Princess Elisabeth's attack on Descartes' Dualist Theory of Mind (from 1643)

[@auntieroach]

Jeffrey, you are fuelling my passion for philosophy as I enter my first semester of my philosophy major! Thank you!

[@csm5040]

What do you plan to do with your major after you graduate, if you don’t mind me asking?

[@MatthewPalomino-l3u]

For the Christians amongst us Princess Elisabeth is the Granddaughter of the King James of bible fame

[@ericloscheider7433]

Daughter

[@alex2ghsisj]

​@@ericloscheider7433 I believe it's granddaughter. Queen Elisabeth of Bohemia was her mother and daughter of king James

[@ericloscheider7433]

@@alex2ghsisjyep you are right. Thanks

[@guadalupeboanrobles4913]

I have homework about Elizabeth and there is not a lot of information in Spanish so i'm trying to figure this out. Thank you a lot and greetings from Argentina!

[@ephemeral1151]

Hello I'm a psychologist from Iran, eager to learn Spanish. We can exchange some knowledge if you wish.🎉

[@nucderpuck]

Princess Elizabeth makes a remarkably clear argument. Interestingly, her thinking is in the spirit of Newtonian mechanics, although the Principia were actually published more than 40 years later.

[@bryanreed742]

Yeah, exactly. Today we have modern physics, computational analogs, the theory of natural selection, etc. to help support this intuition. But she had this insight without even having access to Newton's second law of motion. Truly impressive and well ahead of her time.

[@MugenTJ]

It’s called common sense. Philosopher often think outside the box that lead them into many errors.

[@hunterwashere6242]

@@MugenTJ isn't philosophy all about challenging and questioning what we consider to be "common sense"

[@MugenTJ]

@@hunterwashere6242 sure. Not all conventional wisdoms or common sense are immuned from critical assessment of their validity. That’s how they become more robust over time.

[@geraldharrison5787]

It's a very bad argument and it was first made by Gassendi (and she - Elizabeth - would have read Gassendi's objection as it appeared in the first edition of the Meditations). Descartes was - rightly - dismissive of the objection when it was made by Gassendi (read his replies to Gassendi - they're scathing). But Elizabeth was his friend. She is being misrepresented as some intellectual giant. She wasn't. There is no originality to her objection. And Descartes was not scathing in his replies to her....because he liked her and these were private communications never intended for publication.

[@geraldharrison5787]

It was GASSENDI, not Princess Elizabeth who first raised the 'problem' of interaction (and with which Descartes was thoroughly unimpressed). The Meditations, including Gassendi's objections and Descartes' scathing replies to them, was published in 1641. Princess Elizabeth would have read these and was doing no more than repeating Gassendi's objection. And this was in a private communication with a friend. Elizabeth, unlike Gassendi, was someone Descartes liked. What Descartes said in response to Elizabeth is not, then, fairly taken to represent his view. She wasn't putting him on the ropes at all. His actual view of this kind of objection was that it's just based on a false premise. What was Descartes actual response to the problem of interaction? That is, what did he say to Gassendi about it? This (quote) "Finally, it just isn’t true that the mind couldn’t move a body without itself being a body." And later "[this is]a ‘problem’that doesn’t exist because it· assumes something that is false and can’t in any way be defended, namely that two substances whose natures are different (like the soul and the body) can’t act on each other" There. And he's quite right to be so dismissive. There is no problem of interaction. There doesn't begin to be a problem. It is only if one just assumes at the outset that the only kind of thing that can causally interact with an extended thing is another extended thing that one might think there's a problem....but why think such a thing? Perhaps one might assume, no less arbitrarily, that only things of the same kind can causally interact. But as well as having no basis in reason - again, why think such a thing? - this, if true, would imply not that the mind is material, but that the material is mental! For the mind and events concerning it exist more surely than material substances and events. Thus if it really is true that the mind could not causally interact with extended stuff, the conclusion to draw is that the stuff with which the mind clearly interacts is itself mental too. That is, at absolute best - so, assuming the truth of a principle that is in no way self-evident to reason and that appears to be false - the problem of interaction implies not materialism about the mind, but immaterialism about the sensible world. Something else should be noted. You do not have to be able to explain 'how' something is happening before you can have good evidence 'that' it is occurring. For instance, I haven't the faintest idea how my computer works. But it's working. Or at least, appears to be. I would be reasoning badly if I concluded that my computer cannot really be working given I don't know how to explain the appearances. So, we do not have to be able to explain 'how' an immaterial mind could interact with a material body before we can have good evidence 'that' they are interacting. And we do have good evidence they are interacting: they appear to be. My mind appears to be an immaterial thing. My body appears to be an extended thing. My mind appears to be interacting with it. There. That's excellent evidence that there is causal interaction between the immaterial and the material. I don't have to explain how and nor does Descartes.

[@aleksandarnedeljkovic8104]

It didn't allow my first response , i will try to be short, thank you for common sensical response . He himself proved interaction ( non physical) in first part that he just ignored in later part . I don't understand why does it have to be phisycal to move physical . Just mind ( not brain) doesn't move stuff like physical push or whatever . Something doesn't have to occupy space in order to move things in space , or to be first cause of moving things in space to be more specific.

[@geraldharrison5787]

@@aleksandarnedeljkovic8104 Yes, there is no reason whatever to suppose that only substances of the same kind can causally interact. If mental events can cause mental events, and material events can cause material events, there is no reason to suppose mental events incapable of causing material events and vice versa. Furthermore, being unable to explain 'how' such interaction may take place (and it's not even clear what's wanted here by way of explanation, for what can one do apart from to point to instances of apparent interaction....of which there are plenty, of course), does not undercut evidence 'that' such interaction is occurring. Those who think there is a problem of interaction are as confused as a person who thinks that because I can't explain how my cell phone is working, I don't have any evidence it is working. I must say that I think contemporary philosophy of mind is a joke. It effectively involves assuming minds are lumps of ham - because science studies ham and only things science can study exist (they assume.....for precisely no reason whatsoever) and then noting that if we assume that minds are lumps of ham we are confronted with a load of problems that we would not otherwise have had.....and then they try and solve this artificially generated problems. It's silly. Descartes, Plato, and the bulk of the great philosophers were correct: our minds are manifestly not material objects, but immaterial ones. There is precisely no evidence - none - that minds are material. There is just a dogmatic working assumption - one driven by the misguided idea that the only things that truly exist are things science can investigate.....an arbitrary and self-undermining claim, given that science cannot investigate whether science is doing what these philosophers think it is.

[@aleksandarnedeljkovic8104]

As to how , it is irrelevant to the subject. I can say non material mind creates x substance that is material to cause a movement . Now going further we could say but how mind creates x substancd , and we are in a loop . The point is as you said it , body mind connection , and immaterialism of mind and i don't understand how people don't understand . I saw one comment about neurology . Yes , if you change someones brain you will alter conscionusness , etc . Well no one was arguing that , we all know that . However that new mind will still remain immaterial . There is connection between physical brain and immaterial mind and that is one more reason for actually reaffirming Decartes position . And , obviously Decartes and people in 17 th century knew there was a brain just to say. I didn't know modern philosophy was in such a problem tbh. I am not a phiosopher by formal education , i just love reading it. That being said i am tryiong to read the old stuff obviously . Idk philosophy maybe should reassert its position . That is science - philosophy relation , and i didn't know it was that bad.

[@aleksandarnedeljkovic8104]

Also , i wish i am wrong and someone else is correct , and that mind is material , just undiscovered . Because , whoever discovers the mind itself and proves it, is getting all the Nobel Prizes that year 😂. But that's,not gonna happen.

[@aleksandarnedeljkovic8104]

I re- read your response. Actually if that is the notion : that because science recognise existance only of material , " able to investigate and prove" things it is real problem to philosophy . Philosophy in my mind should have it's own course , out of what scientists think about world or philosphy itself .

[@FusterCluck_9000]

Isn't gravity immaterial? And electromagnetism for that matter? Photons have no mass, doesn't that make them immaterial too?

[@tishadearing8762]

I am in the middle of writing my term paper on neural dependency on the mental, arguing in favor of physicalism. Prior to stumbling on to your channel, I was having a difficult time with it. Thank you for explaining things in a simpler way. With your help, I think I will be able to turn in a pretty good paper.

[@profjeffreykaplan]

Glad to help!

[@markc4176]

Physicalism fails to mention that some movement exists without cause…entropy itself, in a physical world alone, has no prime mover to place order into the original system…time also “moves,” giving rise to the question (and subsequent questions): what constitutes a “movement” in the first place, and can we even limit the action to merely a quality of material things?

[@howlrichard1028]

​@@markc4176 You are equivocating different definitions of movement there. Time and entropy "moving" is in no way the same thing as a physical entity moving.

[@markc4176]

@@howlrichard1028 actually no, you only think that because your definition of “movement” doesn’t include the variable of occurrence WITHIN each component’s applicable dimensions-i.e. time “moves” along an axis within time dimensions, while spatial objects “move” along an axis within spatial dimensions. To say that they are different is to say that a specific case, where change in time is set to zero, defines the universal constraints of every system, which isn’t the case. In a case where spatial change is set to zero, the thing which “moves” simply does so within a dimension unique to its own nature.

[@howlrichard1028]

​​@@markc4176 Do notice how you had to make the distinction between time itself and spatial objects. This is an admission that we're jot talking about the same type of phenomenon. Time doesn't move, physical entities move through time.

[@bullhaddha]

Why Princess of Bohemia?! She was Elisabeth of the Palatinate, related to the House of Stuart from the mother's side (her grandfather was James I and VI - of England and Scotland). Her Father was the King of Bohemia for a very short time, which was the spark for the 30 Year War. Besides that episode he was Prince Elector of the Palatinate, and that's the house she was born into.

[@ByzantineCapitalManagement]

It wasn't a spark . It was for a different reason.

[@jamesjulianguerrero7217]

Thanks for this

[@profjeffreykaplan]

You're welcome. Here is how I do that: kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJDHZWeYocaSfaM

[@jamesjulianguerrero7217]

@@profjeffreykaplan that's cool! im taking a modern philosophy course this sem so expect me in more of ur videoss

[@robbiekatanga]

I had a similar intrigue!

[@fearitselfpinball8912]

Loving your videos. The last paragraph you quote seems to be attacking interactionism in both directions. Not only how can an immaterial mind raise an arm but, if I get injured, how can the material brain cause pain - 'pass on' this information if it is unable to affect an immaterial mental state? So, not only, how can non-physical mental states touch matter in order to impact it, but how can matter (the brain) be the 'type of thing' that creates or affects non-physical mental states. The latter problem, it seems to me, is really the hard problem of consciousness. How is the public, observable, material stuff (a brain) the 'kind of thing' that should cause private, unobservable (except by oneself) states of experience?

[@fearitselfpinball8912]

@@arletottens6349 I would agree except for the word 'experience'. I used to do some coding... I've also built things that are purely mechanical but have a 'housing'. While unseen code is running or while unobservable mechanisms are turning in a closed housing there's at least some kind of 'privacy' to that. I don't think though that this is the same as the computer or a watch having a subjective 'experience'. There's also a special use of the word 'private' in these scenarios which doesn't mean so much inaccessible (except by the subject) but rather, closed-off but only difficult to access.

[@fearitselfpinball8912]

@@arletottens6349 in that definition I would quarrel with the idea that there is a "you" in relation to a Tesla. As a person, like the Tesla, I have (physical) 'components' - the brain, different systems (circulatory, nervous, etc.). Like the Tesla, all of these physical components and systems work together... However, consciousness, to me, is _this sense that I have_ that I am this singular someone, experiencing my own thoughts and environment through and in my body. That's the 'you' in your definition that I think the Tesla with all its physical systems interacting is _completely_ missing. For all its complexity it senses nothing more than a rock.

[@Phat-D]

the first thing that comes to mind is a radio, transceiver and motor. how do we move the mars rover and how does the mars rover tell us what its finding?

[@BelegaerTheGreat]

Pointless. The spirits' uniqueness is exactly that they can be moved by the immaterial, they are like a bridge.

[@jonathangrigg4238]

What if the point is that the body has to seek to connect with the mind?

[@kwas101]

I just though of a good name for a band. "Princess Elisabeth and the Super Spartans". I'll see myself out!

[@ichbifeuertrunk]

Princess Elizabeth never heard of the Force.

[@serversurfer6169]

_"If you understand the problem…"_ *shots fired*

[@pashute12]

There are 3 conditions for movement. The first is that there already was movement in the causing body. But then, there are only two types of propulsion causes in the letter: the impulse and the shape. Both depend on the body that causes the movement. In modern physics we would call the first determinant the moment which is the current speed and mass of the body, and the second determinant is it's direction due to the angle of contact which comes from its shape.

[@tugbaozcan96]

0:28 king of something !!!!! :) LOL

[@bigjothinks]

Jeffrey, you're the man! Thank you for uploading all of this top-notch philosophy content, you're really a positive force, my friend.

[@chrisw4562]

Thanks for the great lecture. I don't believe in dualism, but in Descartes defense, wouldn't it be plausible that animal spirits are an interface between non-physical and physical world, almost like a transceiver performing the communication? EM waves were unknown during his time, but maybe he was thinking about something like that, a mysterious phenomenon. That said, instead of claiming the mind is something immaterial, he could have said it is something unknown to the scientists of the time.

[@fazalnajam]

that "king of something" 0:26 really threw me off on another space/time domain.

[@justrichard2491]

Princess Elizabeth has this backwards. The mind is not "moving" physical stuff. Consider the body to be a type of mechanical "listener". If you know a little about programming, or how cable television for example works, you have a broadcast and a bunch of listeners with programmed functions that "do stuff" based on what they hear when listening to the broadcast. Think of the body the same way. The body isn't a car being driven by a soul. Rather, it is a set of biological machines that all do what they're programmed to do when they receive certain stimulus. Whether or not you think that the mind is separate from the body or not, you will have to agree that it is the mind that takes a decision and sets the body to conscious work. How exactly does the body's systems "listen" to the mind to perform the conscious movements? The body is, after all, just waiting for stimulus before it does something. Even the automatic functions work this way, receiving some sort of stimulus, for example dry eye or bright light, before the eyelid blinks. Is it entirely impossible that there is some part of the body that is able to sense things that essentially exist outside of what we consider to be the "physical world?" I'd argue anecdotally that there is a significant percentage of the population that believes in senses beyond the physical realm. So, what if there is a metaphorical pineal gland, some part of the body or brain that can sense some plane of existence, which may or may not be physical according to our current definition of physics? If our essentially mechanical bodies respond to what they sense, couldn't they also respond to stimulus from that other-worldly realm? With difficulty, we explain the internal workings of the mind. Actions of the mind that don't involve any type of interaction with the body are certainly hard to categorize by behaviorists. But as our technology increases its range of understanding how the brain works, we see that different parts of the brain are lighting up on our sensors when we're thinking thoughts that don't trigger any other bodily systems to "do their thing." Also with difficulty, we talk about planes of existence both in time, space and size where energy patterns are observable at the limits of our discovery, clearly with some sort of physicality, but beyond our comprehension. Personally, I don't think Descartes even believed that the soul/sprit/mind didn't have any extension or form. He might have stated that it doesn't have form or extension in our material world, but that doesn't necessarily preclude having a form and extension in some plane beyond his/our understanding. Continuing with my own personal opinions, I believe that one day we will be able to sense and understand the physicality of the mind, wherever it is located. Minds are too similar that we won't be able to isolate and recognize similar patterns. I'm actually betting that the missing sense that connects us to our own minds, and potentially to the similar thoughts of others is one of hearing. But only time will tell. Personal speculation aside. If the spirit realm, alternate plane, or even if the mind simply exists within us; why does it have to be classified as "non-material?" The microscopic world was once non-material for all intents and purposes. Just because we can't detect something doesn't mean it doesn't have extension and form. Anyway, the only reason I replied to this video was to try to point out that it is unlikely that the mind "pushes" buttons or anything like that. Rather, the body is trained and wired to respond to stimulus. It is a broadcast/listener model, and not a machine model -- like the mind driving a car.

[@r.michaelburns112]

Another huge issue for dualists is why physically altering the brain (through drugs or surgery or physical damage) can so radically change the way the mind works. If the mind were truly independent of a physical brain, then changing things about the brain should have no impact at all on the mind. But we KNOW that this isn't the case -- everything from mood-altering drugs to procedures like lobotomies to strokes and other medical events can drastically alter the mind...

[@Phat-D]

if you mess with antenna on your tv you can get different channels to come in maybe halfway maybe static, sometimes moving the antennas can also clear up the image

[@JebeckyGranjola]

Yeah, but that is the whole basis of Rationalism. It seems obvious that if you chop off Descartes head, he's not going to be thinking about anything. So it's an absurd proposition. But Descartes was trying to wrestle with the modern question we might ask: How do we know we aren't living in an advanced computer Simulation? In other words, he wanted to start from scratch and determine what we can know with certainty. And the first thing we can know is that we have thoughts, thus thought must have a substance. Can we have a body without thought? Not that we know of. That's why he concludes they are separate.

[@r.michaelburns112]

Well, we can definitely have bodies without thought, unless you embrace some very extreme version of the anthropic principle and assume that only by observing things consciously do things come into being. Concluding that we can be certain of thought before anything else is not the same as concluding that we can be certain of thought ABSENT anything else. Descartes also went on to try to prove that our perceptions of the world are accurate, that we do indeed have the bodies we think we have. (I don't think he did it very well, but that's another matter.) As to TV antennas, if that analogy were true, shouldn't minds be accessible to multiple brains, just at TV signals can be picked up by any nearby antenna?

[@JebeckyGranjola]

@R. Michael Burns Epistemically we can't. Descartes was also aware of the Hard Problem of Consciousness, and this was part of that. On that note, he also infamously believed that non-human animals, lacking human souls, did not possess thought and were robots. I'm not saying that he's correct; I don't believe in Dualism. I'm saying that placing Descartes theories in the framework of neurology is to place them within a different context than they were meant to be understood. It also can't be overlooked that Descartes believed in the Christian God, so he could not accept that God's mind only existed in extension.

[@r.michaelburns112]

@@JebeckyGranjola I take your point. My critique was of dualism generally, not really of Descartes per se. That said, I wonder if he was as Christian as he portrayed himself to be. My senior thesis advisor in college had the notion that Descartes may have written some of what he wrote to keep the Catholic church from doing to him what they had done to Galileo. And given how weak his argument for God is, and some of what he writes in the Meditations on First Philosophy, I can see it.

[@siondafydd]

Another interesting related problem: Where is France? I think it seems that France is in the same place as Descartes’ immaterial mind. Is France just the constitution, the ink and paper sitting in Paris? Is it the people and cultural doings of those living north of the Pyrenees? Is France the electrical impulses in the minds of people? Point me towards “France”. Surely France just is.

[@potterna1101]

Problem doesn't sound devastating to me or perhaps anybody who has seen Star Wars. The Force. Or electrical solutions.🤷‍♂️

[@zak8657]

This assumes there is such a thing as "stuff" (matter/extension). The bible answers this in John 1:1.

[@ibhafidonjob6490]

Oftentimes magnets don't need to contact it object before exerting it's force. In a grand scale we can see it in gravitational pull. How do we explain that

[@Faismajeed]

trying to better understand, is information considered physical? If not then we have a case of a non-physical thing (information and commands) moving a physical thing i.e. software commanding hardware. It appears a piece of code can move electrons and motors and move mechanical arms. Of course, this argument rests on information being non-physical which on the surface seems to be the case

[@rizdekd3912]

It would seem the example you raise...information in computers IS transmitted by electrical...electrical impulses. I would think electrical impulses qualify as physical. The 'information' as in the concepts the humans contribute in the form of code gets back to the problem of what is conscious comprehension.

[@sortysciaofiscia]

princess Elisabeth made a 5D royal fork move

[@0NeverEver]

Can we applaud that Decart realized that the mind body interaction is mainly dependend on something in the brain?

[@karadayi3300]

Thank you very for this explicit info! Please, what do you think about the below analogy? Elisabeth was right because considering this analogy, the distinct poles of a magnet, the negative and the positive pole. These poles are different or separable (dualism), but both have a connection with each other they have to can into contact. Looking from this view they have the same properties that's why they can come into contact. To conclude, since the mind is immaterial (unextended) and the body is material and existing in spaces, they can't come into contact.

[@Akael01]

Prove the physical isn't a figment of my mind

[@andrewforbes1433]

Prove that it is.

[@Akael01]

@@andrewforbes1433 can't do either. Damn phaneron!

[@andrewforbes1433]

@@Akael01 If I've imagined all this, I'll be very disappointed in myself.

[@FeelingArtsy-tt3uw]

Thomistic model is made more sense than Cartesian.

[@evammooi]

how do you write so nice in reflection? 🤓

[@joaovitormendescerqueira6985]

Descartes sounds kinda nuts

[@dogsdomain8458]

Most dualists just give a non-answer like "oh its a grand mystery". There are similar problem with platonism and moral naturalism. It seems like, in principle, substances of radically different types cant interact. If they do, well then they would just be considered physical. Ex. The EM feilds and quarks are distinct substances and are very different in terms of properties. But both are physical because both "work together" and so are subsumed by physicalism.

[@philosphyandherbs]

all bull shit literally babbling everyone, there is only one word, one sense

[@logiciananimal]

Both possess energy. There's a decent hypothesis that all real things (all matter in the broad sense) are that which possess energy.

[@lifes40123]

A dualist can argue that consciousness is an inmaterial product of the brain/neurons

[@lauranquakenbush5238]

Can't the dualistic theory be defended by the theory that the pineal gland or some portion of the brain acts as a transmitter.. kind of like mobile broadband. Where the mind influences the brain which then directs the body physically. The brain is like a person piloting a drone. And the mind is the voice on the comms guiding the person on hoe to pilot the drone?

[@ilicythings]

The way that Descartes describes the seperate substances (mind and body) doesn't let that work. While we can't touch radio waves, they are still physical things. What Descartes described was the mind being fundamentally seperate from the physical world.

[@joshwood7177]

@@ilicythings Furthermore, the mind would need to have some degree of control over the pineal gland in order for the mind to relay information to it. If the mind has any degree of control over the pineal gland, it must be physical. Princess Elizabeth claims that only the physical can have contact with the physical "Contact seems to me incompatible with a thing's being immaterial".

[@korbendallas5318]

So he writes in mirror-English?

[@thefireman3476]

There is a third view often accepted within occultism, but not widely talked about in openly discussed philosophy. Which would be that reality is not dual, nor is it physical, but only mental. This is for example accepted as true within Hermeticism (The Kybalion is an excellent starter book if you are interested in this philosophy). The first principle within this body of knowledge is that "The Universe is mental" Further more we explain this view by stating that the underlying essence of the universe, that is everything that everything is made of, is consciousness. Mater would be materialised/condensed consciousness, our minds or souls fragments of the original consciousness.

[@daelalbuquerque]

Hi. I really enjoy your lessons, and sorry being 3 years late to this one. But, sideway question: on 10:13, why where you pushing when saying pull, and pulling when saying push? By the way, I am brazilian and, in portuguese, push translates to EMPURRAR and pull translates to PUXAR. It is a known false cognate.

[@WHITEOUTbomber8]

Great video, thank you for the in depth analysis!

[@xryanv]

But doesn't quantum physics show that the consciousness of an observer has a material impact fundamentally on reality itself eg. the double slit experiment? So we know the conscious mind does have an impact on the physical world even if we don't know how. If it be material or immaterial we know either way it does have an impact through this quantum process and not just by a physical interaction like the kind described in this video.

[@none8680]

One of the explanations proponents of dualism have brought is the intervention of God in making communications between mind and body which is just funny imo.

[@horaciovelutini9158]

We don’t know what is 95% of the universe made of, we think dark energy expand space & time meaning affect matter without touching it apparently. ¿It’s posible the none physical of our consciousness is a part of what we don’t know and related to the dark energy and matter of the universe?

[@sergiogiudici6976]

I love the English-speaking approach to Philosophy. i think it is called "analytical" in opposition to "Continental" (France, Germs, Italy)

[@texas77563]

It seems like there is really only 1 form of stuff and that is energy. Energy at different layers and types and frequencies. We experience solid matter but its just a different way that energy builds itself into stuff in our physical layer. The only thing that makes sense is our mind and consciousness is made up of a higher form of energy than our bodies are. If we have a spirit than the spirit is our mind in a different layer of existence that the all connect layer of energy lives in. I think its a negative energy or the unseen side of energy that is beyond our physical layer that we dont have the ability to experience. I dont think our mind is entirely inside our bodies. This cosmic mind so to speak is what operates the electrical nerves and brain waves that function our body parts. Is there a cosmic mind theory?

[@kensey007]

Liz: Hey D. Taste this Hard Problem of Consciousness.

[@canwelook]

Descartes may have been a brilliant mathematician, in that imaginary realm, but does not come close to the brilliance of Princess Elisabeth in the practicalities of the real world. He speculates a hypothesis of duality, which is fine to do. Only problem is he lacks supporting evidence, or even a method to test his hypothesis in the real world. Princess Elisabeth, rightly, asks him to provide the testable mechanism that would support his hypothesis, and Descartes comes up woefully short. Part of reason he went wrong may have been his desperation to be lauded for 'proving' the existence of a god through a Cosmological argument. But without any mechanism to prove dualism to be true, all thoughts of interaction between the mental/spiritual and the physical can be seen as unsupported and specious speculation.

[@ruprecht9997]

What about stating that the soul is able to sense the state of the body, and the body is able to sense the state of the soul. At least the body demonstrably has sensory organs, such as eyes, but for the soul to have any relevance in this world, it needs access to input to physical (extended) organs, like eyes and ears. One may be able to keep the dualism term, as negating it perhaps leads to rejecting all kinds of spiritual stuff, which must have been problematic in the 17th century, as well as today. I don't know what else the princess wrote in her letter, but one would think she'd question where the soul got its memories from, or else the mind and soul would not have any of the identifying characteristics that we think of, such as knowing stuff. An empty mind inside a black box seems irrelevant to our understanding of ourselves.

[@mbadiwedaniel1474]

Please in which book would I get this Princess Elizabeth's attacks so as to reference her well? I'm writing a project on Descartes. Write now I'm looking for strong argument for and against.

[@Arunava_Gupta]

Mind moving and animating matter is a fundamental fact of reality. What now, Princess! 👍

[@flyingmonkey3822]

You can get an idea about material from a mind, but you can’t get a mind from material. Idealism FTW.

[@robbiekatanga]

Objection clearly explained, but how does the mind and body interact? Clearly, these are two distinct entities or are they 2-in-1?

[@lifes40123]

I interpret the princess as saying "If the mind doesn't exist in the physical universe, how can you think in the first place" Sure, the mind and consciousness are dependent on the physical brain and neurons, but since consciousness is an inmaterial product of neurons, does that not make consciousness inmaterial which is what dualists believe in?

[@GRDwashere]

Perhaps there is no distinction between the mental and the physical except for the distinction we artificially create ourselves since there is only the mental, and what we think is the physical is just another mental construct in the category of mental constructs to which we attribute the property of physicality.

[@scottgarber697]

so the mind otherwise compels the described self-propulsion in a way we do not yet understand?

[@shubhamsuroshe3054]

oh wow

[@chriselyr2484]

Interesting argument, but I'll stick with Uncle Gilbert ;)

[@0NeverEver]

6:05 Yes.

[@HH-ct6ld]

Why not talk about Daniel Dennett's "Quining Qualia"?

[@battlefieldcustoms873]

someone dying happens in the real world. causing the emotion in the mind and then back out physical again in a response. That feels very physicalist to me and I am leaning that way these days

[@Alexayp]

The solution to the “problem” is understanding of the principle of polarity. The principle is based on understanding, that perception of polarity only arises in the eyes of the perceiver, when he starts comparing qualities of a particular aspect or perceived object on a specific scale, that has multiple degrees measuring that quality. For example hot and cold. There is no source of coldness, there is only source of warmth, and so, the less warmth we perceive, the more cold it seems to be. In other words, If you have a certain idea what hot is, then you will measure coldness according to your set point of hotness. In a larger cosmic spectrum of temperatures, your hot and cold means nothing. Just like Light and Darkness mutually define each other, in other words, darkness has no separate existence from light, the degree of darkness raises as he light source disappears. Two are simply the degrees of the same thing - Light. Physicality of the mind and consciousness of matter are also no secrets. 3D physicality is an extension of the mind in the act of playful creation. The difference is only in the spectrum of frequency of vibration of these layers of reality’s our body vibrates on a lower frequency then our mind (In case of conscious alignment, however, the vibrations of mind and body start harmonizing, so that contrasts start looking more like correspondence and interdependence). There are several other layers of energy with different density (spectrum of frequencies) between body and mind, all intimately interrelated. So, there’s no question about correlation between mind and body. And there is no question about 3D spacial extension of the mind. Both, Descartes and Princess were right, and I think that the might of known the exact meaning of the game they were playing, but that is not disclosed in their “official” personal CORRESPONDENCE. Descartes was a visionary and he used the best available to him language to describe his insights. Princess Elizabeth was very well educated and well-versed in philosophy, held regular correspondence with many prominent European thinkers of that time, including Leibniz, and was a passionate follower of Descartes, and his theory, as it intrigued and inspired her intellectual eagerness. The intellectual conversation did not mean an argument, it meant an expansion of the understanding through the filters of contrasts. Comparisons are dedicated the mankind, which is eager to know itself and involves all different ways to reach an understanding of the reality (including this very video and discussion). It’s not a bad problem, it’s a very good one! Good problems, as always, are hidden treasures of genius solutions and divine insights!

[@petermeyer6873]

"Physicality of the mind and consciousness of matter are also no secrets. 3D physicality is an extension of the mind in the act of playful creation. The difference is only in the spectrum of frequency of vibration of these layers of reality’s our body vibrates on a lower frequency then our mind" Hm - that calls for another thought experiment: "Mary 2.0" aka "Mary senses colorfull fireworks only in her mind" Mary - you might have heard of her, she lives in a black and white room she never has left before and thus never has experienced any color especcially not red - her favourite, hears the doorbell ringing and receives a present by postal delivery. The present is from a secret admirer, a philosophy student, who, with means that neednt concern us now, has somehow found out her address and makes that gift via ama**n express delivery to her. As she unpacks it, it turns out to be a big, red, fully charged, ready-to-be-used-out-of-the-box vibrator. This device of course comes with an operating manual. Mary is well read, as we all know, and so she allready knows everything a girl of her adult age ought to know about vibrators - in fact she thinks she might allready know everything there is to know about them through her consumption of certain printworks alone even though she never possessed such a device herself. However she carefully reads the manual and it states, that this vibrator has a special feature: A built in speed gouvernor with a random number generator changes the vibration frequency every now and then. Here are some rethorical questions to you: A) As Mary reaches climax, is it then that the frequency of her conscious quale of that vibrator in her mind at that very moment is in total sync with the frequency of the material vibrator? And if so, has the material vibrator also reached a mental state due to his current frequency? B) In case you feel ashamed now, reading this thought experiment, which was made up especcially to challenge your theory of the mechanically vibrating conscious mind, then why didnt you feel ashamed when you where typing the above cited lines?

[@themongreldiscourse8853]

very good! thank you, the opposite of Occam's razor as described in another lecture, but there are really no opposites only relations. I fear the professor is looking too much backwards instead of forwards and we'd do better not hanging on outdated arguments. Consciousness does somehow explicably and inexplicably -- another false polarity -- influence the physical world, and we need a lot more of it soon. The unified truth is only known fleetingly in art and parables, glimpsed out of the corner of the eye. The need for proofs and stable quantities of information in a relative world cannot but fail rather drastically by Elizabeth's type arguments to address a qualitatively experienced reality -- the truth will use the polarity before devouring it. We can only move forward together in good faith in the ability to communicate and understand each other without proofs, which seem to be the central concern of modern philosophy, when Socrates figured out long ago that "all I know is that I know nothing"

[@notanemoprog]

Well, somebody's doing the pushing!

[@shawnfleming1330]

It seems like propulsion by influence would make sense.

[@julietaroll590]

I go to UC Berkeley and u are 100 times better than my philosophy professor !!!

[@profjeffreykaplan]

I was a GSI at UC Berkeley for many years!

[@13rolf]

what if how the mind rules the body (or the body rules the mind, I don't know*) doesn't concern philosophy? *yes, I did it.

[@13rolf]

I mean, it may be that it doesn't matter how it happens

[@vhawk1951kl]

*Any*music at_all gets a dislike.music is not necessary and adds nothing

[@foolishspeaker8382]

am so in love with philosophy ..Prof how can one formerly attends online classes

[@alancosgrove4728]

Is there a reading list or course notes and assignments for this course to download or view?

[@abrahamkabon1459]

Its not that big of a problem tbh. After all, there is a problem to the problem.

[@missmix48]

I obviously had a pretty smart 9th gr grand mother

[@RVSP21]

That was interesting... thanks Its important to understand that through the time we keep evolving and getting knowledge of things like MAGNETIC FILED & VIBRATION

[@nathanjora7627]

We do but they don’t really change the parameters of the problem, magnetic fields are physical and have extensions in time and space, unlike what Descartes thought.

[@TheiSwanTV]

“In him we live and move and have our being”

[@pujapachchigar6713]

Thank you for such a clear explanation. I absolutely agree with Elizabeth's attack. Unfortunately, some people from the philosophy of mind still talk like Descartes and think that the mind is different from the brain and neuronal level description can not determine the behaviour of an individual.

[@profjeffreykaplan]

I agree that Princess Elisabeth's attack is extremely powerful. But even if she is right, it doesn't necessarily follow that the mind is identical with the brain. Perhaps you know already, but the view you seem to agree with is called the "Mind-Brain Identity Theory" (here is my video explaining it kzbin.info/www/bejne/sICTpJ-wiNqrpqs ) and it does face some challenges (here is a video explaining the central problem with it kzbin.info/www/bejne/qJWbpHyKd9OcoMk ), and then there are problems with physicalism in general (here is one such problem kzbin.info/www/bejne/l5K9k3aZqdGfopY and another one kzbin.info/www/bejne/h5m3g5WOpct-rZo ). So there is more to be said, but P. Elisabeth was definitely on to something.

[@pujapachchigar6713]

@@profjeffreykaplan thank you for suggesting me these videos. I was lately pondering on this view. These videos will give me some more clear view.

[@BANKO007]

All these arguments are another way of saying that if there is an immaterial soul, what is the "force" that connect it to the physical world. It is literally a one sentence argument. If we ever solve consciousness, we will solve this too. Consciousness itself seems to be non-physical in that it exists in addition to the physical particles that are necessary to support it. It creates no additional, measurable, physical property or quantity. If it did, we could measure whether someone is conscious or not. Yet each of us knows it exists while it remains undetectable in the physical realm. Descartes is correct. Elizabeth is also correct. There is no paradox even thought there is a missing explanation yet to be found.

[@realbland]

just because it's a one sentence problem doesn't mean it isn't a problem. consciousness, to me, seems like it *must* be physical, because if it is non physical, there must be some point at which non physical stuff not only interacts with the non physical, but creates it. obviously a human egg has no conscious, non physical experience or existence, so at some point, whether in or out of the womb, that purely physical existence must give create a non physical consciousness. the dualist needs to answer how this is possible

[@BernardS4]

Doesn't the rejection of dualism requires rejection of the transcendental?

[@andrewforbes1433]

What if it does? Not being snarky, just wondering why that would be a problem.

[@kurtissutley1485]

Doesn't modern science render this issue moot. We have a far better understanding of how the "mind" interacts with muscles tissue and other bodily functions without demanding a separation or requiring a dualism at the exclusion of more than one possibility. In other words, sometimes it works one way and sometimes it doesn't.

[@rizdekd3912]

The puzzle now is how does that process produce consciousness and qualia. IOW, yes they may think they can explain how light enters the eyes and causes us to blink instinctively/reflexively for example or why tapping the knee causes the leg to jump, but that doesn't explain why we are conscious of seeing light or why we are conscious of the process.

[@andreas7250]

4:20 "that's what she said"

[@judeevans8303]

This is pretty interesting. I never thought much about this kinda stuff, but after putting on one of your videos for background noise to help me sleep, I became interested. The most intriguing thing is this whole physical/mental debate. I had always assumed that uploading your mind into a computer was possible because it's all physical, it's all stuff, I never considered the dualism position.

[@TheMargarita1948]

The reason you may never have considered the dualism position is because dualism is the default in our culture. Dualism means the “mind” is something different from “the brain.” The mind is immaterial (none of this nasty flesh and blood) and lives off in some other universe somewhere. If you accept the evidence that the mind is the brain, right at home in your skull, you are a non dualist.

[@manavkhatarkar9983]

13:18 well, that's me.

[@putinstea]

Bad audio 😵‍💫

[@xjyang001]

Very nice!

[@RonLWilson]

Quantum physics might provide the answer in that one can only determine the probabilities of what happens at the quantum level. As such these are assumed to be random but that assumption could be wrong and they only appear to be random. This introduces a bit of a disconnect in regard to causality. But say some immaterial body such as the soul or spirit or whatever can affect these in such a way that they appear to be random but in fact are not. And neurons in the brain might be ample to amply what takes place at the quantum level at the macro level. As such the brain might act more as a transducer or interface with that immaterial world and not as the sole cause of thought. And in regard to the other direction, who is to say that the immaterial cannot be aware of what physical states without effecting them by being so.

[@profjeffreykaplan]

Here is what I think Princess Elisabeth might say (if she were here to learn about quantum physics): suppose that the brain can 'amplify' what happens at the quantum level to produce movements of the body on a larger scale, how could an immaterial thing affect physical things at the quantum level? We can grant that what goes on at the quantum level at least appears to be probabilistic, but physical probabilities are still physical. How can something not extended in space affect the probabilistic characteristics of something in space? It can't get up close to them.

[@RonLWilson]

@@profjeffreykaplan That does seem like what she would might say. But then lets say that our physical world is in fcat just a computer simulation and the laws of physics that we experience are just governed by equations and such. The computer program both can know whatever it computes and can compute whatever it wants while we (as creatures in that program) can only see the results but not the underlying process that produces those results. Yes, we might be able to see that those results seems to be governed by some principles and even figure out over time what many of those principles are and so doing replicate some of those equations in that program that in fact produce those results. But at the same time there may be processes in that program (and also form the programers that created that program) that we are not privy and thus may never be able to replicate or derive and may appear chaotic or random as a result. Now I am not saying here we live in such a simulation but rather use that as an illustration of how two realms can coexist where one has full knowledge and control over the one and the other does not but can develop some sense of the principles that are employed in that other realm by observing what it can observe. And BTW, in all fairness for the good princess, in her day they had neither any knowledge of quantum physics or of computers in addition to modern neurological science so no telling what she might have thought had she lived today. And there seem to be two camps in regard to quantum physics. One that thinks this apparent randomness is just due to our inability to observe what al the relevant factor nad this think it is indeed deterministic, while the other thinks that it is truly randomed and thus there is some mystery agent that causes things to happen outside of what is observable and hence the disconnect with causality in that something happens with no cause of that the cause is something outside of the realm of the thing caused like that computer program is outside the realm of those creatures that live in the simulation.

[@TheMargarita1948]

Princess Elizabeth sounds like a person of normal intelligence. The “problem” with dualism is that it it self-evidently wrong. The real question for me is: how was it that a person (Descartes) who, having given the matter a great deal of thought, did not see the error. How is it we are expected to venerate this “great mind” who could not see the problem immediately?

[@Arunava_Gupta]

Why do you feel dualism is wrong? What's so problematic about it?

[@TheMargarita1948]

@@Arunava_Gupta No one has yet answered Princess Elizabeth’s question: how does the non material entity (the mind) affect the material body (the arm muscle, say) to cause movement? Unless you (YOU) have a credible explanation for that, you, too, must doubt dualism.

[@Arunava_Gupta]

@@TheMargarita1948 How does consciousness emerge from neurons? Isn't saying "somehow it emerges" nothing but believing in black magic?

[@Arunava_Gupta]

@@TheMargarita1948 As regards the interaction problem, it's actually no problem at all. The immaterial conscious personality connected to the brain is *by nature* a mover and animator of matter. It's a fundamental fact of reality. 👍

[@TheMargarita1948]

@@Arunava_Gupta I don’t think many physicists would accept than “explanation.” It sounds like magic to me.

[@Islamiccalling]

Maybe I misunderstood but I don't think this problem holds up anymore because we know non physical things like a collection of information can move things. Such as self driving cars. Physically there is little to no difference between a self driving and a normal car. Yet one needs a driver the other doesn't. So we have plenty of examples of non physical things moving physical things, I don't see how you can say this is not possible without doing some kind of equivocation and changing the meaning of physical as it seemed to be described in the letters. Great video btw.

[@williamjenkins4913]

Electricity is one electron bumping into another so it is physical. All computers including the self driving car are fundamentally mechanical gates to those electrons. Programming is very clever but at its very base still a series of physical reactions.

[@bryanreed742]

What makes you think the collection of information stored in the physical circuits and physical memory of the self driving car is non physical? It's not the abstract mental category in your head that's controlling the motion of the car. It's the electronics in the car.

[@GregoryWonderwheel]

The main problem with modern philosophy is that they don't challenge or question their own primary and basic assumptions.

[@artlessons1]

That is the problem. They do the challenge but need to be more intelligent!

[@shubhitewari4283]

Is there an argument that can be used to defend mind/body dualism against the puzzle raised by the Princess?

[@Phat-D]

only possible thing i could think would be some sort of radio, transceiver and motor analogy. wave lengths aren't material but they operate through a material medium

[@gideonelson8418]

Is her argument flawed in a sense that her premise of how objects must be moved (her 3 descriptions) doesn't account for a 4th way? For example the way that gravity moves an object. Yes you can say that "exerts a force" on the object but this force does not involve contact or self propulsion... the limited way in which we understand gravity does require extension though ( the more extension or greater the mass the larger the force) Newtons law which doesn't come for 40 or so more years follows this, but general relativity states that anything energy included can produce gravity or be affected by it even with out mass or therefore extension

[@canwelook]

The analogy to gravity is interesting but far from comparable or explanatory. Gravity normally involves mass which demands extension. To an extent energy influences gravity, although it is normally minor due to it being scattered. Can you look at energy as having extension too? I think so. E.g. A magnetic field extends into very defined areas and patterns in space. Similarly you could look at this as contact between the magnetic field energy and the magnet-attracted object. But even if you don't like these arguments, the relationship between objects/energy in say a magnetic field are simple to the point where a mathematical formula can predict movements. The potential complexity of imagined dualistic mind/body interactions can reasonably be considered infinite and not subject to similar formularisation.

[@AppleSauceGamingChannel]

You're assuming that gravitational pull isn't physical because it isn't 'contact'. If you want to get technical, two molecules never actually touch each other when they are, as you seem to put it, in 'contact'. You're redifining 'contact' as a very limited concept when what is being discussed is a broader use where 'contact' is used to describe a physical action resulting in a physical outcome. The point being that something not physical cannot produce a physical outcome nor vice-versa.

[@TomCarberry413]

If we stare at someone standing a distance away from us, almost always that person eventually will sense it and turn towards us. The starer "caused" the watched person to look. Today, materialism, or physicalism, dominates the world views of most people and it seems to dominate 99.9% of "smart" people. Because people put so much time and effort into getting into the PhD box, few will ever dare to peer over its edges. Thomas Kuhn wrote about this in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. This occurs in basically every academic field, such as history, religion, philosophy, etc. You can't get your PhD in any subject unless you go along with the programming. Our ideas of the nature of the universe come mostly from a very narrow set of viewpoints. And since all of us went to mandatory puppy training academies as children, most of us won't question authority, even when obeying it means engaging in evil.

[@TheRomishRoad]

That's not a difficult problem. How does a computer program move a machine? Interfaces.

[@smb-5003]

Nothing ever touches. Atoms just fight to be balanced so dualism makes perfect sense

[@simonruszczak5563]

Matter is made of energy, (E=mcc). There is no physically of the Universe, it's all forces. Mind and matter are made of the same stuff.

[@joshc4519]

The physical world has these same questions/paradoxes. Is light a particle or a wave? It has the characteristics of both, so sometimes you assume its a particle, other times a wave. Basically every religion from ancient times to now confess both a body (physical) and spirit (mind) and all assume they have to interact with each other by consciousness and free will, though how, nobody knows - and how could we measure with physical instruments things outside the physical realm? The physical world (non-living) we observe is all cause and effect with time. Consciousness is the last effect, and free will is the first cause. It is like "divide by 0" in terms of cause and effect, and we can replace cause with influence and effect with feeling. Animals and people have spirit and body and we interact with both the physical world and spirit world, though most of the spirit world is invisible to us (and maybe most of the physical world too). As a side note, I know there is a God. He has worked miracles involving me and others I know.

[@heymomarockme]

This non-academic home philosopher wonders if the immaterial mental push on the physical body is like Einstein’s ‘spooky action at a distance’ description of quantum mechanics where one particle affects another seemingly unconnected one. Two physical things, yes, but an immaterial space between possibly acting as a medium? My apologies if this is covered elsewhere in another discussion or comment. Enjoying the videos and the ensuing thoughts they provoke.

[@jasonzheng976]

Descartes is right. Only problem is to make sense of interacting with body. Even body is physical, but it is not the stone. Mind can not interact with stone. But body is different.

[@coffeeisgood102]

Dear Princess Elizabeth, There was a time when, just for the fun of it, I would move physical objects just by looking at them. To ensure that there was no possibility of me being able affect the object by physical means I would stand four feet or more from that object and move it in any direction I wanted just by using my concentration. I don’t pretend to know how this works but it is at odds with your theory that only physical force can interact with physical objects. So I must side with Mr. Descartes on this topic and agree that we are dual in nature.

[@GregoryWonderwheel]

There is only one suchness. Consciousness is only possible by the polarization process. Dualism is the belief that the bifurcation is objectively literal. From the mind-only perspective everything is a psychic event. From the materialistic perspective everything is a physical event. Both are perspectives, however we must admit that every thing we think and say is primarily a psychic event that becomes expressed as and within consciousness. There is no knowing of physical reality that is not first mediated and situated as mental or psychic reality.

[@sedevacantist1]

How difficult is it to understand that the mind controls the brain? We breathe air, and we can will that to stop, and that is not a physical act, it's not moving anything physically.

[@adenjones1802]

I'll give you an example of something immaterial or without extension which can move object nevertheless. The law of gravity. I cannot measure touch, taste, or smell the law of gravity. I can measure its effects on the physical world. But I cannot measure the thing itself. The law of gravity itself is immaterial yet it has no extension in space and was not pushed by something else. Its hard to say if it is self-causing but that is one thing. This disproved queen Elizebeth's theory of interaction.

[@rizdekd3912]

You can measure how the movement of objects through time is modified when space and time are warped by mass. All those are physical things, aren't they? And the fact that mass warps time and space is indeed a puzzle, but I don't think of it as a nonphysical process. EG magnetism extends out from some objects and causes some sorts of metals, for example, to move. We can't see it, touch it, taste or smell is, but the effect it has on metal IS how it is detected. In like fashion, that is how the effect of mass on space/time is detected physically...ie how it affects physical things like light bending around hugely massive objects in space.

[@adenjones1802]

@@rizdekd3912 Space and time are physical or i suppose its more accurate to say they are dimentional. As in they are dimensions. But the law of gravity or to use your example magnetism, even if say there was a particle like a graviton or a magnetron or something which was responsible for these forces, their behavior has no reason to act the way they do except by a law which governs its behaviour. If there can be no reason to say that the immaterial interacts with the material, other than by logical nessesity, then there can be no reason to say that atoms interact with each other since they have no particular reason to do so other than they just do and it makes sense of our observations. If a person had never heard of atomic theory they could lobby the same criticism against it queen Elizabeth does against dualism. Immaterial can also mean not made of matter. Magnetism is not made of matter as far as we can tell. Yet it has an effect on matter. Even if this immaterial thing was a product of physical things that would merely be amalogous to the duslist theory of epiphenominalism.

[@rizdekd3912]

@@adenjones1802 I think the physicalist or materialist would consider something that affects other physical things to be physical. Are you conflating tangible with physical? Tangible has the connotation of actually being detectable by touch (and I would include any of our other senses...sight, smell, hearing and tasting) . But I think a physicalist would contend that something (force or field) that could be 'detected' by how it affects other physical things that are ultimately tangible is in the category of physical. So magneticism while not thought to be directly touchable/sensed by the human body (ie it might not be tangible) does affect other things that are physical like iron and we can see and measure that effect. Likewise gravity, while we may not be able to detect any actual particles or actually see gravity directly, does affect other things we can see, so we think of it as physical...ie a physical force. That is unlike how Descarte described the mind as an nonextended substance...ie it doesn't exist as a physical object or force. Frankly I'm not sure what he, or anyone for that matter, means when they say something is nonphysical/nonmaterial while at the same time imagining it to be able to somehow influence the physical world as the mental does. It all does come down to confusing semantics.

[@adenjones1802]

@@rizdekd3912 if a physicalist defines anything that can affect physical things as physical, then that is begging the question. Queen Elizabeths argumet assumes her conclusion in her argument. The whole point of our argument is that there are non physical things which affect physical things but if to a physicalist, anything that affects other physical things must be physical by definition, then they have defined dualism out of existance. It becomes non-falsafiable. I would say "immaterial is that which is to you, physical yet intangable.

[@adenjones1802]

@@rizdekd3912 if a ghost existed and moved an object but was not tangable, would it be physical.

[@oflameo8927]

No, you can't keep the dualism, but you can drop the physical stuff instead of the mental stuff.

[@mrmousetrapcar]

Some propose, including myself, that there is no causal relationship or interaction at all. The shape of an apple and the color of an apple are two distinct expressions of a single event; the apple. The shape of the apple does not cause it’s color nor does it’s color cause the shape. In the same way, the mental and the physical are two distinct parts of the same event. We are made of the physical stuff so it’s much more obvious to us, while the mental is much less obvious, sort of like how an ant crawling on an apple could see it’s color, but it would be too small and too close to see its shape. They do not need a causal relationship. They are correlates that arise mutually without interaction.

[@AppleSauceGamingChannel]

The ‘colour’ of an object is the wavelengths of light that it reflects. This is determined by the arrangement of electrons in the atoms of that substance that will absorb and re-emit photons. The 'shape' of an apple very much determines its colour.

[@ΑντώνιοςΤρισμέγιστος]

@@AppleSauceGamingChannel but the main argument is still valid: there are only events, occurrences, which can be described as having both mental and physical properties. Whitehead thought that it’s the most meaningful description. Essentially there is a here&now perspective on the content of the event, and there is a later&outside perspective. From the “inside” there is a complex of unconscious, semi-unconscious and conscious “mental” processes, while the same “being” viewed by the external observer will appear as brain and nerves. Then the only question is to find correspondence between internal and external contents of the event. In your case the physical properties of the electron shells of the surface atoms (and the characteristics of EM waves that are reflected by them) plus the specifics of human retina and optical nerves and “brain structure” in general is the outside perspective, while redness of the apple is the inside perspective. In this line of thinking you only need to consider events in space-time and their content, and this content can be described as being not mental nor physical per se: mental for-itself and physical for-other events.