Criticisms of dualism
Peace and blessings. I am aware of your dualist-interactionist position. There are several objections to this approach that I would like to hear your opinion on. I will mention only 2:
- Violation of the Law of Conservation of Energy – Interactionist dualism may violate the law of conservation of energy, since it can be said that energy is added to a physical system (after all, my pain, for example, causes a certain particle to move, and this means that something spiritual raises the energy level in the physical system). Do you think the law is really preserved? I will only point out that there are other possibilities for dualism that are consistent with the law of conservation of energy, such as the claim that pain only changes the energy balance (for example, increases energy in a certain particle and decreases energy in another particle, or alternatively increases energy in one particle and this particle decreases energy in another particle and thus the overall balance is preserved), or the claim that there is “spiritual energy” and then the law of conservation of energy is treated as a claim that speaks about all energy (including spiritual energy).
- Causality and the absence of space – our mental states are spiritual, meaning they have no spatial dimension. The question that arises here is why my mental state, for example my sadness, causes my body to do things, for example to cry, and not someone else’s body? In a materialistic worldview, we could simply say that the connection between my mental states and my body is explained by the fact that they are both states in my body. That is, it is clear why a physical state in my body affects another physical state in my body (and not a physical state in another body): they are simply connected by physical connections between them. Of course, a simple dualistic answer is that there are some connections between my mind and my body that do not exist between my mind and another body. But this answer is circular, since the connections in question between my body and my mind are causal connections, and the question was why the causal connection only exists between my mind and my body.
thanks!
- Obviously broken. I didn’t understand what you were getting into with the law of conservation of energy. All the laws are broken, including Newton’s laws (a particle moves without a physical force acting on it). I went into this at length in my free science books.
- I don’t understand the question. You assume that the interaction must be at some spatial point. I don’t see any need for that. Maybe you have knowledge that I don’t have about the operation of spiritual objects…
1. Yes, it is clear to me that more laws are being broken. I am asking about the law of conservation of energy in order to understand something specific about it - does it mean that energy (and thus matter) in the world is constantly growing? Or maybe energy enters from the spiritual to the physical, and then it also leaves in the transition between the physical and the spiritual (and thus the total relative energy is preserved)?
2. No, I did not assume this at all. On the contrary - since the connection is not spatial (this is my assumption), I am asking about its nature. Why do my mental states affect the matter that is my brain, and do not affect the brain that is someone else's? Since the interaction is not spatial, how does my mind “choose” to affect a particular matter that is in a particular place (my brain), and not another matter?
1. In the book I explained that the general conservation of energy is preserved. A person eats and sleeps and accumulates energy and then spends it.
2. I wrote pointwise, not just spatially. There is a connection between a soul and a specific body. I did not understand what the question was.
1. When you say general, you mean the normal energy in the material world, right? That is, not including any “spiritual” energy.
So, this is maintained because, as I said, there is an input of energy by mental-physical causation, and an output of energy by physical-mental causation?
2. I will try to clarify - the connection between the mind and the body can be of all kinds. Interactionist dualism claims a causal connection between them. The question that arises here is, how does the causal connection exist specifically between my body and my mind, and not between another body and my mind? After all, my pain is like someone else's pain, it is not something different in nature. Therefore, what is the explanation for the fact that my pain causes things in my body? As mentioned, in the physical dimension there is no problem - the explanation for the fact that one neuron causally affects another neuron in my brain and not in another brain is that they are connected by physical spatial connections. In the spiritual dimension, there is no such connection, and therefore the question arises.
1. True. But there is no need to assume that the energy is introduced by physical and mental causation (this may be true, but there is no need for this). A person eats and this gives him (material) energy. He releases this energy as a result of the will's instruction. That's all.
2. You haven't clarified anything. I've already explained that itself. You assume for some reason that there is no such connection. But there is.
I've exhausted it.
Thanks for the answers. Just one last thing regarding section 1 - you wrote that the total amount of energy in the material world is conserved, but then you included an example with food. Shouldn't the play between energy input and output be only spiritual-physical, and not in the physical world? After all, if I eat, I'm not really "inputting energy" if you're concerned with the energy in the universe, since material food enters the body, which is material, and does not exit from there to the soul. From what I understand, energy output must be from the physical to the soul (for example, the firing of neurons causes pain), and energy input must be from the soul to the physical (for example, desire causes an electron to move).
I see no need for this assumption. The food that breaks down puts energy into the body. Now comes a command from the will for the body to run, for example. The energy for running is taken from the food you ate. I see no reason to assume beyond ”spiritual energy” or something like that and vice versa. The conservation of energy is a property of the physical world and there it can be conserved.
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