Mind-Body Problem, Essay Example

Descartes’ logic for the distinction between the mind and the body can be traced to his crucial concept of extension. Extension distinguishes physical bodies, insofar as they are traced to a position in space. Thus, matter is extension as it occupies points in space: furthermore, matter can essentially be measured. Mind, in contrast, cannot be spatially located – mind appears to be more ephemeral and non-localizable. What results for Descartes is therefore a dualism between mind and body, as they are posited as two distinct types of entities. What is immediately problematic about Descartes’ account is that he relies on a certain intuitive argument: insofar as the mind feels like it is without substance, Descartes concludes that it is without extension. Such an intuitive position, however, does not offer any substantive proof. For example, Hobbes’ claim that mind may be a property of substance is excluded from Descartes’ account, because Descartes holds fast to his dualistic vision rooted in an intuitive approach.

Prince Elizabeth’s counter-argument to Descartes’ claim rests on an account of the relation of the mind and the body. What Elizabeth detects is an inconsistency in the argument as she questions how the mind can influence the movements of the body if the mind is not conferred the property of extension. In other words, Elizabeth relies on an account of motion in which the very possibility of motion itself dictates that that there must be a causal connection between extended substances. Motion is therefore the result of the relationship between two substances in space, essentially between two types of the same entity. While Elizabeth presents a forceful argument to Descartes’ claim, Elizabeth is relying on a specific account of causality and movement. If other possible accounts of causality and motion not related to substances that have extension is possible, then her argument is necessarily weakened.

Hume, in contrast, does not believe that a unity between substance and thought is possible, because this runs counter to his problem of induction. Hume therefore takes the epistemological gap at the heart of induction – that there is no proof that we can know that phenomenon shall continue to be as they are – and ontologizes it, making this a property of reality itself. Accordingly, when thinking about something like the mind or the body, there is only a retroactive chain of consistency, however, one that does not possess any metaphysical necessity.

All of the above thinkers provide radical accounts of the mind-body problem. However, one of the consistent difficulties with this problem is the equivocation of the epistemological problem and the ontological problem. That is, mind as the seat of reflection is immediately taken as some different type of ontological phenomenon. This results in a certain anthropocentrism that overlooks the possibility that mind is not a special phenomenon within the universe. In this regard, current scientific research suggests that we should move towards a de-mystification of such positions, and think in a similar fashion to both Hobbes and Princess Elizabeth: mind is essentially a material substance, and as consequence, the human being is not an exception in the world, but is one substance within the world.