Dualism - A-Level Philosophy AQA Detailed 25 Mark Essay Plan
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Course
Metaphysics of Mind
Institution
AQA
An essay plan answering ' Is Dualism Convincing?'
It is designed for the AQA Philosophy A-Level 25 Marks. All essays are Band 5 and above.
The essays largely follow the recommended RICE (Reason, Issue, Counterexample and Evaluation).
Introduction and Conclusion are not included. Statement of I...
Is Dualism Convincing?
Statement of Intent: Dualism is not convincing. This is because firstly arguments for both dualist theories
are not sucessful especially their arguments from conceivability with faces the same problems as each
other. More crucially, dualism doesn't cohere with what we know empirically specifically regarding the
interaction between a non-physical substance/property and a physical substance/property. Equally
crucial however is that whilst epiphenomenalism avoids these issues, that itself has much more
concerning problems such as asymmetry and the inability to account for introspective self-knowledge
leaving us with the option of two highly problematic forms of dualism.
RICE 1:
R: Arguments for Dualism are not convincing. Both Descartes’ Conceivability argument for Substance
Dualism and the Zombie argument for property dualism faces the same multiple problems where the
physicalist can attack the same inferences made in both arguments. Both arguments fail to show that what
is conceivable is metaphysically possible. Masked Man Fallacy. What is logically conceivable could be
metaphysically impossible. More crucially for property dualist if physicalism is the case then it is
metaphysically impossible for a functional duplicate to exist without conciousness because in every
possible world it is necessary that a functional duplicate has conciousness because conciousness is a
physical property.
I: For Substance Dualism they can accept that whilst it is true that the inference is not always valid
because the idea of the mind being distinct from the body is clear and distinct the inference is justified.
For Property Dualism they can object that it is metaphysically possible because the water and H20
example is a disanalogy. The essential property of water is that it is H20. Water could have other
contingent concepts such as its colour, where it comes from which differ in possible world but regardless
of that it’s chemical composition is essentially for the liquid to be water. The essence of phenomenal
properties is not the fact it is a physical/functional property - the essence of phenomenal properties is
what it is like to experience them. The physicalist has made the implicit assumption that the essence of
phenomenal conciousness is that it is physical. Therefore the correlation between brain properties and
consciousness is contingent not necessary. And therefore because it is contingent the fact that
phenomenal properties are physical properties is true in some world so it is metaphysically possible that
in some world that it isn’t the case.
C: These seems quite strong responses and we seem to be in a stalemate because for Substance Dualist
we have to assume that the mind being distinct from the body is a clear and distinct i. There is an issue
with conceivability arguments in general in order to discover the nature of the world. All this conceiving of
a zombie in reality is just a reflection of our own epistemic limitations and shows that neuroscience has
not developed yet. Therefore the thought experiment of zombies doesn't tell us anything significant about
the nature of conciousness. From what is conceivable we cannot infer anything about the nature of how
things are. Our concepts as they are now aren’t a good guide to a reality because we constantly change
concepts as we discover more empirically. Therefore the right way to determine the nature of
conciousness is not through conceivability arguments such as the zombie argument but through scientific
investigation. Fundamentally we shouldn't let considerations about concepts determine in advance what
scientific investigations may or may not discover.
E: Ultimately it hasn’t proved that dualism is false but rather shown that arguments for it are unconvincing.
The exchange between the physicalist and the dualist ends somewhat in a stalemate. Neither Dualism nor
physicalism is shown to be true or false. Haven’t shows that Dualism is definitely false. So much less of a
crucial argument
RICE 2:
Is Dualism Convincing? 1
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