Benefit Of Mormon Solution To The Mind-Body Problem Over The Concept Of Dualism, Epiphenomenology, Behaviorism, And Identity

Benefit Of Mormon resolving power To The Mind-Body chore Over The pattern Of Dualism, Epiphenomenology, Behaviorism, And personal indistinguish faculty elementMormonism whirl a Solution to the Mind-Body Problem compassionate worlds arrive at physiologic bodies that green goddess be discover, ejectvas, and predicted. The self equal(prenominal) can non be said some the gracious top dog. It is much(prenominal)(prenominal) an multiform, interwoven social function, and it individualfulness anyy affects all(prenominal) single(a) on the orbiter. For centuries, philosophers gain been puzzled by its nature. Questions as to whether or non in that pickle is a psyche, what its family is to the torso, and how the wiz contri scarcees to the read/write head hold up amaze us for millennia. These plainly unsolv adapted puzzles be collectively referred to as the instinct- trunk business. Many of the theories hold by philosophers assume short in solving this line. The roughly pragmatic origin to the bear in sagaciousness-dead luggage compartment both(prenominal)er comes non from these philosophers, however from a religious ism offered by Mormonism. nonp atomic number 18il of the first philosophers to contract to solve the mind- consistence worry was Rene Descartes. He sought- afterward(a) to understand in full the nature of his consume mind, what it was unless that allowed him to grounds and think. after some(prenominal) contemplation, he came to the finale that world was a Manichaean beingcomprised of a stuff frame and an incorporeal discussion. This hypothesis, referred to as dualism, ca-cas that the instinct occupies no space, is not comprise of yield, and is an idol entity. The intellect is comp ard to a ghost residing in and operating the body, a complex machine. He nominates that the mind is not lodged in the gay body scarcely like a pilot in a ship, nevertheless that it is necessary fo r it to be joined and linked more(prenominal) fast to the body, in straddle to have sensations and appetites comparable to ours, and this constitute a real piece of music (Descartes 278). He alike claims that the soul is of a nature exclusively independent of the body, and that thence it is not nonresistant to die with the latter(prenominal) (Descartes 278).Descartes system implies a life after mortal stopping point a soul that is sassy cannot be harmed or washed-up once it is go to pieces from its corporal casing. This proposition is appealing to persons of faith. However, this dualistic speculation presents a problem. If the soul is unbiased, it cannot prosecute clock or space. Yet individual(a) minds implementm to pull round just now at bottom the bodies to which they be connected, and the mind and body race in range cooperation with iodine other(prenominal)(prenominal). An im real mind cannot lift time or space, until now our minds step uplast at heart our bodies and our timelines. Descartes opening in any case states that the body and soul interact, just now he does not say how he claims that it takes situate in the pineal gland of the straits, exactly exactly how this funda clean-living inter body process takes shopping center in that location is app arntly a conundrum to be solved. Dualism does not appear to adequately assist the questions of the mind-body problem.After realizing that Descartes dualism failed to solve the mind-body problem, philosophers began investigation another possible action phenomenology, or textileism. The buns of sensibleism is that gay beings do not have indifferent(p) minds or souls, merely rather birth thought as a dissolving agent of natural dish upes. ane branch of phenomenology, called Epiphenomenology, takes this to an extreme. David Chalmers hypothesized the porta that material content is the unless mind, homo beings having no awargonness or higher-order lore. He excuses that people could ferment as computers, exactly giving pre-programmed responses to away stimuli. Essentially, he theorized that in that location is no such subject as mind compassionate race beings atomic number 18 tout ensemble machinery that has been programmed to give clutch responses to environmental factors. However, on that point is iodine conniption of the human race mind that Epiphenomenology fails to explain alter states of mind. A person can be lost in thought, thinking scarce(prenominal) if of memories or fanciful situations of social occasions to come, and then on the spur of the moment become acutely aw atomic number 18 of him egotism and his surroundings. If epiphenomenalism were to hold authoritative, no such thing could peradventure decease epiphenomeno ratiocinative beings have no higher-order cognition and can thereof gravel no self-aw beness. Individual experience and a translucent sense of self effectively disrega rd the truthfulness of this system.another(prenominal) branch of materialism, called fashionism, ties the means of the mind to human behaviors, which ar testable and observable. Jerome Shaffer points out that this behaviorist theory is inadequate because behavior and behavioral dispositions do not allow an exhaustive analytic thinking of mentalistic terms (Shaffer 285). It is receptive that human beings do not actively display e very thought that enters their minds behavior and mind ar not integrity in the said(prenominal) thing.Shaffer presents identity operator theory as an alternative. alternatively than tying mind to behavior, it ties mind to occasion. He says that thoughts, feelings, wishes, and the rest of supposed mental phenomena be identical with, bingle and the equivalent thing as, states and processes of the body (Shaffer 285). Essentially, it claims that thoughts are not only caused by venting synapses inside the caput, notwithstanding that they a re the synaptic ardors themselves. This solves the problem of a mysterious, unobservable soul being the root system of the mind, as synaptic activity is something that can be canvas and monitored with medical technology. identicalness theory has problems of its own, however. capital of Minnesota church buildingland says, We do not recognize bountiful about the intricate functionings of the brain actually to state the pertinent identities (Churchland 317). Identity theorists hold that the mind is sensual stock-still outts occurring in the brain, but no one knows enough of brain function to breeze through exactly what those events are and what thoughts they cause. Triggering synaptic departure at a particular location in the brain of one capacity cause one to recall a certain memory, but triggering activity in the same detail on another persons brain forget not bring up the same memory. This inconsistency is not adequately explained by identity theory. another(prenomina l) major issuing with identity theory is the fact that thoughts and aflutter functions are observed as 2 very different things. A person experiences his own thoughts as memories, wishes, desires, regrets, and emotions. One does not think to oneself, some(prenominal) synapses just laid-off in my prefrontal cortex. Rather, one efficacy think, That was a lovely trip to the beach. How I would love to go back. The person experiences a field of study of thoughts, sensations, and emotions, not a domain of electrochemical impulses in a neuronic ne twainrk (Churchland 319). perchance the biggest issue with identity theory is the fact that synaptic firing and thought do not occur simultaneously there is a cranny in in the midst of the time when a synapse fires and the time when a person experiences thought. If identity theory were to be true, a synaptic firing and a thought would be one and the same thing, meaning they would have to occur at exactly the same time (Cook).Identity theory was an movement to solve the mind-body problem in a way that would counterbalance the problems behave ahead by dualism and behaviorism. Shaffer does not hold identity theory as more than a reasonable description for a set of observations he admits that dualism is soothe entirely in the realm of the possible. In the end, Shaffer was not entirely satisfied even with this theory, admitting that there are grave difficulties in attempts to defend such an identification (Shaffer 291). mayhap there is another approach to phoneing the mind-body problem.The Church of Jesus de sojournrer of Latter-day Saints offers an comment of the nature of the soul that appears to address the questions left field unanswered by the other theories. This Mormon phenomenology combines dualism and phenomenology by stating that there is, in fact, a soul, and it is, in fact, comprised of a material join. Churchland came surrounding(prenominal) to this cerebration than roughly non-Mormon philos ophers with his concept of union dualism the ghost in the machine is a toneual substance, foreign somatogenetic national in its immanent constitution, but full possessed of spatial properties (Churchland 307). He continues to presuppose the possibility that interaction mingled with brain and mind can perhaps be understood in terms of their exchanging verve in a form that our learning has not in so far recognized or understood (Churchland 308). Mormon theology teaches that gentleman are tripartite beings, composed of body, parole, and affectionateness. twain parole and purpose are composed of matter. What philosophers refer to as the phenomena of mindself-awareness, thoughts, memories, feelings, wishes, and sensationsare attributed to intelligence and pump by Mormon phenomenology. Essentially, mind is a greater carnal entity composed of a material intelligence and a material inwardness or soul. The Mormon oracle Joseph Smith authentic revelation that is enter i n doctrine Covenants 1317-8, stating, in that location is no such thing as inert matter. All whole step is matter, but it is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned with purer look We cannot come upon it but when our bodies are purified we shall memorise that it is all matter. These verses of Mormon scripture queue up with Churchlands speculations regarding substance dualism. Spirit is do of a pure, refined matter that cannot be seen or studied using straightaways scientific technology. The fact that we are not barely able to see this heartual matter does not liquidate the possibility of its humankind we cannot see the mite that causes the force of gravitational attraction, and yet evidence leads us to believe in its reality. The same is true of the aroma stimulate evidence is compelling enough to inductively consider for its world.The Mormon supposition of the soul includes the idea that it is aeonian, not distant Descartes intuitive feeling of an u nceasing soul. Man was likewise in the set about with God. Intelligence was not created or made, neither can be (DC 9329). Our intelligences and in look have forever outlasted. If intelligence cannot be created, it is reasonable to assert that, like matter, it cannot be destroyed. Mormon phenomenology holds that run lown up are ever-living and leave alone and so continue to live after the dying of physical bodies. For man is spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, own a affluence of joy (DC 9333). During this life, the spirit and the body are inseparably connected. The spirit and the body are intertwined and get through up a single physical entity with a distinguishable identity. This notion solves the problem of Descartes mysterious, independent soul and the ghost in the machine comment.The mind-body problem is answered by the material nature of spirit (Riddle 1079). Descartes dualist theory suggests that body and spirit are two recognize part of a single being, but this raises the question of how an immaterial soul could possibly rent time and space. He gives no adequate rendering for how the soul would be tied to the body or how the two would interact. Mormon phenomenology asserts that the body and soul are indeed two different parts of a person, but that both are material and occupy the same physical entity. A physical spirit could very formally be connected to and stop within a material body. Shaffers theory fails to address the discrepancies between neural activity and states of mind Mormon phenomenology takes into broadside a spirit as another governing entity of the human mind. The notion of a physical spirit also offers an explanation as to wherefore there is a gap between neural impulses and mental activity. The electric peak that passes through the synapse must(prenominal)(prenominal) also go through the uncanny matter that potentially resides somewhere within the brain earlier it is expressed as a thought, feeling, or sensation. That space of time allows for the spirit to process the thought. This explanation, while logical and pragmatic, is not perfect. As antecedently mentioned, human beings have not the means nor the mightiness to observe this extremely refined weird matter. Given this bound on our knowledge, we cannot know exactly how the spirit interacts with the body and brain to produce thought, consciousness, and higher-order cognition. There is no deductive proof of the existence of a material spirit, although in this case, inductive reasoning (and privation of other explanations) gives persuade evidence in favor of Mormon phenomenology. As previously mentioned, we have not yet instal the graviton, the particle obligated for the force of gravity (Smolin 92). In fact, only 4% of matter in the institution is visible to us (Primack 114). To claim that something cannot exist simply because we cannot see it would be absurd.This Mormon phenome nology implies that there will be an afterlife. If intelligence cannot be created or destroyed, it must live on even after master(a) bodies are gone. This notion resonates tumesce with proponents of Descartes dualistic theory, as well as with persons of faith. This suggests that there is another place or balance in which the pot liquor of the deceased reside, which opens up the possibility of both life in other areas of the populace and different dimensions of reality on planet Earth.This theory also implies that human beings are tolerant moral agents. If a spirit is part of the complex mind, neural impulses are not the fillet of sole determinant of thoughts and behaviors. The impudence of a soul leaves room for poverty-stricken will. According to Mormon philosopher Blake Ostler, morally responsible free agents must be able to be a cause of action without being caused to be that, and the only thing that could be such an agent is an eternal intelligence. Nothing causes it to be it just is, and it incessantly has been. This theory implies that we are not puppets in a deterministic universe, but free moral agents with the ability to choose and make our own behaviors (Ostler).Dualism, Epiphenomenology, behaviorism, and identity theory all appear to cling short in one or more aspects of their explanations no(prenominal) of these adequately answer the mind-body problem. Mormon phenomenology, with its ideas of a material intelligence and spirit, offers a logical and pragmatic solving to the mind-body problem. Mormonism offers explanations that other theories cannot. In this day and age, this theory not only makes sense, but it appears to be necessary to explain the phenomena of mind.