A Seldom Considered Argument for Dualism

[Kenny]

And body-minus is not a successor to body, it is what remains of body, thus it is defined as "body"-"minus," i.e. "body," the same "body," minus its pinky.

‘Body-minus’ is not a “definition” of anything; it’s just a proper name of a material object, a different material object than Body. Instead of the names ‘Body’ and ‘Body-minus’, I could just have well as used ‘Harry’ and ‘George’.

In order to define an object as successor to another, it would need be a whole new object, not the remains of one and the same object, and if the remains of one and the same object continue to survive the loss of a part then P2 is an unfounded assertion.

Again, P2 is established by the Body-minus argument if in fact the Body-minus argument is sound. Please, for the last time, tell me which premise(s) of the Body-minus argument that you deny.

[JimL]

‘Body-minus’ is not a “definition” of anything; it’s just a proper name of a material object, a different material object than Body. Instead of the names ‘Body’ and ‘Body-minus’, I could just have well as used ‘Harry’ and ‘George’.

Right, and George is not a successor to Harry, George is just a change of name which you've given to pinkyless Harry.

Again, P2 is established by the Body-minus argument if in fact the Body-minus argument is sound. Please, for the last time, tell me which premise(s) of the Body-minus argument that you deny.

I disagree, you can't compare inanimate matter with animate matter as neither can be said to "strictly survive" the loss of a part, but only the latter form can be said to truly survive or not survive. What remains of a material object after the loss of a part is the same as it was before losing the part, there has been no change in that which remains, so what remains, whether animate or inanimate, continues to exist, but only the animate can be defined as surviving or not surviving. Body-minus is not a successor to body, body-minus is just body, the same body, without its pinky, and it continues to exist, and if it is a human person, it continues to survive also.

[Kenny]

Right, and George is not a successor to Harry, George is just a change of name which you've given to pinkyless Harry.



I disagree, you can't compare inanimate matter with animate matter as neither can be said to "strictly survive" the loss of a part, but only the latter form can be said to truly survive or not survive. What remains of a material object after the loss of a part is the same as it was before losing the part, there has been no change in that which remains, so what remains, whether animate or inanimate, continues to exist, but only the animate can be defined as surviving or not surviving. Body-minus is not a successor to body, body-minus is just body, the same body, without its pinky, and it continues to exist, and if it is a human person, it continues to survive also.

Again, you aren't actually engaging with the argument. You're simply ignoring how I've actually defined my terms and simply denying the conclusion of the body-minus argument without challenging any of its premises. There's no point in continuing. Goodbye.

[JimL]

Again, you aren't actually engaging with the argument. You're simply ignoring how I've actually defined my terms and simply denying the conclusion of the body-minus argument without challenging any of its premises. There's no point in continuing. Goodbye.

How you define your terms has everything to do with your argument. Human persons, that is consciousness, or life, are not material objects per se, nor are they immaterial objects, they are emergent properties of matter, they supervene on matter, and have no existence without matter, so without recognizing the differing nature of material objects and the properties that emerge from them, dependent upon their structure, your argument is moot.

[Kenny]

JimL,
Now you’ve raised a different issue, one that I do think is worth commenting on.

How you define your terms has everything to do with your argument.

No. It only has to do with how I state my argument.

Human persons, that is consciousness, or life, are not material objects per se, nor are they immaterial objects, they are emergent properties of matter

It looks now like you are conceding the conclusion of the main argument in the OP but denying that it entails substance dualism. One way to do that is to maintain that human persons are not, in fact, material objects, but that they are not substances.

You suggest that human persons are not substances, but properties. But surely, whatever human persons are, they are not those. Properties, if such there be, are abstract objects. Abstract objects lack causal powers. But human persons have causal powers. We can act in the world; properties cannot.

they supervene on matter, and have no existence without matter

That may or may not be so (I think it’s not so; but I agree that nothing in the argument in the OP establishes that it is not so). Nevertheless, this is all compatible with the claim that human persons are immaterial substances.

[JimL]

JimL,
Now you’ve raised a different issue, one that I do think is worth commenting on.



No. It only has to do with how I state my argument.



It looks now like you are conceding the conclusion of the main argument in the OP but denying that it entails substance dualism. One way to do that is to maintain that human persons are not, in fact, material objects, but that they are not substances.

You suggest that human persons are not substances, but properties. But surely, whatever human persons are, they are not those. Properties, if such there be, are abstract objects. Abstract objects lack causal powers. But human persons have causal powers. We can act in the world; properties cannot.



That may or may not be so (I think it’s not so; but I agree that nothing in the argument in the OP establishes that it is not so). Nevertheless, this is all compatible with the claim that human persons are immaterial substances.

Well, to this I would only say that properties, not being things in themselves, could not for that reason be defined as immaterial substances. Consciousness, the manifestation of human persons, as manifested through matter, do not because of that manifestation become substances unto themselves, which exist distinct from matter. Consciousness is a property of matter, that becomes manifest through certain arrangments of matter, but not all material forms are arranged in a way that brings about in it the property of consciousness. Human persons are material objects which are conscious, because their material bodies are arranged in such a way that manifests in those bodies the property consciousness, a rock on the other hand, is not a conscious material object, not because some distinct immaterial substance known as consciousness doesn't inhabit it, but it is not conscious because as a material object it is not arranged in a way in which consciousness can come about. This of course is only my opinion, but I don't think that your argument takes these distinctions about the nature of matter into consideration.

[Kenny]

Well, to this I would only say that properties, not being things in themselves, could not for that reason be defined as immaterial substances.

I agree that if there are properties, they are not substances.

Consciousness, the manifestation of human persons, as manifested through matter, do not because of that manifestation become substances unto themselves

I don’t know what it means to say that consciousness is a “manifestation of human persons”, but I agree that if ‘consciousness’ refers to anything (I suppose, if it refers to anything, it refers to the property of being conscious), it does not refer to a substance.

Consciousness is a property of matter

Human persons are conscious. That much is (or at least should be) uncontroversial. Furthermore, if the argument in the OP is sound, human persons are not material things. So if the argument in the OP is sound, there are non-material things that have the property of being conscious.

Human persons are material objects which are conscious

Now you’re back to simply denying the conclusion of the argument in the OP without engaging with any of the premises. I’m not going down that particular rabbit hole again.

[shunyadragon]

Now you’re back to simply denying the conclusion of the argument in the OP without engaging with any of the premises. I’m not going down that particular rabbit hole again.

I believe what is being rejected is '(P2) No material object can strictly survive the loss of some of its parts.'

[Kenny]

I believe what is being rejected is '(P2) No material object can strictly survive the loss of some of its parts.'

But I gave an argument for P2 – namely, the body-minus argument. P2 is false only if the body-minus argument is unsound. Since the body-minus argument is demonstrably valid, the body-minus argument is unsound only if one of its premises is false. Therefore, to consistently reject P2, one must reject one or more of the premises of the body-minus argument.

[shunyadragon]

But I gave an argument for P2 – namely, the body-minus argument. P2 is false only if the body-minus argument is unsound. Since the body-minus argument is demonstrably valid, the body-minus argument is unsound only if one of its premises is false. Therefore, to consistently reject P2, one must reject one or more of the premises of the body-minus argument.

P2, to my mind, is the premise that materialists about human persons should reject. But there is a powerful argument for the truth of P2. Here it goes:

Consider your body. Name it “Body”. Consider the part of Body that consists of all of Body except your left pinky. Call that part “Body-minus”. At time t0, let’s say, Body is intact; it includes your left pinky as a part. Suppose that at t1, however, your left pinky is annihilated. Call the pinkyless, human-body-shaped, material object that remains in your vicinity after this unfortunate event “Deformed”. Note that the following argument appears to be sound:

(1) At t1, Body-minus still exists (because nothing happened to Body-minus except that something external to it was detached from it).

(2) At t1, if Body still exists, Body is identical to Deformed [What else could Body be at that time?].

(3) At t1, if Body-minus still exists, Body-minus is identical to Deformed [What else could Body-minus be then?].

(4) At t1, Body-minus is identical to Deformed [This follows from 1 and 3].

(5) At t1, if Body still exists, Body is identical to Body-minus [This follows from 2, 4 and the fact that identity is an equivalence relation].

(6) At t1, it is not the case that Body is identical to Body-minus [Note, for example, that at t1 if Body and Body-minus both exist, they have different historical properties – Body-minus used to be a proper part of Body, for example, but Body was never a proper part of Body].

(7) Therefore, at t1 it is not the case that Body still exists [5,6].

Of course, a parallel argument could be given with respect to any material body that is said to have survived the loss of a part. So, if the above argument is sound, P2 is true. I think that the above argument is sound.

Well, there it is, an argument for the conclusion that human persons are not material objects. I take it that if human persons are not material objects, substance dualism is true (someone may want to challenge that presumption – if so, go right ahead, and I’ll respond) and I take the argument offered for that conclusion above to be sound. I conclude, therefore, that dualism is true.

I do not consider this either sound nor does it address the issue of whether dualism is true or not.

First, simply I do not think it addresses the concept whether the mind exists as a part of the mind or separate from it.

P2 No material object can strictly survive the loss of some of its parts.' states that the object cannot survive, but your argument describes that with missing parts the object is deformed, ok, but to me this may be considered in some way obvious for all defined physical objects, but it says nothing to the effect that the object cannot 'strictly survive.'

The physicalist or materialist in the various forms does not consider consciousness as in any way a distinct nor separate as a part of the body that can be separated from the living human or for that matter the brain. Yes, if the brain is separated from the body, strictly speaking the body cannot survive from the physicalist perspective, whether it is believed the mind=brain (Rosenberg) or the mind is superimposed on the brain, and strictly dependent on the brain to exist. Both views believe that if the brain dies consciousness no longer exists.

The theist proposes if the soul is separated from the body, the body cannot strictly survive, but this would only hold from the theist and dualist perspective.

[Kenny]

I do not consider this either sound nor does it address the issue of whether dualism is true or not.

First, simply I do not think it addresses the concept whether the mind exists as a part of the mind or separate from it.

P2 No material object can strictly survive the loss of some of its parts.' states that the object cannot survive, but your argument describes that with missing parts the object is deformed, ok, but to me this may be considered in some way obvious for all defined physical objects, but it says nothing to the effect that the object cannot 'strictly survive.'

The physicalist or materialist in the various forms does not consider consciousness as in any way a distinct nor separate as a part of the body that can be separated from the living human or for that matter the brain. Yes, if the brain is separated from the body, strictly speaking the body cannot survive from the physicalist perspective, whether it is believed the mind=brain (Rosenberg) or the mind is superimposed on the brain, and strictly dependent on the brain to exist. Both views believe that if the brain dies consciousness no longer exists.

The theist proposes if the soul is separated from the body, the body cannot strictly survive, but this would only hold from the theist and dualist perspective.

You didn't engage with the actual argument either.

[shunyadragon]

You didn't engage with the actual argument either.

You presented a slippery thing than, that you need to be explained better, because it does not make sense to me or for that matter anyone else responding to the thread..

[Kenny]

You presented a slippery thing than, that you need to be explained better, because it does not make sense to me or for that matter anyone else responding to the thread..

It obviously did make sense to a number of the posters in this thread (even to some of those who did not agree with its conclusion).

[shunyadragon]

It obviously did make sense to a number of the posters in this thread (even to some of those who did not agree with its conclusion).

To understand the thread, would mean that they could present their objections to the conclusions, so far you have not acknowledged anyone who disagreed as being able to engage the argument. Who are the 'number of posters' who have successfully engaged and offered objections to your 'body minus' argument?

[Kenny]

To understand the thread, would mean that they could present their objections to the conclusions, so far you have not acknowledged anyone who disagreed as being able to engage the argument. Who are the 'number of posters' who have successfully engaged and offered objections to your 'body minus' argument?

Among those who disagreed with the conclusion, ENeGMA and Von Smith clearly understood and engaged with the argument. Other posters (like Nightbringer) raised some interesting issues pertaining to the argument, clearly demonstrating that they understood it. In fact, I’d say that everyone who participated except for three individuals appeared to understand the argument.