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A conversation between mind and body
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1. Consciousness is the fundamental fact of human existence, from the view point of persons examining their own experience. There are various aspects of consciouness, such as perception, mental imagery, thinking, memory and emotions. I believe that consiouness is a property of some lower animals and machines. An ant for an example has a conscious mind about staying in covered areas during the rain and to panic when something attacks it. This shows memory, perception and thinking which shows that it does have a conscious. Some machines have something similar to a conscious. A computer for example has a hard drive which is a lot like a “memory”, in which it stores something, and it has ram, which is basically information stored and ready to be used. If I were to open a web page browser and than open up a word document, I could instantly jump back to the browser because its stored on my hard drive, but loaded on my ram, which is a lot like how if we think about an old memory, such as grade school, and than wash our hands, the memory of grade school is still fresh in our mind, and we can go back and instantly load it up with less difficulty than the first time.
2. The mind-body problem asks what is the relationship between the mind(conscious) and the body( brain). The two major positions are dualism and materialism.
-Dualism holds that mind and body are made of different substances: the body is material but the mind is some immaterial soul stuff, and the mind interacts with the body to control human behavior. Out of body and near death experiences have also been offered in support of dualism, but alternative, naturalistic explanations of these experiences are available.
-Materialism is the view that mind and body are inseparable: mental events are produced by brain events. There are 4 types:
-Epiphhenomenalism is the view that conscious is a side effect of brain activity but it has no role in controlling behavior.
-Identity theory says that mental events are identical brain event. For each mental event, there is a corresponding brain event.
- Emergent interactionism- is the hypothesis that consciousness is an emergent phenomenon: it is produced by brain processes, but it has holistic properties of its own and it exerts downward control on brain processes.
-Functionalism is the view that the functional characteristics of mental processes is their critical feature, and it doesn’t make any difference whether the physical substrate is a brain or a computer.
Chapter 4 discusses the several states of consciousness: the nature of consciousness, sleep and dreams, psychoactive drugs, hypnosis, and meditation. Consciousness is a crucial part of human experience, it represents that private inner mind where we think, feel, plan, wish, pray, omagine, and quietly relive experiences. William James described the mind as a stream of consciousness, a continuous flow of changing sensations, images thoughts, and feelings. Consciousness has two major parts: awareness and arousal. Awareness includes the awareness of the self and thoughts about one's experiences. Arousal is the physiological state of being engaged with the environment. Theory of mind refers to individuals understanding that they and others think,
Despite having contrary qualities and fundamentally opposing natures, the mind and body are intertwined and interact with one another. Interactive dualism hold the idea that the mind is eternal and has the ability to exist apart from the body. Descartes holds the idea that if the physical realm in which the body material body exists ceased to exist, the mind would still be. However, if a circumstance arose which annihilated his ability to think, he would cease to exist. Interactive dualism explores the idea that the body is simply an extension of the forms of the individual in the physical world, that the demise of the material body does not render its fundamental nature to be obsolete. Interactive dualism can seem to diminish the importance of the material body, but it does not. Descartes states that the mind and body are united and interact so closely that it seems to create one whole. This unity is expressed by when the physical body experiences pain. If the mind simply related to the body in the manner a sailor relates to a ship, the mind would simply perceive pain through
Rosenthal D 2002, 'Explaining Consciousness', in Philosophy of mind classical and contemporary readings,Chalmers D J (eds), Oxford University press, New York
Fodor develops the idea of functionalism by combining certain parts of logical behaviorism and the central-state identity theory. From logical behaviorism, Fodor incorporates the idea that mental processes can be represented by physical if-then statements. As such, behavior and mental causation are no longer distinct and unable to interact. Also, logical behaviorism provides a way for mental causes to interact with other mental causes. This, in turn, may result in a behavioral effect. The last point is also a characteristic of the central-state identity theory. One doctrine of the central-state identity theory is called "token physicalism." Token physicalism states that all mental states that currently exist are neurophysiological. Thus, token physicalism does not place physical restrictions on the type of substance capable of having mental properties. When the points of logical behaviorism and the central-state identity theory, as described here, are combined, functionalism is the result. The theory of functionalism supposes that a m...
. There are two kinds of dualism. One is Substance dualism which holds that the mind or soul is a separate, non-physical entity, but there is also property dualism, according to which there is no soul distinct from the body, but only one thing, the person, that has two irreducibly different types of properties, mental and physical. Substance dualism leaves room for the possibility that the soul might be able to exist apart from the body, either before birth or after death; property dualism does not. A substance dualism is something with "an independent existence". It can exist on its own. This holds that each distinct non-physical entity mind composed a different kind of substance to material objects. Substance dualist believed only spiritual substances can have mental properties. It is “soul” along with certain memory and psychological continuities that constitutes the survival of the person. Physical properties of property dualism are properties like having a certain weight, conducting electricity and mental properties are properties like believing that 1+1=2, being in love, feeling pain, and etc. Property dualism allows for the compatibility of mental and physical causation, since the cause of an action might under one aspect is describable as a physical event in the brain and under another aspect as a desire, emotion, or thought; substance dualism usually requires causal interaction between the soul and the body. Dualistic theories at least acknowledge the serious difficulty of locating consciousness in a modern scientific conception of the physical world, but they really give metaphysical expression to the problem rather than solving it.
The debate as to the true nature of human beings, the existence of free will and the validity of science is centered on two philosophical theories; dualism and materialism. Under dualism, the proponents believe that there are two kinds of matter that make up human beings which is the physical presence and the non-physical mind or soul . Materialism on the one hand proposes that man and matter is one and the same thing and there cannot be in existence any other non-physical entity therefore . Materialism is one of the major theories that greatly oppose dualism.
René Descartes laid the foundations for Cartesian Dualism within his Meditations on First Philosophy. Descartes provides most of his dualist view within the second and sixth meditations. Dualism is the belief, or school, within philosophy of mind that the mind and body are separate. Cartesian Dualism, specifically, is essentially substance dualism, which argues that the mind and body are of separate substances, in Descartes’ case, the mind being spiritual and the body being physical. This viewpoint was a common one during Hobbe...
Some of these problems question the concept of mind and consciousness, as well as the methods used for studying consciousness, what factors influence the stream of consciousness, or the relationship between conscious and non-conscious, and the processes associated with each. Other questions may include- what is the relationship between consciousness, and the brain, or between consciousness and behavior? Or the role it plays in the human mind/brain system. Among the most distinctive topics of the psychology of consciousness are the “altered states” of consciousness. Altered states of consciousness are temporary, reversible conditions in which one’s pattern of subjective experience, and sometimes the ability to control one’s own behavior, appear to be different than in one’s normal waking
Having retained dominance during its initial existence, the mind-body theory now subsists as multiple derivatives of its original foundation due to constant abuse by religious, cultural, and scientific ideology over time. Due to the possible existence of occurrences unperceivable to man, unscientific theory is met with insubstantial logical support. With vague traces throughout the time span of Hinduism, the mind-body problem emerges most active during the Cartesian era of Descartes. A solution to the mind-body problem is most problematic due to the rigid dichotomy of ideologies: Most notable is dualism in which the body and mind are separate entities, and monism in which body-mind is singular.
idealism is the group of philosophies which assert the reality, basically mental, mentally constructed, or irrelevant. Base on the study, idealism display or show as a skepticism about the possibility of knowing any mind-independent thing. In a sociological sense, idealism focus on how human ideas, beliefs and values in the society. Idealism goes further, asserting that all creature are composed in mind or spirit.
Much of the material that relates to the field of Artificial Intelligence deals with human psychology and the nature of consciousness. Exhaustive debate on consciousness and the possibilities of consciousnessness in machines has adequately, in my opinion, revealed that it is most unlikely that we will ever converse or interract with a machine of artificial consciousness.
Philosophers have always argued about the mind. Some say it is a whole separate part of us that continues to live after we die, others say there is no mind, it is just God who guides us and makes our choices for us. There is a third group, materialism, that agrees that we don’t have an immaterial “mind”, but rather than saying it is God who decides everything for us, this group believes that the brain controls all of our decisions and actions. Materialism goes further than the philosophy of the mind. Materialism, also known as physicalism, is the idea that everything in the universe depends on physical processes (Smart, 2014). When it comes to theories of the mind,
“Consciousness is defined as everything of which we are aware at any given time - our thoughts, feelings, sensations, and perceptions of the external environment. Physiological researchers have returned to the study of consciousness, in examining physiological rhythms, sleep, and altered states of consciousness (changes in awareness produced by sleep, meditation, hypnosis, and drugs)” (Wood, 2011, 169). There are five levels of consciousness; Conscious (sensing, perceiving, and choosing), Preconscious (memories that we can access), Unconscious ( memories that we can not access), Non-conscious ( bodily functions without sensation), and Subconscious ( “inner child,” self image formed in early childhood).
But, “human persons have an ‘inner’ dimension that is just as important as the ‘outer’ embodiment” (Cortez, 71). The “inner” element cannot be wholly explained by the “outer” embodiment, but it does give rise to inimitable facets of the human life, such as human dignity and personal identity. The mind-body problem entails two theories, dualism and physicalism. Dualism contends that distinct mental and physical realms exist, and they both must be taken into account. Its counterpart (weak) physicalism views the human as being completely bodily and physical, encompassing no non-physical, or spiritual, substances.
Materialism has many meaning but in philosophy it does not mean that is a person that has many things and that only cares about the material things. In the philosophical world this has a more deep meaning to it. In philosophy this is one of the four theories of the nature of reality and substance. And the theory is that physical matter is the only reality and that all the things like feelings, mind and will can be explained as physical matter. This is basically the believe that everything known to men in this world is physical matter that all the things in imaginations do not exist because they have no physical property’s.