1. Dualism

Abstract

‘Dualism’ asks: is the mind distinct from the body? Dualism is the theory of mind that answers this question in the affirmative. Looking into Dualism’s ancient origins show us some of the key arguments for dualism. Dualism is thought, by its proponents, to solve one of the great problems in philosophy: the mind‒body problem. Cartesian dualism and René Descartes’s arguments are based on the premise that it is possible to imagine one’s mind existing without one’s body and one’s body without one’s mind. There are also two contemporary arguments for dualism: the knowledge argument, according to which dualism must be true because knowledge of all physical facts does not suffice for understanding conscious experience, and the so-called ‘zombie’ argument according to which the mind must be distinct from the body since a bodily duplicate of a human would not have conscious experiences. Can conceivability be a guide to possibility? In other words, whether one’s ability to imagine a certain situation is reason to believe that such a situation is possible.