You have probably heard the phrase mind over matter, which implies the mind and matter are separable. Or maybe you have heard it’s all in your head, or it’s mental. Both of these phrases imply the separation of mind and brain (or body).
So to explore this issue, I’d like to share some videos that discuss the unity of mind-body. They can help us better understand how inseparable the mind and brain (body) really are.
Mind vs. Brain: In the above video, Yale psychologist Paul Bloom says, “The mind is a product of the brain. The mind is what the brain does.”
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Thank you for putting together this compilation of videos. With graduate background in neuroscience and biophysics, plus a medical degree, I feel well prepared to assess this topic. I started out convinced of the positions presented in these videos, but my opinion has changed. Although I am not sure of the truth, it seems to me that the dualist viewpoint still has considerable life in it.
For the more knowledgeable proponents of dualism, the question isn’t whether there is something physical called ‘brain’ and something nonphysical called ‘mind.’ The more subtle question is: Can we be justified in assuming that what happens in a material object called a brain can only affect other material objects via recognized modes of physical communication (light, sound, touch, chemical sense)? Or do subtle and deep quantum mechanical interconnections exist that allow brain activity to influence remote events? If the latter is true, then in a (quantum) physical sense the mind does extend beyond the brain. The brain is necessary for mind, but mind is not limited to brain.
There have been many well argued treatments of this possibility, based on plausible interpretations of quantum physics. The evidence base is, admittedly, scanty. But more and more data are being collected consistent with the hypothesis.
This is the more modern and scientifically informed formulation of mind-body dualism, and it is not dead in the water like the primitive and outdated arguments debunked in the latter three videos you’ve posted. The UTube commentators take the easy way out: they dismiss a viewpoint they don’t like by using the least compelling versions of it as strawmen.
Unlike the debunkers, I don’t claim to know the answer. But I do know that they aren’t even asking the right question. Why not? Because the more sophisticated arguments couldn’t be demolished in ten minute videos. They remain viable and offer scientifically testable hypotheses. Some people think data already exists which supports these viewpoints; skeptics dismiss this meticulously collected work. Time may eventually tell us who is right, but it hasn’t yet.
None of this changes anything with regard to psychiatric issues, but it’s important to be clear about where the argument really stands.
What Will Meecham said. Spot on.
All the monists can talk for hours about the semantics of the brain mind duality, but NONE ABSOLUTELY NONE can describe a marginally satisfactory physical mechanism that can create qualia. Nor can they suggest a mean of physically locating, measuring or quantifying qualia.