Soul & body: a survey of the basic positions Background on the soul-body problem (see Brown, Murphy, & Maloney 1-29) Main historical & logical positions on the soul-body problem 1. Substance dualism Plato (428-348 B.C.), Augustine (354-430), Descartes (1596-1650) - the soul is a different kind of reality than the body; it is a spiritual substance and is the seat of the self. Soul-body problem: survey - 1

Soul & body: background Plato - the soul properly belongs to the otherworldly realm of Ideas or Forms Comments & problems: Provides a clean solution to scientific criticisms of the notion of soul by putting soul out of the bounds of science. Independence position. Soul-body problem: survey - 2

Soul & body: background If so dissimilar, how can they interact? If humans have evolved from matter, we would expect mind or soul to be similar to matter. Soul-body problem: survey - 3

Soul & body: background Is not substance dualism required for the Jewish & Christian notions of afterlife? Many contemporary biblical scholars argue that dualism is not present in the Hebrew and Christian bibles Soul-body problem: survey - 4

Soul & body: background Hebrew nephesh, often translated as “soul,” does not mean an immortal soul but the life principle or the self as the subject of appetites & emotions & willing Notion of afterlife in late books of the Hebrew bible (Daniel 12:2 - ca. 165 B.C., II Maccabees 14:46 - ca. 140 B.C.) & in N.T. is resurrection. Soul-body problem: survey - 5

Soul & body: background Notion of immortality also appears in late book of the Hebrew Bible. Wisdom (of Solomon) 3:1-5 -- 1st century. “But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them . . . they are at peace . . . there hope is in immortality.” Probably written by a Hellenized Jew. Soul-body problem: survey - 6

Soul & body: background The notion of afterlife in the N.T. is resurrection. 1 Corinthians 15: 12-23 & II Corinthians 5: 1-10. Soul-body problem: survey - 7

Soul & body: background Resurrection Acc. to Oscar Cullmann, resurrection is the recreation of the whole person by an act of God at some future time (“in the last days”) (Oscar Cullmann, Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead? (NY: Macmillan, 1958). Is a gift of God, not anything natural. Soul-body problem: survey - 8

Soul & body: background Cullmann’s famous comparison of the deaths of Socrates & Christ Cullmann’s comparison of immortality & resurrection Immortality Greek, spatial, natural, requires dualism Soul-body problem: survey - 9

Soul & body: background Resurrection Hebrew, temporal, special creative act of God, compatible with a psychosomatic unity Overview of immortality & resurrection Dualism was embraced by early Christianity under the influence of Greek thought, especially Platonism and Neoplatonism Soul-body problem: survey - 10

Soul & body: background 2. Matter-form dualism - the soul is not complete by itself; it is complete only with the body; but it is capable of existing without the body Aristotle (384-322), Aquinas (1225-1274) Problems: Has many of the same difficulties of substance dualism, but perhaps mitigated a bit. Soul-body problem: survey - 11

Soul & body: background The metaphysical baggage which goes with this theory Strength It has a much more positive appraisal of the body than Platonic dualism Soul-body problem: survey - 12

Soul & body: background 3. Physicalism, or “materialism,” or “reductive materialism” Mental events are identical with brain processes. Francis Crick in The Astonishing Hypothesis (1994) Soul-body problem: survey - 13

Soul & body: background “The Astonishing hypothesis is that ‘you,’ your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules. As Lewis Carroll’s Alice might have phrased it: ‘You’re nothing but a pack of neurons.’” (The Astonishing Hypothesis 3) Soul-body problem: survey - 14

Soul & body: background Some criticisms: Crick sets up the problem as if there are only two alternatives: strong substance dualism or reductive materialism. Is this fallacious? At best a research programme It cannot account for the privileged position of the subject Soul-body problem: survey - 15

Soul & body: background 4. Multi-level theories Ian Barbour & Nancey Murphy - Reality is organized into a variety of levels, each with its characteristic types of activity. The mind-brain problem is a particular case of the more general problem of the relation between levels. Soul-body problem: survey - 16

Soul & body: background Advantages: Is congenial with an evolutionary viewpoint According to Barbour, it is compatible with the biblical view of humans Nancey Murphy’s position is a version of the multi-level theory Soul-body problem: survey - 17

Soul & body: background Why science seems to make any version of strong dualism problematic 1. The continuity between humans and other animals Our closest cousins in the animal world are chimpanzees--c.99% of the DNA of humans and chimpanzees is the same Soul-body problem: survey - 18

Soul & body: background Hominids & chimpanzees evolved from a common ancestor c. 5 to 7 million years ago (Ayala 33) One of the lines of these early hominids evolved is Australopithicus. Soul-body problem: survey - 19

Soul & body: background The genus Homo evolved from Australopithicus c. 2.5 million years ago. Of the many species in the genus Homo, Homo sapiens sapiens emerged c. 120,000 years ago. Soul-body problem: survey - 20

Soul & body: background 2. Modern psychology & neurology Brain localization research Murphy: “Nearly all of the human capacities or faculties once attributed to the soul [language, emotion, decision-making] are now seen to be functions of the brain” (1). See Malcom Jeeves, “Brain, Mind, and Behavior,” in Whatever Happened to the Soul? 79-87. Soul-body problem: survey - 21

Soul & body: background Specific mental processes have been shown to be tightly linked to particular regions or systems of the brain Examples The hippocampus -- remembering names or events Writing prose and reading it are linked to different parts of the brain. Soul-body problem: survey - 22

Soul & body: background Recognizing faces Damage to the right temporal lobe results in obsessional behavior Soul-body problem: survey - 23