Is the mind anything distinct from the body?

Here's another, perhaps more precise, way of asking the question:

Are mental states (thoughts, beliefs, desires, sensations, fears) states of the brain or are mental states distinct from brain states?

Please provide support for your claims. I would like to hear from people who hold different views about this, so kindly support your view or any claims you make with reasons so that those who don't hold your view can see where you are coming from and why you think what you think.

Thank you in advance.

Athos

As far as I know, no mind has ever been observed distinct from a body.

Yes, mental states are states of the brain which is itself "informed" by the body through the body's senses, chemistry, hormones, etc.

I don't know how to prove those statements other than to say they seem self-evident to me.

templelane

You might be interested to know that medical doctors and scientists are currently running experiments to test the verification of out of body experiences (OBE)s- when the mind and body would be said to have disengaged.

They place random pictures in hospital crash rooms on high selves facing upward- unseen to occupants of the room, unless they have an out of body experience and float upward to observed their resuscitation from afar. If somebody in that room claims to have experienced an OBE they can test them on what the picture was. If somebody described it right it would support the claim.

In an ideal world they would get laptops cycling random images to ensure no foul play, but this would cause a cost that most funding bodies would not pay for such an experiment.

They have not found anything yet, but I'm sure we would all here if they did.

Akoue

You say it seems self-evident to you. Perhaps I can try to draw you out a bit with some questions.

1. Physical states and events obey physical laws. If mental states just are physical states (of the brain), that might seem to jeopardize the freedom that we often take to characterize our mental life. Do you find the prospect that your thoughts and desires and feelings (etc.) are governed by physical laws unpalatable? Do you think that this imperils free will, since not only your beliefs and desires, but your choices as well would appear to be governed not by your consciousness or your will but by purely physical factors governed by physical laws?

2. If the brain state you are in when you entertain the belief that 2+2=4 is, well, let's just call it N-4, does that mean that a person whose brain is not in N-4 does not hold the belief that 2+2=4?

3. We are capable of an infinite number of mental states. And yet the brain is finite, so it isn't capable of being in an infinite number of states. Do you see this as posing a difficulty for your view?

4. Could an organism with a radically different brain from ours be said to have mental states? What about an organism with no brain?

I intend these follow-up questions only to provide a way of unpacking the seeming self-evidence of the view that mental states just are states of the brain. It would be great to hear your thoughts about any or all of them. Then we can see where things go from there.

Akoue

Yes, I am interested to learn of this. I have always found the idea of an out of body experience to be rather dubious, but I'd love to hear what their findings are. Do you have any information about these experiments (where they're being conducted, etc.)? It would be nice to get ahold of some more of the details.

Athos

1. I think you're making a lot of assumptions here. You seem to be suggesting that physical states are a simple either/or proposition. I suspect they're enormously more complex than that. So complex, in fact, that freedom is not affected (unless we follow the proposition to its nth degree which, in any case, would have an infinitesimal effect on ordinary existence - something like the gravity of a baseball affecting the sun). No, I don't think this affects free will in any significant sense (although a case could be made for, say, a toothache directing all my energies to see a dentist even though I would prefer to do something else). Since consciousness itself is a function of the brain, and governed by physical laws, then, yes, free will is "imperiled" but, as stated above, in a very limited way. But the real problem I see with what you've written is the notion that physical laws are somehow deterministic in an absolute sense. This does not seem to be the case on the quantum level.

2. Isn't this a tautology? It is true that someone who does not believe what A believes - does not believe what A believes.

3. Who or what is the "we" in this sentence? Humans with a mind/brain? Then, in my view, you are saying that the brain is capable of infinite states while at the same time you are saying the brain is capable only of finite states. I think you first have to establish that whatever you mean by "we" exists separately from consciousness/mind/brain. I don't think you've done that.

4. If by organism you mean something living, then I think any organism is capable of a mental state broadly defined. I don't know how else a bacterium, say, would "know" how to eat and reproduce. Something is directing it to purposeful action. That something is a state that is more than its constituent parts and yet still a part of the whole.


"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy". Like Hamlet, I think these things are not yet absolutely knowable - if ever they will be. But there you have my first salvo at the thing. I will be interested in reading whatever response you may have, and, who knows, you may even convince me.

templelane

Here you go, I read it in new scientist but here is a bbc report on the study
BBC NEWS | Health | Study into near-death experiences

I can't say I think they'll find anything though...

asking

Yes. But not as a separate entity.

The mind is distinct from the body in the way that the behavior of a crowd is distinct from the behavior of individuals. You can see this effect when looking at traffic patterns, flocks of birds, and groups of cells. To me the mind is just a word for higher order function of the brain, an emergent property. So in a sense it is distinct. It does not reside in individual neurons, but in the interactions among all of the neurons.

This doesn't seem like a precise question to me. Or maybe it just seems like a wrong question. Or maybe I'm not understanding it.

First of all, mental states are not purely the result of brain states. The mind, in my opinion, is a product of the processes of the whole body. To give a single example, hormones, which affect behavior, are produced all over the body.

Second, there is not a one-to-one correspondence between brain states and mental states, unless you define the brain state very narrowly--meaning that any given brain state is completely unique. (In that case, a person could argue that any mental state linked to that completely unique brain state (unique in both time and space) is itself unique -- by definition. I don't think that's a very interesting proposition, since it has no general usefulness.) I think multiple brain states can almost certainly produce a standard mental state such as fear. Otherwise unique individuals--people with different genes and experiences--would not be able to share their mental states so easily.

There's a word for multiple ground states leading to a standard outcome, which is canalization. It's used in developmental biology, but I am going to introduce it hear since it conveys my meaning. Maybe philosophy has another word already.

asking

To address Akoue's four points.

First, I agree with Athos' response to question 1.
Not sure about 2. I found question #2 hard to understand.
I do not understand Athos's answer to #3.
I disagree that a bacterium has a mind. I think of a mind as a product of neural activity, so I may have an excessively narrow view of what mind is. If you both mean apparent intent, as perceived by others, that would broaden the definition considerably. I think we need to nail this down.

1. The matter of freedom of will is a non issue for me. Whatever free will I have is not going to change as a result of this discussion. Whatever free will I have, I am content with as it is. It cannot change from what it is. So if you decide as a result of this discussion that the mind having a physical basis means that there is no such thing as free will as you define free will, then that's fine with me. I feel this argument is defective. It's nearly a threat. Like this: "The mind CAN'T have a physical basis or You won't have free will, and you wouldn't like that would you?"

But it's an empty threat. Nothing is going to change for me except a series of theological and philosophical arguments with which I am mostly unfamiliar. I'm still going to be able to go the store and decide whether to buy veal (no).

I do not think you mean it as a threat yourself. But I think you have accepted the unreasonable ground rules that produced this standard argument.

2. It means that the person in brain state N = 4 may be in 1 + 3 = 4 or 0 + 4 = 4. You cannot predict absolute brain state backwards from superficial classifications of mental state. But if you define mental states so narrowly that they only refer to a single individual brain state at a single moment in time, there is no usefulness to the discussion, I think. Science deals with general principles. So I would tend to group mental states in general categories based on whether the differences do or do not affect behavior. If the differences in mental state do not produce different behavior, it is all essentially the same mental state for my purposes.

3. We are capable of finer and finer distinctions but we are certainly not capable of an infinite number of mental states in any other sense. You are not capable of assuming the exact mental state of me or an octopus or an eocene fish. So you are not in fact capable of an infiinite number of mental states. I would say our mental states are quite limited--especially if you set aside abnormal ones that we call insanity. So, no, this assertion poses no difficulty for my view.

4. Yes. I think (obviously) that other organisms have mental states. I do not think that an organism with no brain can be said to have a mental state in any usual sense of the phrase. I would not attribute a mental state to a bacterium or to an amoeba. I think a flatworm probably has a mental state roughly comparable to my Roomba.

excon

Hello A:

I LOVE this stuff. I just wish I was smart enough to add to the conversation.

I do have a couple questions, though. If the mind is really just the brain and/or body at work, that would mean even non sentient beings have minds.

Does it mean that? I thought a mind was a product of intelligence.

Is a non sentient mind different than a sentient one? Does having a mind indicate at least a modicum of intelligence? Or is the mind only the property of man?

I hope these questions are relevant. I don't wanna head the thread off in a different direction. But, as I read, these questions came up for me, and I know you guys can explain it to me.

excon