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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
Hope this is relevant. It explained a lot to me about hylomorphic dualism:
“EVERYTHING in the cosmic universe is composed of matter and form. Everything is concrete and individual. Hence the forms of cosmic entities must also be concrete and individual. Now, the process of knowledge is immediately concerned with the separation of form from matter, since a thing is known precisely because its form is received in the knower. But, whatever is received is in the recipient according to the mode of being that the recipient possesses. If, then, the senses are material powers, they receive the forms of objects in a material manner; and if the intellect is an immaterial power, it receives the forms of objects in an immaterial manner. This means that in the case of sense knowledge, the form is still encompassed with the concrete characters which make it particular; and that, in the case of intellectual knowledge, the form is disengaged from all such characters. To understand is to free form completely from matter.
“Moreover, if the proper knowledge of the senses is of accidents, through forms that are individualized, the proper knowledge of intellect is of essences, through forms that are universalized. Intellectual knowledge is analogous to sense knowledge inasmuch as it demands the reception of the form of the thing which is known. But it differs from sense knowledge so far forth as it consists in the apprehension of things, not in their individuality, but in their universality.
“The separation of form from matter requires two stages if the idea is to be elaborated: first, the sensitive stage, wherein the external and internal senses operate upon the material object, accepting its form without matter, but not without the appendages of matter; second the intellectual stage, wherein agent intellect operates upon the phantasmal datum, divesting the form of every character that marks and indentifies it as a particular something.
“Abstraction, which is the proper task of active intellect, is essentially a liberating function in which the essence of the sensible object, potentially understandable as it lies beneath its accidents, is liberated from the elements that individualize it and is thus made actually understandable. The product of abstraction is a species of an intelligible order. Now possible intellect is supplied with an adequate stimulus to which it responds by producing a concept.”
~From Thomistic Psychology: A Philosophical Analysis of the Nature of Man, by Robert E. Brennan, O.P.; Macmillan Co., 1941.
Second point: the Cartesian idea of 'res cogitans' as 'substance' was criticized by Husserl in the posthumously-published Crisis in the European Sciences. The grounds for the criticism was precisely because Descartes tended to treat 'res cogitans' as something that was in principle objective. 'Descartes had correctly identified the ego as 'the greatest of all enigmas' but unfortunately went on to misconstrue it in a naturalistic fashion as an objective substance in the world. Descartes....treated this ego as 'a little tag-end of the world' - as a real entity rather than as the condition for the possibility of unified experience and as a domain of meaning-constitution."
source
So - the reason we can't conceive of how 'the soul' acts on 'the body' is at least in part because the soul is inconceivable as 'a substance' or as something existing, because it's on a completely different ontological level to matter. But the sense of this difference has been 'flattened' by naturalism such that 'the soul' is considered as 'something existing' - which it isn't, as it is transcendent in the same way that the meaning of a sentence is transcendent to any particular expression of it.
This, as Terry Eagleton said in his review of The God Delusion, is why 'God and the universe do not add up to two, any more than my envy and my left foot constitute a pair of objects.'
Last edited by quotidian (4/30/2018 11:53 pm)
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
John West wrote:
My apologies: I wasn't thinking when I wrote this. The body is man's designated matter. Aquinas frequently says that the soul is the form of the body, but one might be left wondering whether the body is the matter or the man. But I found this: "If, however, the intellectual soul is united to the body as the substantial form, as we have already said above (Article 1), it is impossible for any accidental disposition to come between the body and the soul, or between any substantial form whatever and its matter." (ST I q. 76 a. 6c).
I suppose that makes sense. Aquinas originally wanted to give men substantial forms of corporeity before giving them substantial forms of humanity, but later collapsed the two into one (with the corporeity still “logically preceding” the humanity).
My original worry was that this makes “the body” basically just prime matter stamped with spatial (and perhaps temporal) dimensions, whereas we typically think of the body as something with various accidents (e.g. skin with colour). You can chalk this up to an odd use of the term “body”, though.
I must correct myself again. I should not have accepted the disjunction "the body is the material substance minus the intellectual power or prime matter or designated matter". I think it is rather some more proximate matter. This is indicated by the fact that Aquinas takes it to have determinations beyond its dimensions: "Therefore the body to which the intellectual soul is united should be a mixed body, above others reduced to the most equable complexion" (I q. 76 a. 5c).
As (I think) I said, I don't think that what "body" is is that important for hylomorphic dualism.
How, specifically, does the relation differ between cases?
Well, wherever aRb and cSd, there is some relation which doesn't differ between the cases, that is, which relates both a and b and c and d, namely the disjunctive relation RvS. My thought is that for the Aristotelian, that is the logical structure which the instantiation relation would have, if it were taken to be neutral between accidents and substantial forms.
Now, why think that? For one thing the relation between a thing and its accidents (a rose and its redness) is a familiar one. The relation between a thing and its form or between a thing's matter and its form is not a familiar one, it is a relation of philosophical art, discovered through an analysis of substance.
Another thing is that matter is not what primarily has a substantial form, but the substance. The shift from "Socrates has the form of man" to "Socrates' matter has the form of man" is a natural one, but what those sentences cannot be doing is saying the same thing of Socrates and his matter. The sense in which Socrates' matter "has the form of man" is an extended one. But this is to say that the relation between a thing and its form is not the same as the relation between a thing's matter and its form. But if anything, the relation between a rose and its redness is to be assimilated to the former, not the latter.
In any case, this needn't change my essential point that the relation between the body and soul or body and intellectual power is “mighty strange [...], but [...] mighty common”. Only the specifics of my example (e.g. the rose and substantial form of roseness, or the rose and its power to wilt).
I agree with this, and it is proposed as one of hylomorphic dualism's selling points. But as I said before:
[W]hen I said that we have been discussing "what is involved in claiming that the soul is the form of the body," I didn't mean that we have been discussing what kind of relation obtains between the soul and the body. I meant we had been discussing the bearing of that thesis on what it is for activity to be intelligent and of what sorts of explanations the intelligence of activity should admit (i.e., concretely, in saying that some thought is the formal cause of some intelligent behavior, what else are we committed to?).
It is one thing for the hylomorphic dualist to say: The relation between soul and body (or man) is as familiar as the relation between rose's form and rose--of course they can "interact," or don't need to. The worry is that, in saying this, one has rendered it obscure how mental activity works. For we don't say that a rose's form is the efficient cause of, say, this bud's opening up. But it is tempting to let "the soul" and "the intellect" and particular kinds of mental acts be efficient causes of human thinking and doing. There's a question of whether "the soul is the form of the body" ends up being lip service.
(By "it is tempting" I don't mean to suggest that we can't talk that way. It is fine to do so; we just cannot be confused about what we mean. We need always to understand the claim that the soul efficiently causes something as we would any other claim that a form causes something. Those are admissible constructions, albeit liable to misinterpretation.)
Isn't there a dispute over whether the intellectual power is immaterial or non-material? (What does it mean for something that exists to be non-material without being immaterial?)
Geach wants to say that it is non-material but not immaterial. Anscombe doesn't mind calling it immaterial, but she wants to resist the notion of immaterial events in immaterial media.
I don't think there's any clear-cut pretheoretical distinction between the immaterial and the non-material. Geach says what he means by it. He is, like Anscombe, resisting the notion of an immaterial part (where he means an integral part, not a "part" in some secondary sense).
They both, I think, are adopting such terminology in order to avoid confusions, in an attempt to prevent "the soul is the form of the body" from becoming lip service.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
Well, wherever aRb and cSd, there is some relation which doesn't differ between the cases, that is, which relates both a and b and c and d, namely the disjunctive relation RvS. My thought is that for the Aristotelian, that is the logical structure which the instantiation relation would have, if it were taken to be n[/qeutral between accidents and substantial forms.
I don't think there are disjunctive relations (at this level, anyway), and I would be surprised if Aquinas does. It's a truism that each universal is strictly identical in each of its instances; hence, if there is a disjunctive relation RvS it's strictly identical in each of its instances. Now, RvS is presumably instantiated in both aRb and cSd, but are R and S strictly identical in each case of its instantiation? Obviously not.
Compare: Fe and Gf, where F is blueness and G is redness. If there are disjunctive universals, then presumably e and f also instantiate FvG. (After all, a disjunction only needs one disjunct to hold.) But are the two instances of FvG in Fe and Gf strictly identical? Obviously not. I used to be open to being shown that there are weird, disjunctive universals at the quantum level (or something), as part of my commitment to Armstrong's "scientific realism".
My point was that if we want to say that two types of entities are distinct, we need to (i) give some clear identity conditions for each and (ii) show how they're distinct from each other. Otherwise, it seems we ought to reject that there is any major distinction here (cf. Ramsey's problem for the universal-particular distinction). But having said all that, I now think you might be able to distinguish between the two relations by claiming that the matter-substantial form relation can only hold between matter and substantial form, whereas the material substance-accident relation can only hold between material substances and accidents. There is a leftover question as to whether this is really necessary, though.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
Now, why think that? For one thing the relation between a thing and its accidents (a rose and its redness) is a familiar one. The relation between a thing and its form or between a thing's matter and its form is not a familiar one, it is a relation of philosophical art, discovered through an analysis of substance.
I'm not convinced that the matter-form relation is less familiar than the accident relation. The former arises through an analysis of substances, whereas the latter arises through an analysis of objects. Both are pieces of analysis and theory. Neither is obvious or “common sensical”. (It's a Moorean fact that a car is speeding towards me as I cross the highway. It's not a Moorean fact that that car is either a substance-attribute layer cake or a nominalist blob. I can claim that the car exists without engaging in analytic ontology.)
The instantiation relation is a weird relation (and that is even if we leave Bradley aside). It's probably not even a real relation. I certainly didn't think it was back when I was heavy into Armstrong's views. Rather, I thought properties "gappy" state of affairs types more accurately representable as F__, or ___ is red.
Another thing is that matter is not what primarily has a substantial form, but the substance. The shift from "Socrates has the form of man" to "Socrates' matter has the form of man" is a natural one, but what those sentences cannot be doing is saying the same thing of Socrates and his matter. The sense in which Socrates' matter "has the form of man" is an extended one. But this is to say that the relation between a thing and its form is not the same as the relation between a thing's matter and its form.
In “Socrates has the form of man”, “has” is the “has” of constituency. We're saying that “Socrates has the form of man as a constituent” (or, using the extended sense of part, as an “ontological part”). By contrast, in “Socrates's matter has the form of man”, “has” is the “has” of instantiation.* We're saying that “Socrates's matter instantiates the form of man”.
*I'm leaving our ongoing exchange about this aside for ease of exposition here, and trust you understand and will be able to translate without problems.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
But if anything, the relation between a rose and its redness is to be assimilated to the former, not the latter.
This is right, I think. When we say “The rose is red”, we're saying that the rose has the property of redness as a constituent. If we were to take “is” as the “is” of instantiation, we would then be using “rose” to refer to the rose's "bare" material substance and saying that the rose's material substance instantiates redness.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
It is one thing for the hylomorphic dualist to say: The relation between soul and body (or man) is as familiar as the relation between rose's form and rose--of course they can "interact," or don't need to. The worry is that, in saying this, one has rendered it obscure how mental activity works. For we don't say that a rose's form is the efficient cause of, say, this bud's opening up. But it is tempting to let "the soul" and "the intellect" and particular kinds of mental acts be efficient causes of human thinking and doing. There's a question of whether "the soul is the form of the body" ends up being lip service.
(By "it is tempting" I don't mean to suggest that we can't talk that way. It is fine to do so; we just cannot be confused about what we mean. We need always to understand the claim that the soul efficiently causes something as we would any other claim that a form causes something. Those are admissible constructions, albeit liable to misinterpretation.)
I see.
Geach wants to say that it is non-material but not immaterial. Anscombe doesn't mind calling it immaterial, but she wants to resist the notion of immaterial events in immaterial media.
For what it's worth, I also think “non-material” might be useful for avoiding the baggage traditionally associated with “immaterial” in other contexts. For instance, if everything material is extended in space, then substantival space isn't “in” space in this sense and so isn't material. (It isn't “in” space in the sense of being contained “in” it. It's “in” space in the sense of constituting it.) But I doubt the naturalist is going to be terribly bothered by having to say that there is something that isn't in space, but constitutes it. Any argument against space on the grounds that since it isn't contained in space it's immaterial is getting at least some of its force by trading on historical associations of “immaterial” with souls, and angels, and devils, and God. Calling it “non-material” instead of “immaterial” might help with this.
(And since this recently came up, I'll tip my hat to that thread by saying that the ad hocness would, of course, need to be gotten rid of with demonstrations of why we need substantival space for various independent reasons.)
But anyway, we're talking about hylemorphic dualism right now, not space, and this is a tangent.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
I should actually be stepping away from the forum for a couple weeks (at least), so if we could start tying this conversation off, or, at least, pruning some of its branches, I would appreciate it.
(You already know why. I'm putting this here mainly for the benefit of anybody following along.)
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
It's a truism that each universal is strictly identical in each of its instances; hence, if there is a disjunctive relation RvS it's strictly identical in each of its instances. Now, RvS is presumably instantiated in both aRb and cSd, but are R and S strictly identical in each case of its instantiation? Obviously not.
Compare: Fe and Gf, where F is blueness and G is redness. If there are disjunctive universals, then presumably e and f also instantiate FvG. (After all, a disjunction only needs one disjunct to hold.) But are the two instances of FvG in Fe and Gf strictly identical? Obviously not.
Pardon my ignorance of terminology here, but is strict identity numerical identity or is it complete (as opposed to loose) qualitative identity? A quick search around reveals uses of both.
If numerical identity, then that may be a truism (indeed a crucial premise to Boethius's sophistical argument against universals), but it's a truism which at least many of the medieval authors who want to say there are universals would qualify or reject (starting with Boethius).
If complete qualitative identity, then I find your subsequent claims rather less than obvious. (And the truism rather less than truistic. On the classical account animal is a universal present in horses and in men. But is animality completely qualitatively identical in horses and in men? Is color completely qualitatively identical in blue and red things?) (What would make this seem obvious perhaps is a particular picture of what sort of thing a universal in a particular is. If f is F but not G, and we say that f is FvG, then one might think that the instance of FvG in f could only be the instance of F in f. The instance of F in f is clearly not qualitatively identical with the instance of G in g. But that this is how we should view the matter seems to me far from obvious.)
(That said, I agree that Aquinas would probably not countenance disjunctive relations. My first tendency here was to deny that the instantiation relation is metaphysically fundamental on the Aristotelian view. One could elaborate that by saying that if there is an instantiation relation, then it's disjunctive.)
But having said all that, I now think you might be able to distinguish between the two relations by claiming that the matter-substantial form relation can only hold between matter and substantial form, whereas the material substance-accident relation can only hold between material substances and accidents. There is a leftover question as to whether this is really necessary, though.
Well, I think it is important. Material substances and accidents are both "things" in the sense of the categories, whereas neither substantial form nor matter are.
But we don't need to hash out our differences on universals and the relation between matter and form here, since I think we agree on the points relevant to hylomorphic dualism.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
Pardon my ignorance of terminology here, but is strict identity numerical identity or is it complete (as opposed to loose) qualitative identity? A quick search around reveals uses of both.
Neither, I think. The way Armstrong uses “strict identity” (which is the same as “absolute identity”), something is strictly identical if and only if it's both numerically and qualitatively identical.
Here is an argument to support that thought. Suppose that there are thin or bare particulars. Then the atomic state of affairs Fa is numerically identical with the atomic state of affairs Ha, where a is the thin particular. They are one and the same thing instantiating two different properties (viz. numerically identical but qualitatively distinct). Now suppose, instead, the atomic states of affairs Fa and Fb. They're numerically distinct but qualitatively identical. But I'm often confused when I see the indiscernibility of identicals cashed out in terms of numerical identity, so there may be different uses of numerical identity in the literature (or, possibly, I'm missing something).
The reason that it's a truism that each universal is strictly identical in each of its instances is that the whole idea behind positing universals is that they account for sameness among different things by the fact that each of the different things have exactly the same entity as a constituent or ontological “part”.
If numerical identity, then that may be a truism (indeed a crucial premise to Boethius's sophistical argument against universals), but it's a truism which at least many of the medieval authors who want to say there are universals would qualify or reject (starting with Boethius).
Medieval authors used “universals” in two ways. They use it in the sense of whatever can be present in many things (i) wholly, (ii) simultaneously, and (iii) in some appropriately metaphysically constitutive way, or in the sense of whatever is naturally able to be predicated of many (Spade). I will always use (and most contemporary authors will always use) universals in the first sense, but in the second sense even nominalists who thought some terms predicable of many like Ockham believed in “universals”. I mention this to avoid a confusion at the outset.
Boethius's argument, if it's the argument I'm thinking of, fails because he thinks of universals as substances rather than as ways things are.
The idea behind my argument is that if something is red, then it's red or blue, and, likewise, if something is blue, then it's red or blue as well. But obviously the red and blue aren't strictly identical.
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Re: Hylemorphic dualism and the interaction problem
And the truism rather less than truistic. On the classical account animal is a universal present in horses and in men. But is animality completely qualitatively identical in horses and in men? Is color completely qualitatively identical in blue and red things?
This is literally one of Armstrong's arguments against irreducible natural kinds. I think, at the very least, that the believer in them is going to have to assume that men and horses are identical in respect of something that is going to seem like a “mysterious ingredient” to some.
“But surely both horses and men are identical in respect of animality, and we're just wrong in thinking of animality as some kind of sensory quality?”, you might reply. Well, perhaps. Armstrong offers his own analysis of kinds in terms of reducible complex universals.
(Though, now that I'm thinking more about it, Aquinas might be able to sidestep this version of the argument with his rejection of pluralities of substantial forms. He wouldn't say that there is some qualitatively identical, bearer-individuated instance or "trope" of animality in both the horse and man. He would, I think, say that the horse has an irreducible substantial form of horseness and the man has an irreducible substantial form of humanity and we can rightly predicate animality of both of them because of the forms' natures, but neither has some further qualitatively identical substantial form of animality. The only way he would have a problem is if he thinks substantial forms are reducible to parts that make each up. Of course, pluralists can still be picky about their forms and make similar moves.)