Discussion Board Forum 1

Chapter 3

Minds and Bodies

A man or a woman is a physical thing like other physical things. A human body is heavy if one lifts it, solid yet yielding if one runs into it, capable of supporting weight if one leans against it. It consists of solids, liquids and gases, variously composed and mingled. It can be analyzed chemically or diagrammed geometrically. It has contours that can be photographed and smells that can be smelled. A human is, in short, a material object.

A man or woman is not a physical thing like other physical things. A sack of cement has weight but makes no weighty judgments; a wooden bench gives support but cannot be supportive. A running stream may be full of music, but it takes a human being to hear the music. A rock may be made into an altar, but it takes a living soul to worship at it. Humans, unlike other physical things, write poems and love letters, invent scientific theories and discover the depths of evil. They are like ordinary material objects, yet unlike them in so many ways.

The Mystery of Mind and Body

This, in a nutshell, is the mystery of mind and body. How is it that this familiar object, compounded out of ordinary chemicals, is yet able to transcend physical limitations and to live a life of the spirit? Or, to come at the mystery from the opposite direction, how does it happen that a rational spirit, capable of speculating about truth, beauty and goodness and of worshiping a Supreme Being, nevertheless finds itself embedded—some would say, imprisoned—in a body consisting of flesh and bone, blood and muscle? However one states the question, it remains a deep and perplexing mystery. And if anyone is ready with a quick and easy answer, it may be said with confidence that such a person has neither probed the depths of the question nor considered fully the complexities and difficulties that arise out of the proposed answer.

It may occur to you, however, that there is something wrong with the way in which the problem is being presented. If we compare a man or woman with a stone or a river, we may see little in common. But what of cows and horses, cats and canaries, lizards and turtles, fish and fireflies? Don’t other living creatures present, as it were, a continuum of cases between humanity and inanimate nature? And mustn’t these be considered if we are to put man in his proper place in the scheme of things?

The complaint is justified and will be discussed in due course. But considering the variety of living creatures does not by any means provide an easy resolution of the mystery of mind and body. Rather, it complicates the problem considerably. For one thing, there is the very real question as to how many of the “distinctive” characteristics of human beings are in fact shared by other creatures. Consider, for example, the controversies about the alleged linguistic abilities of apes. On the other hand, since some of the attributes which distinguish humans from ordinary material objects are shared by other creatures, some of the same questions will arise concerning those creatures as arise concerning human beings. If, for example, we think of a living organism as an assemblage of the microparticles of physics (electrons, quarks, gluons and the like), it seems a considerable mystery how such an assemblage of particles can experience a feeling such as pleasure or pain. Certainly our current physical theory, the best knowledge we have concerning the nature and behavior of these particles, gives us no help with this at all. And this remains true whether the organism in question is an amoeba (if amoebas have feelings), a fish, a snake, a leopard—or a human being.

I believe it is important to see at the outset that the mind-body relationship is deeply mysterious and will remain so whatever theory about it we finally adopt. That is to say, the mysteriousness is inherent in the subject matter and is not just the result of a confused or inadequate way of viewing it. If we do not see this, we may be apt to think we have found the correct answer when all we have really done is to point out difficulties in a rival theory. Thus one may feel that it is obviously absurd to suppose that a mere assemblage of atoms could compose symphonies or worship God—and, therefore, that the correct view must recognize the existence in man of an immaterial mind, soul or spirit. On the other hand, one may point to the numerous difficulties which arise if such an immaterial mind is postulated, and thus conclude that the correct view has to be some form of materialism.

Either of these conclusions might be correct, but as stated both are premature. This is so, first, because on this question (as with many other philosophical questions) there are not just two possible answers, such that by disproving one the other is automatically shown to be correct; and, second, because one is not justified in rejecting an opposing position because of its difficulties until one’s own position has been carefully scrutinized and shown to be free from equal (or even greater) difficulties. But for this latter task, we absolutely need the help of philosophers who do not share our favored view, and who will therefore be both more acute and more zealous in finding flaws in it than we ourselves are likely to be.

At this point we need to begin to define more precisely both the mind-body problem and some of the key terms and concepts that are involved in the problem. One might think that the terms to begin with are “mind” and “body,” but beginning this way would tend to imply that mind and body are both “things”—and this, as we shall see, is very much in controversy. It will be better, therefore, to begin by defining physical and mental properties. Let us say, then, that a physical property is a property or attribute which can characterize an ordinary physical object, whether or not that object is thought of as being alive or as being possessed of “mind,” awareness or consciousness. Examples of physical properties would include such things as being seven feet three inches in diameter, weighing 127 pounds, being purple and smelling like Limburger cheese.

A mental property, on the other hand, is a property which can only characterize an entity which is possessed of some kind of consciousness or awareness. Examples would include feeling pain, seeing something blue, thinking to oneself that 12 is the square root of 144, and smelling something that smells like Limburger cheese. Given these definitions, we can state the mindbody problem as follows: How are we to explain the fact—or what seems to be the fact—that the very same entities, in particular human beings, are characterized both by physical properties and by mental properties?

Let me be quick to point out that these definitions are quite rough-and-ready and are by no means to be taken as the last word on the meanings of “mental” and “physical.” In fact, there has been and continues to be a great deal of disagreement about the best way to define both of these terms. But the definitions given above, with the associated examples, suffice to point out a number of clear cases of mental and physical properties, and for present purposes this is all we really need. Let us proceed then to examine some of the answers to this most perplexing of problems.

Avoiding the Problem: Behaviorism and Idealism

In presenting the mind-body problem in the previous section, we have been assuming that there really are two fundamentally different kinds of properties which are possessed by human beings. If we accept this as a fact, then the task of explaining how and why it is a fact is a formidable one. But what if it is not a fact after all? What if one kind of property, when rightly understood, turns out to be simply a special case, a subclass, of the other kind of property? In this case the mind-body problem might be easily resolved or perhaps shown not to be a problem at all.

We shall now examine two philosophical theories which attempt this kind of resolution of the problem. Philosophical behaviorism states, in effect, that mental properties are really a special category of physical properties; they are, to be specific, behavioral properties of living organisms. [1] Idealism, on the other hand, holds that what we have termed physical properties are really properties of “ideas,” thoughts or “sense data” which exist only in the minds of some person or persons. Either way, the mind-body problem is in effect eliminated by getting rid of one group of properties.

First, behaviorism, which may be stated as follows: When we describe the mental states, attributes and actions of a person, we are really describing the person’s behavior, and whatever can be said by talking about such mental properties can also be expressed by talking directly about behavior. For example, there can be no doubt that Lucy (in the comic strip Peanuts) is very conceited. If we were asked what Lucy’s conceit is, we should probably be inclined to say that it is a mental property of Lucy. It is a state of Lucy’s mind, part of the way she thinks about herself. But if we were asked how we know that Lucy is conceited, we would have to point to her behavior—her actions in setting herself up as a “sidewalk psychiatrist,” her constant disparagement of Charlie Brown and so on. Now, the behaviorist takes the apparently simple step of saying that this pattern of behavior just is Lucy’s conceit. So, too, with Charlie Brown’s inferiority complex, Schroeder’s love of music and the rest. In each case, the supposed mental attribute is really a highly complex pattern of behavior. Normally, to be sure, we don’t trouble to spell out the behavior in detail; rather, we just say “Lucy is conceited” as a sort of shorthand for the whole complex pattern. But the point is that we could spell it out, and if we could not—if we had no idea how Lucy’s “conceit” would translate into behavior—then there would be no sense in our assertion that she is conceited.

At least one further qualification must be added in order to protect behaviorism from obvious counterexamples. It sometimes happens that we think about something, have some feeling or make a decision without ever having the opportunity to express our thoughts in actual behavior. For example, I may have thought about what I would do in the event of an atomic attack, but if (as I devoutly hope) no such attack ever comes I may never do anything about it or even tell anyone about my thoughts. So, what is the behavior-statement equivalent to “Hasker has planned to do so-and-so in the case of an atomic attack”? In order to answer this and to handle many similar examples, the behaviorist speaks of actual and potential behavior; my plan means that if there were an attack I would respond in certain ways. Similarly, a full spelling out of Lucy’s conceit would include statements about how Lucy would respond to this or that situation, even though many of these situations may never actually arise.

The arguments in support of behaviorism are complex and include many criticisms of other mind-body theories which cannot be gone into here. But one major benefit should be readily apparent from what has already been said: It eliminates the mindbody problem. The problem of why human beings have both mental and physical properties resolves itself into the question of why certain material objects, namely, human bodies, exhibit such complex and fascinating forms of behavior. To be sure, that question is not an easy one and may keep scientists busy for some little time, but their concerns as they wrestle with it need not include the mind-body problem.

The other view to be considered in this section, a view first clearly presented by Berkeley, is idealism. According to this view material objects, as we ordinarily think of them, have no real existence. “To be is to be perceived” was Berkeley’s motto—the very existence of a tree, a stone, a building, consists in the fact that it is perceived, now by this mind, now by that one. The existence of such “sensible objects,” as Berkeley called them, is thus entirely relative to the minds which perceive them.

Does this mean that, for example, if no one is looking at a tree, the tree ceases to exist, only to pop back into existence the moment someone else looks in its direction? Berkeley did not say this; what he said, rather, was that no tree ever is completely unobserved, for all that exists is continually present to the mind of God. God, furthermore, is also needed to coordinate the various perceptions which human beings have of the tree. If you observe a tree, for example, your perceptions are continually changing with the wind, the sunlight and so on. If I am viewing the same tree from the other side, then I am getting a different view of it, consistent with my position, the state of my eyesight, and so on. So what guarantees that we are seeing the same thing? There is no direct connection between the idea or image of the tree in my mind and the one in your mind. Nor is there (as we might ordinarily suppose) the tree “in itself,” existing separately from both of us and operating as a common causal factor in our perceptions of it. What guarantees that when you see a tree I also see a tree, and indeed the very same tree? The answer, according to Berkeley, is that God guarantees this. He alone is able to give each of us the perceptions that we need to have, in order that we should all perceive the world as a single, unified and orderly whole. What better demonstration could there be of his power, wisdom and goodness? Berkeley in fact felt it to be a great merit of his theory that abolishing “material substance” made all things directly dependent on God and so put an end to materialism and atheism. But also, and not incidentally, idealism resolves the mind-body problem by making physical properties, as we have termed them, attributes of images or “ideas” which exist only as perceived by a mind.

So we have two opposite methods of resolving the mind-body problem: Behaviorism claims that the “ultimate constituents” of mental states and processes are bits of behavior, while idealism states that the ultimate constituents of physical objects such as trees, stones and skyscrapers are mental images, thoughts in the mind. Obviously both cannot be correct, but is either?

It is fair to say that most philosophers have now become convinced that behaviorism is not satisfactory as a philosophical theory of the mind. It is true that the connection between inner, mental experiences and overt behavior is both intimate and important, and the behaviorists deserve credit for calling attention to this fact and developing it through detailed analysis. But the further claim that mental experiences just are behavior does not seem to be justified, and attempts to show that our mental life can be completely described by talking only about behavior have run into seemingly insuperable difficulties. Only two points will be mentioned here.

First, some experiences by their very nature do not allow expression in overt behavior. Dreaming, for example, is by definition done while one is asleep; the actions “experienced” in the dream are never physically performed, nor can one narrate a dream while having it. The only behavior that can be fixed on as the expression of the dream is the dreamer’s behavior of retelling the dream after awakening. But the dream itself, we think, happens during sleep, when there is no behavior at all. And what of dreams which are forgotten and never recalled? [2] But more fundamentally, is it not obvious that certain experiences (pain, elation, tasting pistachio ice cream and so on) contain elements which, whether or not they are expressed in behavior, are clearly different from overt behavior of any kind? These “raw feels,” as they have been called, seem to be an insurmountable problem for a behavioristic philosophy of mind.

But what of idealism? About this I will say here only two things. First, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to give a direct refutation of idealism—to show that it is logically inconsistent or contradicts established facts. But, second, in spite of this the theory seems immensely implausible; it runs so much against the grain of our normal beliefs about the world that only a really overwhelming case in its favor could make us accept it. A bit more will be said about it in the next chapter. In the meantime, let us turn to some solutions which begin by accepting the real existence of the physical body.

Dualism

By all odds the most influential mind-body theory in Western civilization has been mind-body dualism. Dualism was first developed as a philosophical theory by some of the Greek philosophers, notably Plato. It was adopted by most of the Christian thinkers of the first few centuries and subsequently came to share Christianity’s dominance of European civilization. In recent times it has been placed somewhat in the shadow, but it continues to be the working viewpoint of large numbers of people and as such demands serious consideration. The version of dualism discussed here is that of Descartes, by far the most influential dualist of modern times, but much of what is said applies to other forms of dualism as well.

Dualism begins by taking quite seriously the fact that human beings have both physical properties and mental properties—as opposed to theories like idealism and behaviorism which collapse the two types of properties into one. Furthermore, dualism gives a clear and straightforward explanation of the existence of the two types of properties: physical properties, it says, are properties of the body, while mental properties are properties of the mind.(Dualists sometimes use the word “soul” instead of “mind”; according to dualism the two words refer to the same thing.) The body is an ordinary physical thing, following the same laws which govern nature in general, but it has no mental properties, no awareness of any kind. Even a simple sensation, such as the pain felt when you scratch your finger, is not a property of the body but rather of the mind as influenced by the body.

The mind, on the other hand, has mental properties but no physical properties—it thinks, perceives and imagines but has no size, shape, mass, or even any spatial location. A person’s mind and her body, then, are about as different from each other as any two things could be—yet they are not disconnected; on the contrary, they are continually interacting with each other. For this reason, the full name of the theory is dualistic interactionism.

Whenever you have some sensory experience, such as stubbing your toe or seeing a traffic light, the sensory information, after being processed in the necessary ways by your brain, is “picked up” by your mind, and this is when you experience the stub or the red light. And whenever you decide to do anything, the decision, which occurs in your mind, is transmitted via the brain to the various muscles which carry out the decision. In fact, one can conceive of the mind-brain relationship as being like that between a computer operator and her computer. The brain is the “central computer” for the body, receiving information from the various sense organs and sending out instructions through the nervous system. The mind, as the operator, “reads out” information from the brain and decides on the course of action to be followed, which is then “typed into” the brain’s computer console and carried out by the appropriate parts of the body. Of course one must not think of the “operator” as physically present within the brain: The mind is completely nonphysical and is not literally located anywhere at all; but it does operate on the brain in such a way as to affect brain function and therefore bodily behavior.

Further points of interest concern the origin and destiny of the mind. Since the mind is seen as a completely nonphysical entity, the mind (or soul) cannot be generated through the biological process of reproduction. Instead, many dualists have held that each human person is endowed with a soul which is directly and individually created by God. And since the soul is nonphysical, there is no reason why its existence should be threatened by the death of its body. So dualism lends itself very readily to a belief in life after death. Christian theologians typically have held that the soul will be re-embodied in a changed, resurrection body; this view is consistent with mind-body dualism but is not required by it.

Many of the advantages of dualism are implicit in what has already been said. It recognizes the existence of both physical and mental properties of human beings, and it explains this fact in a straightforward way. It allows full scope for the scientific study of nature. (Descartes, the originator of dualism in the form here described, was deeply involved in the development of early modern physics.) At the same time, it recognizes the existence of an immaterial or “spiritual” part of man, so that certain aspects of human life (for example, morality and religion) cannot be fully comprehended by scientific study alone. It thus lends itself better than many other views to an affirmation of free will, although it does not require this. On the whole, dualism seems to harmonize quite well with a religious, specifically with a Christian, world view.

The most frequent objection to dualism proceeds by attacking the assertion of mind-body interaction which is central to the theory. Once we have conceived of mind and body as two entirely different types of reality, how is it possible for there to be the intimate and continuous cause-effect interaction required by dualism? How can the mind, totally lacking as it is said to be in any kind of physical reality, nevertheless bring about physical changes within the brain? And of course such changes, were they to occur, would come about in defiance of the laws of physics, which presumably govern physical processes in the brain as well as elsewhere.

There is much less in this objection than is generally thought. To begin with, of course the dualist will affirm that the physical processes within the brain are not completely predictable by physical law; the laws of physics describe the behavior of particles and the like when no nonphysical influence (such as that of the mind) is acting upon them. It may be true that there is some difficulty in imagining just how this influence operates, but what of that? There is no reason to think that reality is limited by what is easy for us to imagine. If it could be proved, from premises which are evidently true, that mind-body interaction is impossible, then the dualist would be in trouble. But no such proof has been given. [3]

But there are other difficulties with dualism that are not so easily brushed aside. For one thing, dualism, in spite of its affirmation of mind-body interaction, is hard pressed to explain the extent of the mind’s dependence on the body as we actually find it. From the standpoint of dualism, it is readily understandable that physical damage to the brain or nervous system should interrupt the flow of sensory information from the body, as well as the mind’s ability to initiate bodily actions. But why should consciousness itself be interrupted by a blow on the head or by the action of drugs? And how does dualism account for the profound changes of personality and character which may result either from physical damage to the brain or from chemical imbalances within it? [4] It seems likely that any adequate account of these phenomena will have to recognize that the mind is dependent upon the brain in a way that is more fundamental than dualism is willing to allow.

Another group of objections to dualism arises from the intriguing yet baffling problem of the souls of animals. Do animals have souls or don’t they? Descartes, impressed with the difficulties which arise if we attribute souls to animals, decided that they do not. This means that animals are purely physical automata, with physiological reactions but no actual feelings, sensations or experiences of any kind. When your dog jumps up to greet you as you come home, or yelps when you step on his tail, it may seem to you that the dog really is feeling joy or pain, but nothing of the sort is true. What you observe is entirely the result of automatic physiological reactions within the dog’s body. But clearly this is absurd! In order to avoid the absurdity, the dualist must affirm that animals do indeed have souls—not, to be sure, souls just like those of human beings, but souls all the same.

This, however, opens the way to further problems. Where do all these souls come from? It may seem not unreasonable that God should individually create a soul for each human being, but do we want to say this also about rabbits, toads and termites? And what happens to the souls of animals when the organisms perish? Are they also, like human souls, naturally immortal? If not, why not? And what of those organisms, like starfish, which can be cut into parts with each part subsequently developing into a complete organism? Before such a division there is one starfish and therefore one soul. Afterward, there are two starfish and, presumably, two souls. Where did the second soul come from? For the dualist, no good answer seems available. [5]

These are not, I think, merely frivolous objections. Rather they point to a serious difficulty with dualism. The dualistic view draws, and is intended to draw, a very strong contrast between man as a spiritual being and “mere” physical nature. But the gulf thus fixed between matter and spirit means that the entire living creation other than man is left unprovided for—and it may be that this can only be rectified by abandoning or fundamentally modifying dualism.

Materialism

Man is a wholly material being: This is the central thesis of materialism. Materialism, like dualism, comes in several varieties; currently the most popular variety is the mind-body identity theory. This theory does not deny that humans have both mental and physical attributes but says that both are attributes of the same thing—namely, the living human organism. A human being is his body, and the body is the person.

Another way to look at materialism is this: In discussing dualism, we said that the brain can be likened to the central control computer of the body, and the mind to its operator. But does every computer need an operator? We are familiar in fiction, if not yet in everyday life, with computers that “set up on their own” and operate independently of human control. Think, for example, of Hal, the psychotic computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey. For the materialist, the human brain is a self-operating computer. The thoughts and other mental properties of humans are simply properties of complex, highly organized physical systems—namely, human brains. Whether manmade computers will ever be able really to think—as opposed to simulating thought processes—may be an open question: Does consciousness exist only in biological systems, such as humans and other animals, or would it also arise in a properly constructed assemblage of microchips and integrated circuits? But whether or not ordinary computers can think, the “meat computer” which each of us carries around in his or her head can and does.

One merit of materialism is its simplicity. Instead of explaining human life in terms of an immaterial mind whose nature is obscure and whose very existence is controversial, it limits itself to the familiar material organism whose existence is indisputable and whose characteristics are readily amenable to scientific study. In fact, the desire to have a thoroughly scientific understanding of human nature is one of the strongest motivations for adopting materialism. The dualist’s immaterial mind is seen, rightly, as a barrier that would prevent us from fully integrating human life and activity into a unified scientific perspective in which the laws of physical science are the fundamental operating principles of the universe. The phenomenal success of science to date makes such a unified perspective a reasonable hope, and materialism is the mind-body theory which best accords with this hope. It should also be pointed out that materialism is completely free from the objections noted against dualism: All the objections result from the gulf between mind and matter, and materialism never allows that gulf to open in the first place.

But on further consideration the advantages of materialism may seem less clear. Materialism is simpler in that it has one basic type of substance instead of two, but there remains the duality of physical and mental properties. Materialists have tried in various ways to eliminate distinctively mental properties, but none of these attempts seems to be very successful. And it is not clear that the elimination of mental substance represents a real gain in simplicity if we must then ascribe to the physical substance properties quite unlike those it is known to have in all other contexts. Explaining how consciousness, feeling and other mental attributes arise from combinations of physical particles may not be a great deal easier than explaining the origin and nature of the immaterial mind.

Materialism’s claim to produce a complete scientific understanding of human nature is also open to question. It has to be emphasized that such an understanding does not now exist; scientific progress has indeed been remarkable and must not be ignored, but it is by no means clear that it is leading in the direction of a single “unified science” in which all human thought and behavior is explained in physicalistic terms. And the tenability of this objective is called into question by some of the arguments presented in the chapter “Freedom and Necessity”: It was argued there that physical determinism (with or without a random element due to quantum indeterminacy) entails not only the denial of moral responsibility but also the denial of human rationality—a consequence which is clearly unacceptable to the materialist, who relies heavily on scientific knowledge. Unless this argument can be met, the materialist will be forced to admit that there is after all something about human beings which cannot be captured in explanations couched in terms of the physical sciences.

It would seem that the disagreement between the dualist and the materialist, like that between the determinist and the libertarian, is connected with deep-rooted motivations which do not easily yield to philosophical argument. Persons who are deeply committed to a scientific world view may acknowledge the difficulties of materialism but will tend to cling to it anyway as they work for solutions of the difficulties. Similarly, persons committed to a religious and humanistic world view will continue to affirm at least some of the tenets of dualism in spite of their recognition of the difficulties of that viewpoint. One’s views on the mind-body problem will tend to be strongly influenced by one’s general perspective on the way things are. But the converse is true as well: surely one of the acid tests for a world view is whether it is able to provide a consistent, coherent and acceptable account of the nature of humanity. Both materialism and dualism seem to leave something to be desired in this regard.

Emergentism

There is no logical limit to the number of sections in this chapter. Unlike the free-will controversy, the mind-body problem does not divide up into a limited number of clear-cut, mutually exclusive alternatives. But of the many additional views which could be considered, only one more will be pursued here. Is it possible, we may ask, to develop a mind-body theory which will combine some of the advantages of both dualism and materialism while avoiding many of the disadvantages of each?

The difficulties of dualism arise from the gulf which is created between mind and matter when we assert that mind is a separate element added to the physical organism “from outside.” Materialism, on the other hand, reduces man entirely to a physical organism functioning according to natural laws, with the result that crucial aspects of human existence—morality, rationality, aesthetic experience, religion—inevitably are either slighted or denied altogether. What seems to be needed, then, is a view in which the human mind or soul is grounded in the human biological organism without being reduced to that organism.

Suppose we say, first of all, that the human mind or soul is produced by the human brain and is not a separate element added to the brain from outside. This of course agrees with materialism, but the difference from materialism is apparent when we add that while the mind is produced by the brain and dependent upon it, nevertheless the mind is distinct from the brain and its activities are not completely explainable in terms of brain function. This statement, in contrast with the first one given, indicates the element of truth in dualism which is denied by materialism.

But how can we conceive of the mind-body relationship in accordance with these two statements? Here a helpful analogy may be found in the theory of fields in the physical sciences—the magnetic field and the gravitational field, for example. In both of these cases the field is certainly produced by a generating physical object, but it is also clear that the field is distinct from the object, as is shown by the fact that the object is sharply localized whereas the field spreads out for an indefinite distance in all directions. So, we may surmise, the “field of consciousness” or “soul-field” is generated by the appropriately complex organic functioning of the human brain. And just as the fields of physics continually interact with the generating body (as in an electric motor or generator), so the “conscious field” continually interacts with its own generating organism. Of course the distinguishing characteristics of human beings are not exemplified by the fields of physics. What we can say, however, is this: Just as electrical, magnetic and gravitational fields function in accordance with the laws of their respective natures, so the soul-field functions in accordance with its own inherent natural potentialities, which include, among other things, both rational autonomy and moral freedom. This view may be termed emergentism, in recognition of the appearance or “emergence” of the soul-field as a result of the organization and functioning of the brain and nervous system.

To make this clearer, certain questions need to be answered. What exactly is this field supposed to be? Is it a thing—or, as philosophers say, a substance? The answer is that the conscious field is to be thought of as a concrete, individual, continuing entity, and thus a substance in at least one sense of that term. Is the soul-field a “mental substance,” like the mind or soul of dualism? It is certainly mental in that it is characterized by mental properties such as feeling, choosing and imagining, but it does not share other characteristics of the dualist’s mental substance. The soulfield has spatial location and extension, and it is also physically divisible; under certain circumstances dividing an organism into parts may result in the division of the associated conscious field. The gulf between mental and physical simply is not as wide for emergentism as it is for dualism; that is a principal difference between the views. But isn’t emergentism, after all, a kind of dualism? Perhaps in a sense it is, but it is sufficiently different from the common types of dualism (for instance, the theories of René Descartes and Thomas Aquinas) that it is useful to designate it by a name of its own.

A theory of this kind, while certainly not proven by scientific data, seems to be entirely consistent with all scientific findings to date. And it clearly avoids the major disadvantages noted in the other theories. Unlike materialism, it avoids simply equating a person with her body, and it recognizes the distinctive aspects of human functioning which are negated if it is claimed that human activity is entirely explainable in terms of physics and chemistry. Like dualism, it affirms interaction between a person’s mind and her body, but such interaction is far more credible and intelligible if it is interaction between a field and its generating body than if it is interaction between two substances which are entirely diverse in their nature and origin. And emergentism readily accepts the multiple dependencies of the mind on the biological functioning of the brain and nervous system; for emergentism (unlike dualism) this is what would naturally be expected. Furthermore, the problem about the souls of animals is on this view a nonproblem: Of course the beasts have souls, but souls that are less complex and developed than those of human beings because they are generated by less complex and less developed nervous systems.

But what of life after death? We have not attempted to give a philosophical proof of a future life and perhaps could not do so. It is clear, however, that this is a crucial issue for many persons (including Christians!), one which cannot be ignored in assessing mind-body theories. Does emergentism, with its assertion that the mind or soul is generated and sustained in being by the biological organism, imply also that the soul will perish along with the body? If it does imply this, that would constitute a serious objection to the theory.

But emergentism need not be taken to imply the soul’s mortality. The analogy with the magnetic field may suggest that the field should disappear along with the generating body. But this may not be invariably true even of the fields of physics. A black hole, for example, is an incredibly intense gravitational field which is originally generated by a massive object. But once it has formed, it literally squeezes the generating object out of existence. Thus, according to Roger Penrose, “After the body has collapsed in, it is better to think of the black hole as a self-sustaining gravitational field in its own right. It has no further use for the body which originally built it!” [6] Could the human mind then, like a black hole, become a self-sustaining field of consciousness?

Another possibility, perhaps of more interest to Christians, is suggested by the neurologist Wilder Penfield. He hypothesizes that throughout life the mind is supplied with energy by the brain, but, he says, “Whether there is such a thing as communication between man and God and whether energy can come to the mind of man from an outside source after his death is for each individual to decide for himself. Science has no such answers.” [7]

To sum up this point: Emergentism does not guarantee the immortality of the soul; but it is consistent with the affirmation of life after death for human beings if evidence for a future life can be provided from another quarter. And surely this is sufficient. It should be enough for us if we are able, philosophically, to conceive the possibility of eternal life; it must be left to God to demonstrate the reality.

So much for the strengths of emergentism; what are its weaknesses? Since this view has not yet been subjected to the same sort of intensive investigation and criticism as have dualism and materialism, it may be premature to try to answer the question. It is clear that insofar as emergentism is in many respects positioned between dualism and materialism, it is open to attacks from both directions. Thus, some dualists will view emergentism as a thinly disguised materialism, and some materialists will regard it as merely a minor variant of dualism. The emergentist does share with the materialist the belief that mind and consciousness result from the functioning of the physical organism, and therefore also the difficulty of explaining how this is possible. To this the emergentist, if he or she is a Christian, may respond by citing the biblical testimony that man was created from the dust of the earth—dust which, itself the creation of the all-wise God, is rich with potential beyond our imagining. Whatever view we accept, there is plenty of mystery left. [8]

Eternal Life: Immortality or Resurrection?

In the preceding sections we have implied that dualism is likely to be acceptable to religious believers because it implies the existence (or at least the possibility) of life after death, whereas materialism will be unacceptable because it denies this. A number of Christian thinkers, however, would find this emphasis misconceived. Dualism, they would say, does indeed offer support for the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, but this doctrine is not essential to Christianity and may not even be compatible with good Christian theology.

The belief in immortality, originating in Greek thought, is tied to such dubious notions as that the soul is inherently divine or quasi-divine and that the body is evil, a prison in which the soul is confined until its blessed liberation by death. In contrast to this is the Hebrew, and biblical, belief in the resurrection of the body: It is not that our “souls” survive, but that God on the day of judgment resurrects the entire person for a life either of blessedness or of damnation. Thus the dualist’s belief in a separable soul is at best irrelevant and at worst may represent a damaging intrusion of pagan philosophical concepts into the Christian faith.

Much of this can be dealt with summarily here. It is true that some dualists have believed in the inherent divinity of the soul and the inherent evil of the body, as well as in the superiority of a disembodied existence. But none of these notions are implied by the core conception of dualism as elaborated here, and Christian theologians who are dualists have generally managed to avoid these problematic notions. Thus according to Thomas Aquinas a human being is a composite substance consisting of both soul and body. The disembodied soul, in between death and resurrection, exists in a state of incompleteness, which will be remedied only when God raises us on the last day. While Aquinas does draw heavily upon Greek philosophical conceptions, it is hard to see what in his thought on these matters could be viewed as a betrayal of the Christian conception of human beings.

There remains, however, an interesting philosophical question: Is belief in a separable soul necessary for the doctrine of eternal life? According to one group of philosophers, who may be termed “Christian materialists,” the answer is no. [9] There is no need of a soul to provide the link of identity between the person who dies and the same person resurrected; the truth is rather that the entire person perishes at death—ceases entirely to exist—and then is re-created by God in the resurrection. But, one might ask, is this really possible? Would a person, just like me, created after I have died, really be me? Or would it be a mere replica, a simulation of me? In order to answer such questions, John Hick proposes a couple of test cases:

Suppose, first, that someone—John Smith—living in the USA were suddenly and inexplicably to disappear from before the eyes of his friends, and that at the same moment an exact replica of him were inexplicably to appear in India . . . . Further, the “John Smith” replica thinks of himself as being the John Smith who disappeared in the USA. After all possible tests have been made and have proved positive, the factors leading his friends to accept “John Smith” as John Smith would surely prevail and would cause them to overlook even his mysterious transference from one continent to another, rather than treat “John Smith,” with all John Smith’s memories and other characteristics, as someone other than John Smith.

Suppose, second, that our John Smith, instead of inexplicably disappearing, dies, but that at the moment of his death a “John Smith” replica, again complete with memories and all other characteristics, appears in India. Even with the corpse on our hands we would, I think, still have to accept this “John Smith” as the John Smith who died. We would have to say that he had been miraculously re-created in another place. [10]

An initial response to this might be that while Hick’s examples are somewhat plausible, this plausibility is due to reasons which have nothing to do with the case he is trying to make. In order to support Hick’s case, the examples must be seen as instances of total personal annihilation followed by re-creation. But to a generation of Star Trek fans the first example suggests merely an advanced form of transportation: It occurs to us that Smith’s reappearance should have occurred in the transporter room of the Enterprise! The second example, of course, excludes this interpretation. But I would suggest that all of us, even if we are not professed dualists, have a strong tendency to read the example as though Smith’s mind, or soul, having survived his physical death, is re-embodied in the newly created body. (Hick is, I think, correct in assuming that it doesn’t matter that it is not Smith’s original body which is resurrected. Surely God’s ability to raise us from the dead can’t be thought to depend on whether enough quarks, electrons and so on from our original bodies are available to make the resurrection bodies. For that matter, are resurrection bodies composed of ordinary physical “stuff’?)

Hick will insist, however, that the second example is to be read without the assumption of a soul which survives—that Smith has undergone total personal annihilation and has then been recreated. But is this intelligible? What exactly, according to Hick’s view, is a human being supposed to be? One possibility is that “John Smith” names a general category of some kind, so that there can be any number of John Smith’s so long as they are sufficiently similar in relevant respects. If this is correct, then there is no problem in saying that the “John Smith” replica really is John Smith. In fact there is no logical reason (though there might be other kinds of reasons) why God must wait until Smith is dead to re-create him—there could be any number of John Smiths alive at the same time, and all of them would have equal claim to being considered the real John Smith. And this leads to some interesting questions: If Smith is married, which of the numerous replicas is Mrs. Smith’s husband? And who would be responsible for the parking ticket he got last month?

The obvious alternative to this view—and the one which, I think, Hick and other Christian materialists are really bound to accept—is that John Smith is identical with a certain living human body. But if we apply this to Hick’s second example, then the conclusion we come to is that John Smith no longer exists. Smith’s body exists, all right, but the body is dead; and therefore so is he. The replica body is alive, but this can’t be the body that is identical with John Smith, for that body is stretched out cold and dead on the floor. So the replica is an imposter, a new person remarkably similar to John Smith.

If this is correct, then we are led to the conclusion that materialism really is logically incompatible with life after death. To say this does not in any way deny or minimize the omnipotence of God. The question is not how much power God has but whether the act that is attributed to God is logically consistent. It has long been recognized that divine omnipotence does not include the power to perform contradictory acts, such as creating a square circle or bringing it about that 2 + 2 = 17. If the argument given here is correct, it is equally nonsensical to assert that God creates out of nothing a person that has already lived, died and completely passed out of existence. So it is essential, if we are going to affirm eternal life, that we should hold that in some way the “core person” survives bodily death and continues in existence. And this is just what is offered, in their different ways, by both dualism and emergentism.