Essentially the arguments against the idea of the soul come down to the fact that there is evidence that the mind is dependent upon the physical aspects of reality.  However, there is no evidence to the contrary.  There is no empirical information that points to the idea that the physical body is somehow dependent upon the mind.  This presents a less than credible basis for the notions that many non-theists have come to regarding the nonexistence of the soul.

The most fundamental problem with basing these decisions upon scientific observations is the issue of meaning.  While it is possible to create large frameworks of understanding concerning the physical world, our certainty of this information can never be absolute.Furthermore, the notion of the self is something that these individuals are not fully taking into account. While it seems evident that a large amount of complex processes could give rise to some type of awareness, the idea of self-awareness is difficult to grasp the reality of.

Science, despite all of the progress that it has made, has still failed to determine exactly where the idea of the self originates, or whether it is unique to humanity, or simply those with complex enough minds to comprehend it.  This could indicate that there is no physical manifestation of the notion of the self, and it, instead, stems from some deeper, more intrinsic understanding of the self that does not necessarily originate in the physical manifestation of matter.

Works Cited

Haldane, E.S. René Descartes:The Passions of the Soul. Gentile. 2008.

Akinola Mohammed, Akomolafe.A Critique of Descartes’ Mind-Body Dualism. Kritike. Vol. 6. No. 1. 2012.

Pasnau, Robert. The Mind Soul-Problem.Ashgatebundel. 2006.