ipl-logo

Thomas Nagel: The Mind-Body Problem

1361 Words6 Pages

This essay looks at Thomas Nagel’s account of the problem of consciousness i.e., the mind-body problem. I compare both Nagel’s and Colin McGinn's arguments regarding consciousness. Nagel’s argument introduces us to the intractability of the mind-body problem. The focus for Nagel is not to highlight the distinction between mind and body. Nagel employs one to not be so focused on the problem, rather embrace the possibilities regarding the phenomenology of consciousness. However, this should not deter one from their external investigation, thus giving rise to objective phenomenology. Nagel’s optimism is rooted in the possibility of a different reality that is unavailable to humans given their perception and structure. In this regard, Nagel’s optimism …show more content…

This has seen some materialist thinkers disregard the problem. Materialist has utilised mental reductionism to physical concepts, for example: temperature or molecules movement (motion) (Nagel, 1974: 435). Nagel (1974: 436) believes that conscious experiences exist in a variety of forms. The are two types of properties, that are mental and physical.These are features belonging to organisms predominantly …show more content…

It is evident that McGinn’s pessimism outweighs his rather unsatisfactory optimism. Nagel position on the inclusion of subjectivity has made his argument stronger, given that he acknowledges that one could never completely detach.Thus one could never be curly objective. However, there is a greater role that one’s subjective experience plays in one's brain. This is more relatable, given the environment that one is in. It is through my subjective experience that I am able to formulate concepts. However, McGinn is also correct in pointing out that there are limitations to one’s cognitive processes. I admit that my cognitive closure towards McGinn argument. I still find that Nagel more plausible, as there is room for discovery and investigation. While McGinn has rejected the problem

Show More
Related

Comparing Christian Philosopher 'Richard Swinburne And Tim O' Connor

515 Words | 3 Pages

In this two Christian philosophers, Richard Swinburne and Tim O'Connor, discussed the concept of neuroscience and the soul. The first philosopher, Swinburne, believed in the idea of substance dualism while O’Conner supported the argument for emergent individualism. Swinburne starts off by saying one’s physical body is simply the vehicle we interact with the world while the real essence of a person lies within their soul. When it comes to Swinburne’s belief on the soul after death I am reminded of Phaedo and how death will only bring about separation of body and soul.

Read More

Nagel Rhetorical Analysis

192 Words | 1 Pages

This quote that I will be analyzing and explaining why it is the key quote that represents the thesis of Nagel. Nagel’s main goal is to define consciousness and refute any reductive approach to consciousness. Nagel claims that consciousness is the reason why the mind-body problem is so difficult. Consciously being aware and cognizant is unexplainable because it is hard to reduce down to a single entity. The chosen quote is essentially saying that all organisms have conscious states and in order to truly be that organism or understand, you must understand their consciousness while still maintaining your own consciousness.

Read More

What Is Nagel's Response To Death

732 Words | 3 Pages

Nagel proceeds to respond to his objections with the argument that goodness or evil of a subject depends on their possibility and history, not just their state. Because of this, subjects may succumb to misfortune even though they are not able to experience it themselves. Another reply to the objection that death is not bad is that if one dies, one is not able to experience any more goodness in life if one dies. A response to the question of why death is considered bad while our time before birth is not, is because the time after one dies that death takes away from us and this is not the case for the period of nonexistence pre-birth. At the end of the essay Nagel presents the question of whether the non-realization of further life is bad in all cases, or if this depends on what can be naturally hoped for in life.

Read More

Compare And Contrast The Articles Of Confederation And The Constitution

1511 Words | 7 Pages

The Articles of Confederation and the Constitution of the United States are in some cases the same in many ways. We can assume that the Constitution is the extension of the Articles of Confederation which can be considered as the first Constitution of the United States. The Articles of Confederation were adopted in 1777 and were the combination of 13 states that includes New Hampshire, Massachusetts-bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. By the 1787 the Constitution replaced these articles, which is the existing Constitution of the United States of America.

Read More

Examples Of Existentialism In Grendel

502 Words | 3 Pages

Existentialism is a philosophical theory that was developed by Nietzsche and many other philosophers in the 19th century. In the first four chapters of the novel Grendel by John Gardner, the protagonist and the narrator, Grendel tells a story of his adolescence. Like any teenager, Grendel encounters multitude of events which molds him into what he is; an existentialist. Through the use of diction, personification, and simile in the narration of Grendel, John Gardner illustrates the cause of Grendel’s existential outlook.

Read More

Nagel's Argument Against Psychophysical Reductionism

1672 Words | 7 Pages

Hunter Zappia Prof. Jackson PHI 370 ID#:110906542 Prompt # 1 (Thomas Nagel: What is it like to be a bat) Word Count (not including main quote/citations): 492 In this essay I will discuss 3 important points that stem from Thomas Nagel’s paper “What is it like to be a bat.” The first thing I will do in this paper is define psychophysical reductionism and explain why Nagel is arguing against using such a straightforward psychophysical reduction. Secondly, I will explain how Nagel’s bat example ties into his argument against using psychophysical reductionism to explain psychological phenomena.

Read More

Book Summary: No Rest For The Wicked

341 Words | 2 Pages

I got a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I don’t think I’ve read any book about angels, ever. That doesn’t mean that I’m not interested in books about angels though. I do. So when the author offered me to review this book, I was excited to read it.

Read More

Descartes Sixth Meditation Analysis

1919 Words | 8 Pages

Conclusion: The mind is substantively different from the body and indeed matter in general. Because in this conception the mind is substantively distinct from the body it becomes plausible for us to doubt the intuitive connection between mind and body. Indeed there are many aspects of the external world that do not appear to have minds and yet appear none the less real in spite of this for example mountains, sticks or lamps, given this we can begin to rationalize that perhaps minds can exist without bodies, and we only lack the capacity to perceive them.

Read More

Meaning Of Life In The Absurd By Thomas Nagel

991 Words | 4 Pages

Philosophers such as Albert Camus and Thomas Nagel believe in the ideology that life is absurd. In his publication “The Absurd” Nagel, questioned why sometimes people feel that life is absurd and how should we respond once we are aware of life’s absurdity. Throughout this essay we will discuss what Nagel believes is the best way to answer these questions. To begins his argument, Nagel explains how sometimes people believe that ‘what we do now will not matter in a million years’ which he states is a poor argument because he believes that if our present actions are absurd then their mattering in the distant future can hardly give them meaning. Because if something is to matter

Read More

Thomas Nagel's What Is It Like To Be A Bat

619 Words | 3 Pages

Nagel contributes to the mind-body dualism by posing challenges to faulty reductive theories by discussing the importance of the consideration of subjectivity. He is entitled to the assumptions he makes because reductionism overlooks the gap between the subjective and the objective. Further exploring such gap can signify the creation of new methods that invoke the objective as well as the subjective. As of now the call for innovative approaches to understand the consciousness are essential to better understand our species and others

Read More

Thomas Nagel's Argument On Death

688 Words | 3 Pages

Thomas Nagel’s conclusion is that death is not an evil for the person who has deceased, but rather for others. He begins his argument by attempting to establish whether death is to be considered as an “evil”, how great this “evil” may be, and of what kind it may possess. If the permanent end to our existence is death, would it be considered a bad thing? That is the fundamental question that Nagel asks and thus explores by formulating two distinct hypotheses. The first of these hypotheses is that death robs us of life, which is all that we have, therefore is the worst possible fate and makes death a certain evil.

Read More

What Is It Like To Be A Bat Analysis

606 Words | 3 Pages

In Nagel’s “What Is It Like To Be a Bat?” he attempts to refute reductionism by stating that in order to understand the relationship between mind and body, one must address consciousness and reductionism fails to do that. Nagel lays strong emphasis on what he calls ‘subjective character of experience’ which states that everything has its own interpretation of what it is like to be themselves. Fundamentally, each organism has a unique subjective perspective and conscious experience that is only understandable from the organism’s point of view.

Read More

How Does Kierkegaard Contributed To Emotions?

271 Words | 2 Pages

For existentialists, emotions or moods play a central role. Emotions are viewed as a sensuous presentation as well as a cognitive experience of human finitude. Existentialists contributed to emotions by claiming that moods signify the relation of oneself to the world, where the emotion of anxiety for example signifies freedom. In this paper, I first analyze Kierkegaard’s view as a religious existentialist on human moods and emotions. He presumed that emotions or moods disclose something.

Read More

Aristotle Dualism Essay

526 Words | 3 Pages

He argues that the body and soul are two elements that have the same underlying substance. He maintains that a person’s soul is the same as his nature of body; however, he argues that the mind differed from other parts of the body as it lacked a physical feature. In this case, he maintains that the intellect lacks a physical form, and this allows it to receive every form. It allows a person to think about anything, including the material object. In this case, he argues that if the intellect were in a material form, it could be sensitive to only some physical objects.

Read More

Essay On Predicate Dualism

1009 Words | 5 Pages

The one of common categories enlighted upon for these purposes are substance and property, referring one substance dualism and other property dualism. There is, however, an important third category, called as predicate dualism. Predicate Dualism: Predicate dualism is about the theory that psychological predicates are: (a) Important for a complete identification of the real world, and (b) are not defined further to physicalistic predicates. The mental predicate to be defined in sub categories, there would be some laws which connect different psychological states to physical states carried no information will not bring any information of mental predicate whenever used which could be defined in presence of it.

Read More

More about Thomas Nagel: The Mind-Body Problem

Related Topics

Open Document