Soul, mind and body

• What term would we use to describe Plato's approach to soul, mind and body?


  Dualism
• What gives us our identity according to Plato?


  Our soul
• What is Plato's view of the body and how does he describe it?


  It is decaying and material, a prison for the soul
• What is Plato's argument from affinity?


  The impermanence of the body means that there must be something permanent (the soul)
• What is the charioteer analogy?


  The soul is the charioteer who controls the horses (our desires) and the horses is our body
• What is Plato's argument from recollection/knowledge?


  Our soul comes from the World of the Forms where it remembers the forms, which explains why we recognise universal concepts (anamnesis)
• What is Plato's argument from linguistics?


  We speak about our mind and our body differently: 'I have a body' vs 'I am happy', so we are not our bodies
• What is Plato's argument from opposites?


  Everything comes from its opposite e.g. death comes from life
• Give two challenges to Plato's argument of body and soul.


  Peter Geach: seeing is a physical process, so how did the soul 'see' the forms?

  Not everything has an opposite e.g. colours
• Aristotle was an...


  Empiricist
• How did Aristotle's view of the soul differ from Plato's?


  Aristotle believed that the soul dies with the body, while Plato believed it could live on after death
• What was the soul for Aristotle? How did he link body and soul to the four causes?


  The life-giving force of the body, the body is the material cause and the soul is the formal cause
• How did the wax seal illustrate Aristotle's view of the body?


  The matter (wax) and the form (seal) cannot function without one another
• Why did Aristotle liken the soul to skills?


  Skills cannot function without the person like the soul cannot function without the body
• What were the three faculties (abilities) of the soul?


  Vegetative, appetitive and rational abilities
• What term did Aristotle use to describe reason or the intellect?


  Nous
• How did Aristotle contradict his theory?


  He said that the nous could survive the death of the body, despite there being no evidence for this
• Give a strength and a weakness of Aristotle's theory.


  Aristotle's view appeals to scientists because it is rooted in empiricism

  Despite being an empiricist, he has no proof that the nous can survive death
• What term would we use to describe Descartes' approach to mind and body?


  Substance dualism
• What was Descartes' argument from doubt and what famous phrase did this lead to?


  We can doubt all things except from the fact that we are thinking, this lead to the famous phrase 'I think therefore I am'
• What was Descartes' argument from clear and distinct ideas?


  If it is possible to clearly and distinctly perceive the mind and the body as distinct, then they must be distinct
• What was Descartes' argument from divisibility?


  The body can be divided into parts, while the mind cannot, so they must be different substances
• All three of these arguments rest on an assumption made by Leibniz. What was this assumption?


  If there is one aspect in which things differ, then logically they must be different
• Descartes tried to solve the issue of how a non-physical mind can interact with a physical bond by suggesting that there was a point of contact between the two. What was this point of contact?


  Pineal gland
• Give a strength of Descartes' theory.


  It makes sense that the mind and the body are separate substances due to the argument of divisibility
• What did Ryle mean by a category error?


  Incorrectly categorising something by thinking there is something extra to everything else we have seen
• How does Descartes make a category error? Use one of Ryle's examples to explain this.


  Descartes tried to categorise events as either mental OR physical, assuming that they cannot be both. This is like touring all the facilities of Oxford university and then asking where the university is
• What phrase did Ryle use to argue against the idea that there is a separate immaterial mind?


  Ghost in the machine
• For Ryle, body and mind are not separate but a description of...


  The whole person and what it means to be a conscious, thinking being
• What is materialism?


  The view that the only substance is matter
• Name two materialists.


  Dennett and Dawkins
• What does identity theory say?


  That all mental activity is centred in the brain, this is proven by the fact that drugs can alter our personality
• Give one strength of materialism.


  Dennett, Dawkins and Blackmore convincingly argue that consciousness is just processes and responses in the brain
• Give one weakness of materialism.


  Even if thoughts can be tracked to processes in the brain, it doesn't explain the intentions behind our actions