more from this thinker
|
more from this text
Single Idea 3616
[filed under theme 17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 2. Interactionism
]
Full Idea
It is not sufficient that the reasonable soul should be lodged in the body like a pilot in a ship, unless perhaps to move its limbs, but it needs to be united more closely with the body in order to have sensations and appetites, and so be a true man.
Gist of Idea
The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations
Source
René Descartes (A Discourse on Method [1637], §5.59)
Book Ref
Descartes,René: 'Discourse on Method/The Meditations', ed/tr. Sutcliffe,F.E. [Penguin 1968], p.76
A Reaction
The idea that the pineal gland is the link suggests that Descartes has the 'pilot' view, but this idea shows that he believes in very close and complex interaction between mind and body. But how can a mind 'have' appetites if it has no physical needs?
Related Idea
Idea 24039
All the emotions seem to involve the body, simultaneously with the feeling [Aristotle]
The
18 ideas
with the same theme
[mind and matter mutually affect one another]:
|
24039
|
All the emotions seem to involve the body, simultaneously with the feeling
[Aristotle]
|
|
24056
|
The soul (or parts of it) is not separable from the body
[Aristotle]
|
|
5695
|
Only bodies can touch one another
[Lucretius]
|
|
6683
|
The contact of spirit and body is utterly amazing, and incomprehensible
[Augustine]
|
|
3400
|
Things must have parts to intermingle
[Gassendi]
|
|
3616
|
The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations
[Descartes]
|
|
6153
|
Interaction between mental and physical seems to violate the principle of conservation of energy
[Rowlands on Descartes]
|
|
3654
|
The pineal gland links soul to body, and unites the two symmetrical sides of the body
[Descartes, by PG]
|
|
6553
|
Descartes discussed the interaction problem, and compared it with gravity
[Descartes, by Lycan]
|
|
3469
|
Mind and brain don't interact if they are the same
[Searle]
|
|
3409
|
Mental substance causation makes physics incomplete
[Kim]
|
|
2446
|
Cartesians consider interaction to be a miracle
[Fodor]
|
|
2445
|
Semantics v syntax is the interaction problem all over again
[Fodor]
|
|
9293
|
Body-spirit interaction ought to result in losses and increases of energy in the material world
[Teichmann]
|
|
3911
|
The very concept of a substance denies the possibility of mutual interaction and dependence
[Scruton]
|
|
2409
|
Maybe dualist interaction is possible at the quantum level?
[Chalmers]
|
|
2411
|
Supervenience makes interaction laws possible
[Chalmers]
|
|
4590
|
If causation is just regularities in events, the interaction of mind and body is not a special problem
[Heil]
|