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Single Idea 3613
[filed under theme 17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 1. Dualism
]
Full Idea
Whereas reason is a universal instrument which can serve on any kind of occasion, the organs of a machine need a disposition for each action; so it is impossible to have enough different organs in a machine to respond to all the occurrences of life.
Gist of Idea
Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs
Source
René Descartes (A Discourse on Method [1637], §5.57)
Book Ref
Descartes,René: 'Discourse on Method/The Meditations', ed/tr. Sutcliffe,F.E. [Penguin 1968], p.74
A Reaction
How can Descartes know that reason is 'universal' rather than just 'very extensive'? Is there any information which cannot be encoded in a computer? It doesn't feel as if there any intrinsic restrictions to reason, but note Idea 4688.
Related Idea
Idea 4688
We imagine small and large objects scaled to the same size, suggesting a fixed capacity for imagination [Lavers]
The
22 ideas
with the same theme
[mind and matter are two quite different substances]:
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3519
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Man uses his body, so must be separate from it
[Anon (Plat), by Maslin]
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1710
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Emotion involves the body, thinking uses the mind, imagination hovers between them
[Aristotle]
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13307
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If everything can be measured, try measuring the size of a man's soul
[Seneca]
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21809
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Our soul has the same ideal nature as the oldest god, and is honourable above the body
[Plotinus]
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21825
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The soul is outside of all of space, and has no connection to the bodily order
[Plotinus]
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18458
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The soul is bound to matter by the force of its own disposition
[Porphyry]
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22105
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The human intellectual soul is an incorporeal, subsistent principle
[Aquinas]
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24028
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The force by which we know things is spiritual, and quite distinct from the body
[Descartes]
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3608
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I can deny my body and the world, but not my own existence
[Descartes]
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3613
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Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs
[Descartes]
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2276
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The mind is a non-extended thing which thinks
[Descartes]
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2298
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Mind is not extended, unlike the body
[Descartes]
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3423
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Descartes is a substance AND property dualist
[Descartes, by Kim]
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2303
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The mind is utterly indivisible
[Descartes]
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5011
|
There are two ultimate classes of existence: thinking substance and extended substance
[Descartes]
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19409
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Soul represents body, but soul remains unchanged, while body continuously changes
[Leibniz]
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5585
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Soul and body connect physically, or by harmony, or by assistance
[Kant]
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22039
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Geist is distinct from nature, not as a substance, but because of its normativity
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
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14802
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Physical and psychical laws of mind are either independent, or derived in one or other direction
[Peirce]
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2620
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Dualism is a category mistake
[Ryle]
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4069
|
Descartes did not think of minds as made of a substance, because they are not divisible
[Crane]
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8289
|
The idea that Cartesian souls are made of some ghostly 'immaterial' stuff is quite unwarranted
[Lowe]
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