Conatus: THIRD EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

entirely separate from mind and body, but somehow manages to get both mind (the workings of the brain) and body to do its bidding.

Another explanation suggests that God forms the link. I decide with my mind that I want to move my arm and then God moves it for me! The problem here is that there are also thoughts that are inspired by memory or are disconnected with external stimulation. How can these thoughts be accounted for? And if all thought is just a by-product of the brain, which is really taking care of its own affairs, then I am effectively just an automaton, and not responsible for my actions. So for the most part my behaviour is determined — I have only an illusion of free will. (See Chapter 16.)

Whilst, as we’ve seen, many criticisms have been levelled at Cartesian dualism, nonetheless staying with the dualism of mind and body allows us the common-sense notion of standing ‘outside’ or ‘above’ the incoming sensory data and making decisions based on it. This would seem to maintain personal responsibility and justify the way all of us regard ourselves as some kind of thinking beings.

The opposing view to dualism is the view that mental events can be completely explained in terms of physical ones, usually events in the brain. There is therefore just one substance to the universe — in this case, of course, the physical. If this is true then two physically identical people would also be identical in all other respects and thus, identical in terms of their thoughts, feelings and emotions. But this

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