Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Iris Marion Young, Elizabeth, Princess of Bohemia and Willard Quine

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these philosophers

display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers


3 ideas

17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 8. Dualism of Mind Critique
A soul with physical extension is more likely than an immaterial soul that moves bodies [Elizabeth]
     Full Idea: I would find it easier to concede matter and extension to the soul than to concede that an immaterial thing could move and be moved by a body.
     From: Elizabeth, Princess of Bohemia (Letters to Descartes [1643], p.42), quoted by Matthew Cobb - The Idea of the Brain 2
     A reaction: Very nicely expressed! I'm trying to imagine a ghost which finds itself stuck with a physical body which it has to drag around like a reluctant dog. She is stating the classic interaction problem which plagues all mind-body dualism.
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 3. Eliminativism
Quine expresses the instrumental version of eliminativism [Quine, by Rey]
     Full Idea: Quine expresses the instrumental version of eliminativism.
     From: report of Willard Quine (Word and Object [1960]) by Georges Rey - Contemporary Philosophy of Mind Int.3
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 6. Conceptual Dualism
A hallucination can, like an ague, be identified with its host; the ontology is physical, the idiom mental [Quine]
     Full Idea: A physical ontology has a place for states of mind. An inspiration or a hallucination can, like the fit of ague, be identified with its host for the duration. It leaves our mentalistic idioms fairly intact, but reconciles them with a physical ontology.
     From: Willard Quine (The Scope and Language of Science [1954], §VI)
     A reaction: Quine is employing the same strategy that he uses for substances and properties (Idea 8461): take the predication as basic, rather than reifying the thing being predicated. The ague analogy suggests that Quine is an incipient functionalist.