Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Descartes and the Soul 1

I don't want to take the time to write it up this morning but maybe I can at least get my juices going by jotting down some thoughts on Descartes and the soul.

1. First, there is the shift from viewing the soul as material to viewing it as immaterial. This shift goes along with the invention, so to speak, of nature by Descartes. This is the dividing up of the world into natural and supernatural, the material and the immaterial. Before creation was more of a continuous spectrum from embodied to thin, disembodied material (cf. Dale Martin).

2. Descartes letters to the princess of Holland, where she takes him to task--how can the immaterial have an effect on the material? He suggests maybe it is something like gravity. He locates the soul in the pineal gland. The body is a machine (Treatise of Man, Passions of the Soul). Thoughts are formed in the pineal gland:

Even though the soul is joined to the whole body, "nevertheless there is a certain part of the body where it exercises its functions more particularly than in all the others... The part of the body in which the soul directly exercises its functions is not the heart at all, or the whole of the brain. It is rather the innermost part of the brain, which is a certain very small gland situated in the middle of the brain's substance and suspended above the passage through which the spirits in the brain's anterior cavities communicate with those in its posterior cavities. The slightest movements on the part of this gland may alter very greatly the course of these spirits, and conversely any change, however slight, taking place in the course of the spirits may do much to change the movements of the gland" (Passions of the Soul).

3. Passions can affect the soul. Prior to him only the soul affected the body, not the other way as well.

4. Soul is simple and indivisible, potentially infallible in its detachment from the material world, able to look on objectively.

5. Descartes represents a shift from seeing the soul as the principal of life to the principal of thought. The soul becomes the seat of the "I." This leads to an introspective trajectory for Western culture.

I may add more notes today as thoughts occur...

7 comments:

Angie Van De Merwe said...

Today's "model" of reality is based on material grounds. Therefore, what one "thinks" about things, is unimportant. It is what one experiences, as that creates what is needful for the brain to react or respond. Therefor, psychologists/sociologists would love to create experiments on others to analyze how the sense experience "interacts" with "mind". Is there a distinction?

Experimentation that creates false experiences, cannot measure realities that have been remembered from the past, unless those memories are vivid enough to be formative. And this is the issue.

Is it ethical to create "trauma" to understand "trauma"? Or to "help along" the character development of other humans? This is where the distinction between man and animal gets important.

If man is just another animal, then there is no need to consider that he is anything other than "a rat" for experimentation. This is what the Nazis did to the Jews, as they were "sub-human".

But, it is also the case, that humanists could argue that experience will help identification with those that are being persecuted under tyrannical government, war, or other misfortunes. And this would bring about a "crisis of concern", or alturism....

Humans are just the substances that make up their physical being. And everything that the "mind" processes is really a result of stimuli, nothing more or less. So, the "I' is "formed" by its physicality alone. The "self" is a false concept. What is needed is a sense of "consciousness about mankind", so that humanity can become....etc. etc.

No self? because it is a modern construct from Decartes. That is really stretching the bounds of rationality, I think.

Developmental psychologists would roll over in their graves, or jump up from theis desks in opposition to such thinking. The child's sense of self is developed from the time of birth. This is a sense of "self" or 'I', where boundaries are formed and "other" can be respected apart from "me" or the "I". Otherwise, we have no basis for business contracts, negotiating differences (as these would be a false consciousness), etc. And this is where I think the globalists are irrational. Because the globalists believes that nation states should dissolve their independent boundaries to form "one world". One cannot think if one cannot distinguish. This is absurdity!

Ken Schenck said...

Your train of thought makes no sense to me. I never even know what to say. You make perfet sense on your blog where you are setting the topic. But you never quite seem to be able to get into other people's trains of thought.

Angie Van De Merwe said...

I re-read your post, and my response.

The question I gather from the post is; "Is the "I" (or self) of value, since it is a "modern" construct, and not a "simple state of nature".

I argue for the "I" or "self", because I believe without it, there is no way to distinguish "other".

While distinguishing between "self" and "other" is the result of modernity, it is also the basis of boundary-making, as in laws, which maintain civility. Passions, then, can be checked by such boundaries.

I argue for the presevation of nation-states, because of the necessity of maintaining differences, and a "identification".

Where I think you might have mis-contrued my response was in my sarcasm over experimentation of humans. Humanists and scientists would value such endeavors, as then, they can bring verification to their theory of human nature.

The scientists would love to evaluate whether sense experience is all that the "mind" is, while the humanist would evaluate how the mind responds to de-humanizing factors, such as "trauma, war, etc.".

I argue in defense of distinguishing between man and animal. And I argue that man is more than his brain, although without the physicality of the brain, then the "mind" could not function.

I argue against the globalist/humanist because of the dissolution of the "self" for a "consciousness of humanity". "Consciousness of humanity" dissolves ways of rationality, and man becomes "emotive" alone.

There is a dualistic nature to a liberal democracy and man, himself. The material and immaterial cannot be separated from each other without doing disservice to one or the other.

There is a tension between the realistic and the idealistic that must be maintained, if there is to be a healthgy sense of self and other, which upholds civil society, itself.

Ken Schenck said...

ANGIE: The question I gather from the post is; "Is the "I" (or self) of value, since it is a "modern" construct, and not a "simple state of nature".

KEN: The post was merely describing Descartes point of view. It says nothing of what I think or what I think anyone should think. It was description, not prescription.

ANGIE: I argue for the "I" or "self", because I believe without it, there is no way to distinguish "other".

While distinguishing between "self" and "other" is the result of modernity, it is also the basis of boundary-making, as in laws, which maintain civility. Passions, then, can be checked by such boundaries.

KEN: This relates a little to Descartes. You might preface comments like this with. "Regardless of what Descartes was talking about, I think the idea of the distinct self is important because..."

ANGIE: I argue for the presevation of nation-states, because of the necessity of maintaining differences, and a "identification".

KEN: And now you've left the building. We're no longer talking about the soul but following your stream of consciousness to a analogous boundary situation. No announcement of the shift because I don't think you are really aware that you have floated off.

ANGIE: Where I think you might have mis-contrued my response was in my sarcasm over experimentation of humans. Humanists and scientists would value such endeavors, as then, they can bring verification to their theory of human nature.

KEN: I construed it to be even further afield from the original topic, the stream is now in unexpected rapids.

ANGIE: The scientists would love to evaluate whether sense experience is all that the "mind" is, while the humanist would evaluate how the mind responds to de-humanizing factors, such as "trauma, war, etc.".

I argue in defense of distinguishing between man and animal. And I argue that man is more than his brain, although without the physicality of the brain, then the "mind" could not function.

KEN: How did we get here? This has nothing to do with Descartes.

ANGIE: I argue against the globalist/humanist because of the dissolution of the "self" for a "consciousness of humanity". "Consciousness of humanity" dissolves ways of rationality, and man becomes "emotive" alone.

There is a dualistic nature to a liberal democracy and man, himself. The material and immaterial cannot be separated from each other without doing disservice to one or the other.

There is a tension between the realistic and the idealistic that must be maintained, if there is to be a healthgy sense of self and other, which upholds civil society, itself.

KEN: Complete awe at where the train of thought has led. All roads in Angie's thoughts lead to political philosophy. I'll confess that I often stop reading as soon as you go off topic. I think if I really worked at it, I could see the path, but it's not easy for me to do and almost impossible for those who don't know you!

Angie Van De Merwe said...

Thanks for helping me understand. I suppose that sense I am interested in formulating my "world", then I have an agenda (with questions alongside) already in my "mind" when I am reading something. I am "enlarging" my viewpoint. But, as you point out, it has little to do with what is posted. So, I cannot be critically engaged. My loss.

Political philosophy is of utmost importance to me, because political philosophy constructs "the real world"....there is no other that impacts life more emphatically.

I will try to be aware of this tendency!

Ken Schenck said...

I think you've hit the nail on the head. When you are setting the agenda in your own writings, I am often impressed. But in my opinion, you don't engage the ideas of others very well. You seem simply to use some set of words and run with it on your own terms.

Bob MacDonald said...

Well done - you gave me my morning smile today with this line: He suggests maybe it is something like gravity.

Descartes may be well ahead of his time. Have you seen the latest ideas on gravity as the path of least resistance for the universe to conform to the second law of thermodynamics? Posts are linked from Entangled States