Cartesian Interaction

Introduction

Dualism refers to a philosophical position that assumes that there is a nonmaterial or spiritual reality over and beyond the physical reality. Therefore, our beings are not only composed of a body. There are different types of dualism (Burroughs & Rindfleisch, 2002). The mind-body dualism assumes that the body and mind are separate although interacting entities. This concept originated with Rene Descartes (1596-1650), a French mathematician and philosopher. He popularized the concept of reality as dichotomized into matter, or spatial substance, and spirit, or thinking substance, that includes God.

Cartesian Interaction

The principle is interpreted so as to restrict what kinds or categories of substance can interact; in particular, it is interpreted so as to imply that a cause must be able to possess the same sort of modification as it brings about in its effects. Since a thing's nature determines what sort of modifications it can possess, if this interpretation is accepted, then, in the words of one critic, “as Descartes himself sees the causal situation, one substance cannot produce a modification in another substance which is of an entirely different nature. This conclusion does indeed conflict with Cartesian interaction between mind and body (Malinowski, 111-115).

The category interpretation is striking in part just because it is inconsistent with Cartesian interaction. Indeed, this feature initially makes one suspect that the category interpretation must be incorrect. Descartes provides precious little information about how one is to think about degrees of reality, but he does sketch this much of a picture: things are arrayed on an ordinal scale corresponding to their degree of reality: “reality admits of more and less.”' Infinite and independent substance (God) tops this scale, with finite and dependent substance below; and below all this fall accidents or modes. If there were such things as so-called real qualities or incomplete ...