Why should a person prefer hylomorphic dualism to competing positions in the philosophy of mind?

[Richca]

I’m no expert but my understanding is that Aristotle believes we cannot go beyond our experience in making sense of the world, and so we cannot make sense of Plato’s separate world of forms. Therefore I think objective

 

[inocente]

I think that would be an interesting question to ask, but it is not necessary to know if other people do the same thing every time they claim to be performing addition in order to understand the point that I am trying to make. The only thing necessary to understand is that when you, inocente, calculate 3+5 are you, inocente, really doing the same thing as when you calculate 5+6? I would think the answer would have to be yes otherwise you could not claim to be doing addition in both cases. If you are not really doing the same thing each time, then why do you think that you are?

I don’t believe I am. An obscure philosophy paper being discussed on another thread makes what may be a similar claim to yours, my take on it is here.

But the bottom line is that whatever our intuitions and arguments, we can’t know without empirical evidence.

Interesting, I think we are actually closer in our views than we think. The only possible point of disagreement in your analysis that I can see is whether we agree on what I am calling “reductionism.” For instance, can the biological level be completely explained without remainder in terms of physics? Many people say yes, but would say that biology is still a meaningful science because it is useful shorthand, because it would be far too complicated for anyone’s understanding to represent a biological system in terms of physical entities alone. So it is only an “in practice” limit and not an “in theory” limit. I would disagree with that claim and say that biology gives you real knowledge that could never be had at the physical level alone, even though it cannot exist without the physical elements. That is the view I am trying to apply to the mind/brain distinction.

Agreed. Now suppose we divide it into two propositions: (1) Even if we had a complete knowledge of physics, there are biological (plus psychological, geological, etc.) phenomena which we could never predict, and so other sciences cannot be subsumed by physics. (2) There is but one world, and so all biological phenomena must ultimately be consistent with physics (although in practice the physics explanation may be far too long-winded to be useful or interesting).

I agree with both (1) and (2). Do you?

I think it can be assumed a priori because reality seems to be “top-down” rather than “bottom-up”, to use your previous analogy. The reason I say this is that any attempt to explain reality seems to presuppose that we have the intention to explain reality by our verbal utterances and physical actions. Otherwise it is not really an “explanation” of reality.

That seems to conflate reality with our attempts to explain it. But also it’s unclear to me why intention should be picked out rather than curiosity, which appears to have more fundamental drivers (e.g. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curiosity).

BTW, I am taking “intentionality” to mean what you described in your quote from MIT’s Philosophy of Science: An Encyclopedia, which I thought was what Peter meant by “inner tendencies.”

OK. Here’s a quotation from that article: “This – rather vaguely characterized – phenomenon of “aboutness” is called intentionality. Something that is about (directed on, represents) something else is said to “have intentionality””.

A rainbow is about sunlight on raindrops, sunlight directed on raindrops, yet I guess even the most avid scholastic wouldn’t say a rainbow has intentionality. That’s another reason why I suspect that the concept is artificial.

I think I have but have maybe done a poor job of explaining the point again . Yes, intentionality is part of the form because it is part of what is actual in the rational agent. How are you understanding form here?

There’s the form of the form with respect to time: how the form of the brain evolves from conception onwards, how activity itself changes the connections, There’s the moment by moment form of the electrical activity, and the form of each branch. There are the more abstract architectural forms, such as the form behind what it means to be in love, the systems diagram of how we learn to drive. The form behind the rather scary moment when, as an experienced driver, you arrive home from work and realize you did the whole journey on autopilot, not even knowing which route you took.

There are lots of simultaneous forms needed to explain the mind. Does hylomorphism’s concept of form include them all? Someone with a split personality has only one personality conscious at a time. Does hylomorphism say she has a single form, or two forms, or that the form switches depending on which personality is in consciousness, or she has many more forms as well?

 

[inocente]

Aristotle agreed with Plato that forms or ideas have objective reality. However, he disagreed with Plato that forms or ideas have a seperate existence apart from the material things of this world, which material things according to Plato, participate in the forms. Aristotle placed the forms or ideas of Plato as a substantial component in the material things of this world. Thus, we have his doctrine of hylemorphism. The objectivity of the forms is not subtle at all; they are the formal cause of things, matter being the material cause. Plato, though, was not altogether wrong for separating the forms from things themselves (if we understand this correctly). St Augustine placed Plato’s separate world of ideas in the Divine Mind and the scholastic theologians followed Augustine here. The divine ideas are the exemplars or models according to which God created things. However, this does not do away with Aristotle’s hylemorphism. The forms of things are a created participation of the eternal divine ideas. For Aristotle, the main point here is that the forms of Plato are a substantial component of material substances and thus they have objective reality outside our minds, this is what the doctrine of hylemorphism means.

For Aristotle, the unmoved mover is a pure form, pure act. So, we can’t say that Aristotle did not hold that there was such a being and this being he held to be a divine being, that is, God. This is a part of his metaphysics.

Thanks. The clarity of your explanation indicates you have a deep understanding of these doctrines. They are completely separate from my religion, and not even mentioned when I took comparative religion. Buddha, Confucius, Isaiah, Paul yes. Hylomorphism not a peep .

 

[utunumsint]

Thanks. The clarity of your explanation indicates you have a deep understanding of these doctrines. They are completely separate from my religion, and not even mentioned when I took comparative religion. Buddha, Confucius, Isaiah, Paul yes. Hylomorphism not a peep .

I took a degree in Comparative Religions and Classical Studies. We talked a great deal about philosophy and metaphysics during my comparative religions classes. I think the main reason was because of the nature of my combined degree. But they also offered sociology of religion courses and psychology of religion courses. What I found fascinating was how many philosophical presuppositions were brought up during the psychology and sociology courses. Especially the psychology courses. For example, William James, Nietzsche, Kant, and also Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas. Sociology also has its philosophical presuppositions.

My favourite class was the thesis class where I focused on mystics. It was really interesting to see how deeply Thomistic were Saint John of the Cross and Saint Theresa of Avila. And also what insights from Augustine and Plato would creep in. Certainly they were the psychologists of their day.

Anyway, I suppose it is possible to do a degree in Comparative religions and never hear mention of Hylomorphic dualism, but I think that is an important bit of information that helps contextualize a lot of subsequent Catholic spirituality (at least). Also, you can’t deny that Luther was an Augustinian, and Wycliffe was a thoroughgoing Platonist. Regardless of what you think of Greek philosophy in general, it has had a substantial impact throughout the history of Western religion and also provides substantial points of dialogue between eastern and western religions.

God bless,
Ut

 

[balto]

An obscure philosophy paper being discussed on another thread makes what may be a similar claim to yours, my take on it is here

Actually Ross’ argument is what I had in mind while formulating my own. Here the relevant part of your quote from the other thread:

But mainly, I think it’s clearly implausible. In his example of NN, there’s no evidence that we can set up such programs in our minds, and that when I ask myself what is 1010 or 1616, it somehow goes to a CPU in my head. Actually, for 1010 I probably already remember the answer, but if not I may think “put a zero to the right of the first ten”. For 16*16, I happen to know the same trick works in any number base, so 16 in hexadecimal is 10, put a zero to the right of it, = hex 100, which I remember is 256 base ten. We all use such tricks, and the tricks depend on our past learning, we never calculate the way a computer would.

I think this gets at the heart of the issue. The problem is that computers do not calculate things. It is an aid to help us calculate. When the computer “calculates” 2+2, it has allowed a certain pattern of electrons to move around which terminates in a pixel-generated 4 appearing on a screen. I may also take an abacus and move two beads together with two other beads to compute 2+2. We would not say that the abacus has “computed” 2+2, so the method of representation is not what is important. Of course the computer does not do exactly what we do, but only we know what it means to calculate additions. If the computer uses 32-bit integers and I compute 2147483647 + 1, I will get -2147483648 due to an overflow error, yet surely I would be able to know that the “real” answer is 2147483648. It is not the process that I am interested in, but the actual “meaning” that I am getting at.

Agreed. Now suppose we divide it into two propositions: (1) Even if we had a complete knowledge of physics, there are biological (plus psychological, geological, etc.) phenomena which we could never predict, and so other sciences cannot be subsumed by physics. (2) There is but one world, and so all biological phenomena must ultimately be consistent with physics (although in practice the physics explanation may be far too long-winded to be useful or interesting).

I agree with both (1) and (2). Do you?

Yes I do agree with 1 and 2 . How do you understand these insights as regards the human mind? It seems that mental activity must be consistent with neural activity, although not entirely reducible to it.

But also it’s unclear to me why intention should be picked out rather than curiosity, which appears to have more fundamental drivers (e.g. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curiosity).

But you only become curious about something if you have some intention to understand it, otherwise you would not be curious about it. If you mean to say that the attempt to understand something intellectually begins with some kind of sense or empirical observation then I would agree with you. But the sense observation is not part of intellectual activity itself even though it normally precedes it in time.

OK. Here’s a quotation from that article: “This – rather vaguely characterized – phenomenon of “aboutness” is called intentionality. Something that is about (directed on, represents) something else is said to “have intentionality””.

A rainbow is about sunlight on raindrops, sunlight directed on raindrops, yet I guess even the most avid scholastic wouldn’t say a rainbow has intentionality. That’s another reason why I suspect that the concept is artificial.

Yes, it is true that when the Scholastic speaks of intentionality they most likely have intellectual intentionality in mind. Our intentionality is not necessarily aimed at any particular thing (i.e. our thoughts can be “about” anything). This “universal intentionality” is what I was taking to be special regarding human minds.

There are lots of simultaneous forms needed to explain the mind. Does hylomorphism’s concept of form include them all? Someone with a split personality has only one personality conscious at a time. Does hylomorphism say she has a single form, or two forms, or that the form switches depending on which personality is in consciousness, or she has many more forms as well?

I was going to mention this in the last post but then didn’t because I feared it would just make things more confused, but I might as well address it here. Technically there are not “a lot of simultaneous forms” in the human mind. There is only one: the rational soul. All of the different factors that you described all have the form of “rational soul.” This gets back to the old debate over the unicity of substantial form, where certain people argued that since humans are rational and sentient, they must have a rational soul and a sentient soul (and even a vegetative one as well, probably many more as well). The answer is no, they only have a rational soul. The sentient soul is only “in” the rational soul by way of power: sentient powers are in the rational soul but they exist to “serve” rationality. In an irrational animal, a dog say, sentience is the highest actuality, so the dog has a sentient soul actually.

Regarding split personalities, I am not familiar with “official” Scholastic arguments, although if I had to guess they would probably say that there is only one form. They would probably argue that “personality” in this context refers to a set of behavioral attributes or habits, and that these are accidentals that inhere in a subject. The person with split personalities has multiple sets of behavioral attributes or habits, not two persons.

 

[inocente]

I took a degree in Comparative Religions and Classical Studies. We talked a great deal about philosophy and metaphysics during my comparative religions classes. I think the main reason was because of the nature of my combined degree. But they also offered sociology of religion courses and psychology of religion courses. What I found fascinating was how many philosophical presuppositions were brought up during the psychology and sociology courses. Especially the psychology courses. For example, William James, Nietzsche, Kant, and also Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas. Sociology also has its philosophical presuppositions.

My favourite class was the thesis class where I focused on mystics. It was really interesting to see how deeply Thomistic were Saint John of the Cross and Saint Theresa of Avila. And also what insights from Augustine and Plato would creep in. Certainly they were the psychologists of their day.

Anyway, I suppose it is possible to do a degree in Comparative religions and never hear mention of Hylomorphic dualism, but I think that is an important bit of information that helps contextualize a lot of subsequent Catholic spirituality (at least). Also, you can’t deny that Luther was an Augustinian, and Wycliffe was a thoroughgoing Platonist. Regardless of what you think of Greek philosophy in general, it has had a substantial impact throughout the history of Western religion and also provides substantial points of dialogue between eastern and western religions.

God bless,
Ut

Mine was only an elective in high school. The professor was a doctor of divinity, we would regularly walk in and find him knelt in prayer.

I just did a search online for university comparative religion courses, and found no mention even of “Hellenic”. Most are 101 level and it’s an unscientific search anyway but you may be right about your combined degree making the difference. Some also offer comparative secularism, e.g. explorecourses.stanford.edu/search?view=catalog&filter-coursestatus-Active=on&page=0&catalog=&q=ANTHRO28N

 

[inocente]

The problem is that computers do not calculate things.

Can’t see the difference, the word “computer” was originally a job title for humans - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_computer

It is an aid to help us calculate. When the computer “calculates” 2+2, it has allowed a certain pattern of electrons to move around which terminates in a pixel-generated 4 appearing on a screen. I may also take an abacus and move two beads together with two other beads to compute 2+2. We would not say that the abacus has “computed” 2+2, so the method of representation is not what is important.

An abacus is passive, we must move the beads and know what they signify. Whereas an aircraft autopilot makes calculations and adjustments without anyone having to give meaning. And before you object that the programmer supplied the meaning, autopilots don’t even need to be programmed and can learn the meaning for themselves (e.g. here and here).

Of course the computer does not do exactly what we do, but only we know what it means to calculate additions. If the computer uses 32-bit integers and I compute 2147483647 + 1, I will get -2147483648 due to an overflow error, yet surely I would be able to know that the “real” answer is 2147483648. It is not the process that I am interested in, but the actual “meaning” that I am getting at.

Even a cheap computer in a washing machine has carry and overflow flags which it sets or clears after every instruction. The flags are often ignored, but the computer always knows.

“Meaning” is subjective and can’t rescue Ross’ argument. He makes a claim about how we think, which seems highly implausible to me, but debating can’t settle it, as it’s an a posteriori claim and so can only be settled by evidence.

Yes I do agree with 1 and 2 . How do you understand these insights as regards the human mind? It seems that mental activity must be consistent with neural activity, although not entirely reducible to it.

We’re not that different then . I think it must be possible in principle due to proposition (2), but the narrative would be extremely long to get from basic neurology to psychology, and may need a few new branches of science in between.

But you only become curious about something if you have some intention to understand it, otherwise you would not be curious about it. If you mean to say that the attempt to understand something intellectually begins with some kind of sense or empirical observation then I would agree with you. But the sense observation is not part of intellectual activity itself even though it normally precedes it in time.

No, that may be how it feels subjectively, but it is driven by curiosity, a trait we share with many other species, which must therefore confer a survival advantage, despite killing the odd cat. We want to intellectually understand something because curiosity is a primitive state of arousal (have a look at the article I linked).

Yes, it is true that when the Scholastic speaks of intentionality they most likely have intellectual intentionality in mind. Our intentionality is not necessarily aimed at any particular thing (i.e. our thoughts can be “about” anything). This “universal intentionality” is what I was taking to be special regarding human minds.

I think subjective introspection sent them down a blind alley.

*Technically there are not “a lot of simultaneous forms” in the human mind. There is only one: the rational soul. All of the different factors that you described all have the form of “rational soul.” This gets back to the old debate over the unicity of substantial form, where certain people argued that since humans are rational and sentient, they must have a rational soul and a sentient soul (and even a vegetative one as well, probably many more as well). The answer is no, they only have a rational soul. The sentient soul is only “in” the rational soul by way of power: sentient powers are in the rational soul but they exist to “serve” rationality. In an irrational animal, a dog say, sentience is the highest actuality, so the dog has a sentient soul actually. *

There’s far too much fancy footwork going on there. On the one hand there’s a desire for a neat tidy connection between matter and form. On the other there’s a desire for a neat tidy “rational soul”. But to make them compatible it was necessary to add these untidy notions of power, serving, sentient, … Hylomorphism is not exactly an elegant theory, with all the added bits of string and sealing wax needed to hold it together!

Regarding split personalities, I am not familiar with “official” Scholastic arguments, although if I had to guess they would probably say that there is only one form. They would probably argue that “personality” in this context refers to a set of behavioral attributes or habits, and that these are accidentals that inhere in a subject. The person with split personalities has multiple sets of behavioral attributes or habits, not two persons.

If you look up psychiatric criteria for dissociative identity disorder, it involves “marked discontinuity in sense of self and sense of agency, accompanied by related alterations in affect, behavior, consciousness, memory, perception, cognition, and/or sensory-motor functioning”.

So behavior is an effect of the disorder, not the cause. Whatever else, clearly hylomorphism must be abandoned to treat mental problems, since it brings no insights and seems more concerned to maintain its doctrines!

 

[fisherman_carl]

I just wanted to make an observation about the hylemorphic concept of form and matter. If you ever watch Star Trek you notice that they are able to beam humans through a transporter to remote locations and through walls. They do this by ‘dematerializing’ a person and storing the person in what’s called a ‘pattern’ inside a ‘pattern buffer’. Then they send this ‘pattern’ to a particular location where it is then ‘rematerialized’. I think this concept could be used to demonstrate Aristotle’s form and matter. If we were to rephrase the process in Aristotelian terms we would say that when the person is ‘dematerialized’ his form is saved in the computer and sent to the remote location where then matter is made substantial according to that form. Or you could say the matter was turned into prime matter (matter in pure potential without form) until his form made it actual again.

If we think of matter as a collection of fundamental physical particles and the form as the arrangement or pattern of those particles that makes it what it is then I think what gets saved on the computer is the pattern or that form, while the matter ‘dematerializes’. What do you think?

One question to ask though. Is the transporter actually transporting you or cloning you?

 

[cfauster]

The Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas devoted its 2010 Plenary Session to an examination of The Human Animal: Procreation, Education, and the Foundations of Society.

The entire proceedings can be downloaded.

One of the interesting essays is from Rev. Nicanor Austriaco. His paper is entitled The Soul and its Inclinations: Recovering a Metaphysical Biology with the Systems Perspective, which can be downloaded separately.

Links to his publications are here and here (with this list, scroll way down to get to the downloadable PDFs of his metaphysics papers).

Biographical information is available from CAF and from Providence College.

I do not share the same views on some issues, but I appreciate his explanations of Thomistic thought and his work relating Thomism to modern biology.