Why Isn’t the Mind-Body Problem Medieval?

King, Peter

doi:10.1007/978-1-4020-6084-7_10

“…The interaction between body and mind does not seem to have been a problem at the time these concepts were first constructed. 1 Versions of these notions are already present in the work of Plato and Aristotle, but neither seems to have worried about how they communicated. Most historians agree that issues only appeared during the 17th century after Descartes redefined the ontological status of mind and body as res cogitans and res extensa, respectively.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Historical epistemology of the body-mind interaction in psychiatry

Berríos¹

2018

Dialogues Clin Neurosci

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper deals with the history of the relationship between the mind-body dualism and the epistemology of madness. Earlier versions of such dualism posed little problem in regard to the manner of their communication. The Cartesian view that mind and body did, in fact, name different substances introduced a problem of incommunicability that is yet to be resolved. Earlier views that madness may be related to changes in the brain began gaining empirical support during the 17th century. Writers on madness chose to resolve the mind-body problem differently Some stated that such communication was not needed; others, that mind was a redundant concept, as madness could be fully explained by structural changes in the brain; and yet others described psychological spaces for madness to inhabit as a symbolic conflict. The epistemology of the neurosciences bypasses the conundrum, as it processes all together the variables representing the brain, subjectivity, and behavior and bridges the “philosophical” gap by means of correlational structures.

show abstract

“…As a prelude to reconsidering the Cartesian problem of global perceptual scepticism, consider that 'the' mind-body problem is neither Ancient nor Mediaeval (Matson 1966;King 2007). Ancient and Mediaeval philosophers regarded the human body as percipient; our nous or mens (mind) was responsible only for conceptually articulate thought and action.…”

Section: Philosophical Methods and The Advent Of Cartesianismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Scepticism & transcendental arguments: Some methodological reconsiderations

Westphal

¹

2017

Filoz drus

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Kant provided two parallel, sound proofs of mental content externalism; both prove this thesis: We human beings could not think of ourselves as persisting through apparent changes in what we (apparently) experience-nor could we think of the apparent spatio-temporal world of objects, events and people-unless in fact we are conscious of some aspects of the actual spatio-temporal world and have at least some rudimentary knowledge of it. Such proofs turn, not on general facts about (or features of) the world, but on appreciating various fundamental regards in which our finite human cognizance depends upon the world we inhabit. The 'transcendental' character of these analyses concerns identifying and appreciating various fundamental features of our finite form of human mindedness, and basic constraints upon, and prospects of, cognitive justification within the non-formal domain of human empirical knowledge. Such analyses and proofs have been developed in various ways, using distinctive strategies, not only by Kant, but also by Hegel, C.I. Lewis, Heidegger, Wittgenstein and Frederick Will. Here I examine and defend the methodological reflections required to understand, assess and appreciate such transcendental proofs, and why so few analytic epistemologists have found them persuasive or illuminating.

show abstract

“…The interaction between body and mind does not seem to have been a problem at the time these concepts were first constructed. 1 Versions of these notions are already present in the work of Plato and Aristotle, but neither seems to have worried about how they communicated. Most historians agree that issues only appeared during the 17th century after Descartes redefined the ontological status of mind and body as res cogitans and This paper deals with the history of the relationship between the mind-body dualism and the epistemology of madness.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Historical epistemology of the body-mind interaction in psychiatry

Berríos

¹

2018

Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper deals with the history of the relationship between the mind-body dualism and the epistemology of madness. Earlier versions of such dualism posed little problem in regard to the manner of their communication. The Cartesian view that mind and body did, in fact, name different substances introduced a problem of incommunicability that is yet to be resolved. Earlier views that madness may be related to changes in the brain began gaining empirical support during the 17th century. Writers on madness chose to resolve the mind-body problem differently Some stated that such communication was not needed; others, that mind was a redundant concept, as madness could be fully explained by structural changes in the brain; and yet others described psychological spaces for madness to inhabit as a symbolic conflict. The epistemology of the neurosciences bypasses the conundrum, as it processes all together the variables representing the brain, subjectivity, and behavior and bridges the “philosophical” gap by means of correlational structures.

show abstract

Why Isn’t the Mind-Body Problem Medieval?

Cited by 80 publications

References 0 publications

Historical epistemology of the body-mind interaction in psychiatry

Historical epistemology of the body-mind interaction in psychiatry

Scepticism & transcendental arguments: Some methodological reconsiderations

Historical epistemology of the body-mind interaction in psychiatry

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About