Life and Death Flashcards
How was Plato influenced by the philosophers that came before him?
- Pythagoras gave Plato his belief in immorality, religion, mysticism and maths
- Parmenides gave him the notion that reality is eternal, unchanging and timeless
- Heraclitus gave him the conviction that there is nothing permanent in the physical world and that true knowledge cannot come from the senses
- Socrates gave Plato his preoccupation with ethical problems and a desire to explain ‘purpose’ in the world.
What did Plato attempt to find a resolution between in his philosophy?
Between the Heraclitan view of the universe, that the world of appearances is constantly changing, with the Parmenidean notion that reality is one and unchanging.
What was Plato’s theory of knowledge?
He believed that knowledge is recollecting what is in your head already, not perceiving new things. The problem for Plato was that if the world is constantly changing, how can the world or the senses be relied on? He concluded that they cannot and that true knowledge had to come from elsewhere. He concluded that it was pre-existant. True knowledge consists of concepts (ideas already in our heads), not information (ideas that come to us through our senses)
What example did Plato use to explain his theory of knowledge?
He presents Socrates as setting a mathematical problem for a slave-boy to solve. The slave-boy has never been taught any maths, but he manages nevertheless to solve the problem. This is because he knows the answer already, even though he does not know what he knows. Socrates’ claim is that we do not ‘learn’ we ‘remember’. The knowledge exists in our minds all along; we possess it from before we are born.
What quote does Plato use in his example to explain the theory of forms?
Socrates says; “Either he has at some time acquired the knowledge which he now has, or he had always possessed it. If he always possessed it, he must always have known; if on the other hand he acquired it as some previous time, it cannot have been in this life, unless somebody taught him geometry.”
What did Plato believe was the advantages of his theory of knowledge?
It means that education and experience do not matter; true knowledge is innate in us, and we do not have to rely on our senses for knowledge of the world.
What did Plato believe about the world?
- That the world is divided into reality and appearance (the One and the Many)
- Our information about the world is divided into knowledge and opinion. Knowledge is what we seek, but opinion is usually all the we have. Plato advances the view that opinion usually passes for knowledge.
What did Plato argue about opinion and knowledge?
Opinion results from objects as presented to the senses. Objects in the natural world therefore have a contradictory nature: opinions clash about them and it is impossible to have true, universal knowledge. He claims that the person who concerns himself with beautiful things has ‘opinions’ about them, but the person who concerns themselves with Beauty itself can possess ‘true knowledge’.
What quote did Plato use about true knowledge?
“And those whose hearts are fixed on the true being of each things are to be called philosophers and not lovers of opinion? Yes, certainly.”
What two worlds did Plato believe in?
- A visible world- the world of the senses, a world of opinions
- An intelligible world- a world beyond the senses, a world of true knowledge, a world of the Forms
What quote does Plato use about the Form of the Good?
“The highest form of knowledge is knowledge of the form of the good, from which things that are just and so on derive their usefulness and value. THe good, then, is the end of all endeavor, the object on which every heart is set…”
What did Plato believe about gaining true knowledge?
True knowledge, for Plato, meant abandoning the world of the senses and seeking by reason to discover the Forms of universals in one own’s mind. Grasping these forms lead to grasping true knowledge and, finally, to grasping the good. Only the Forms could be ‘known’, but the changing, physical world of nature could never be truly ‘known’ and was not a fit subject for philosophical contemplation.
What is meta-physics?
It involves searching beyond the world of the senses for an explanation of why the world is as it is, looking for the ‘one’ behind the ‘many’. The term comes from Aristotle’s work.
Why did Aristotle criticise Plato’s Theory of Forms?
Aristotle argued that, pushed to its logical conclusion, Plato’s Theory of Forms appears ridiculous. If a particular dog is merely a picture of an ‘ideal’ god, is there then a third dog- an ideal of the ‘ideal’- behind the ideal? If so is there one behind that, and behind that? What is the sense in talking about an ideal dog at all? More over, what about one-legged pirates, or blind white rabbits? Are there ‘ideal’ Forms of theses?
What did Aristotle believe about knowledge?
- Knowledge is perception
- The natural world is the real world
- Perception and sense-experience are the foundations of scientific knowledge
What quote does Aristotle use to highlight that knowledge is perception?
“And for that reason, if we did not perceive anything, we would not learn or understand anything, and whenever we think of anything, we must at the same time think of an idea”
What did Aristotle argue about material substances?
He deals with the question of change and continuity in physics. He came to realize that material substances are, in fact, composite. All substances, Aristotle decided, have two parts: material and structure- or ‘matter’ and ‘form’, both of which belong to this world, not the world beyond.
What did Aristotle’s theory about ‘matter’ and form’ allow him to argue about the soul?
Form is the organizing principle which turns matter into recognizable objects. According to this belief, he was able to say the ‘soul’ is the form of the body. Objects change and their change has a purpose or goal. Objects have actuality or potentially (acorns turn to oaks, children to adults etc.) he called this change ‘teleological’ as it had an end. All objects are composed of matter, and matter is always subject to change, objects can never becoe perfect.
What did Aristotle say about God?
He argued that only God, who exists as “form without matter” is perfect.
How did Aristotle think humans could draw close to perfection?
Human beings can draw close to perfection by comtemplating pure form by means of pure thought.
How are Greek philosophy and Christian religion linked?
They have both been two major influences on the ground ideas of Western cultures. Both believed in the immorality of the soul. Greek philosophy stressed reason, while Christian religion stressed faith. The first few centuries of the Christian era saw a sustained attempt by early Christian thinkers, the Church Fathers, to harmonize Greek philosophy with the Christian faith.
What did Plato think a person is?
In Platonic thought a person is part of the physical world in that they have a body through which they receive sense-impression. But at the same time they have an immaterial mind which is capable of knowing eternal truths beyond the world. They also have a directing force, the soul. The mind wants to travel into the heavenly realm of the ideas and to understand them and the body wants to be involved in worldy matters to do with the senses. The soul is caught between these two opposing forces.
What is Plato’s view of the soul?
For Plato, the soul and body are two different things. The soul is immortal; it inhabits the body temporarily. The soul is trying to steer but is trapped in the prison of the body. therefore, according to Plato, people have no real freedom if their lives are concentrated on physical requirements. However, your soul can free itself from this bondage, and direct your life, both your physical circumstances and your intellectual pursuits. But it is only after bodily existance that the soul rises upward to the eternal world of ideas.
What is Aristotle’s view of the soul?
He follows the belief common to the Greeks that the soul is the principle of life; inquiry into the soul is inquiry into the different forms of life. The basic from of life is found in plants, so the basic form of soul consists in the ability to feed, grow, decay and reproduce, which all life manifests. The word ‘soul’ then simply describes how something is alive in the world. A ‘soul’ is not necessarily separate from the body or eternal. on the contrary, a ‘soul’ is what gives a body life.
What is a soul according to Aristotle?
A soul is what makes a body work. These souls are not bits of special spiritual stuff which have been placed inside the living body. They are sets of powers, capabilities and faculties. To have a soul is like having a skill; it is not a part of you which functions independently from any other part.
For Aristotle, what is the difference between a human soul and any other type of soul?
For Aristotle oak trees and ostriches had psyche [or soul] as much as monkeys or men. The word ‘soul’ did not meant he same as ‘mind’. Rather, everything that lives has a psyche, but human beings are at the top of creation; it is this hierarchical arrangement which makes it difficult to say that Aristotle had one single definition of soul.
What quote does Aristotle use about the body and the soul?
“One should not ask if the soul and body are one, any more than one should ask it of the wax and the shape, or in general of the matter of anything and that of which it is the matter”
What did Aristotle think about what happened to the soul after death?
Aristotle argued that soul and body are inseparable; the soul cannot exist without a body nay more than walking can happen without legs. He also believed that a soul is not the kind of thing that can survive a person, as how could my skills, my character, or my temper survive me? The soul is the essence of form of the body, it is not immortal.
How does Aristotle take a ‘materialist’ view of humankind?
He is seen as having a ‘materialist’ view of humankind because he rejects the Platonic idea of a spiritual soul, and takes a biological attitude towards life.
What did Aristotle believe could come in from the outside?
Aristotle did not think the soul can somehow come in from the outside. The only thing he saw as coming in from the outside is ‘thought’ and ‘intellect’.
What is Aristotle view of life after death?
In Aristotle’s philosophy, thought is an aspect of soul that is almost divine and immortal, but yet belief in personal immortality is impossible.
What is the problem with Aristotle’s view of life after death?
His view of an immortal intellect depends on the view that thinking does not involve any bodily activity, yet in his general account of the soul he makes it clear that thinking is something done by “natural organic bodies.” It is difficult this see how this can be consistent.
What questions does Aristotle’s view of an immortal intellect raise?
- Who or what are we after death? Are we a soul separated from the body? Is it just our ‘thought’ that continues?
- Who or what are we now? Are we a more developed version of plant and animal life? Or are we human because we have a soul, or spiritual element in us?
What view did Rene Descartes take on mind and body?
He takes a dualist view that mind exists independent of matter. He believed in a split between body and mind.
What ideas does Descartes’ dualism of mind and body rest on?
- He argues that mind is a ‘non-corporeal’ (non-bodily substace, which is distinct from material or bodily substance
- Every substances has a property or a special character. So, for instance, the property of mind-substance is consciousness and the property of bodily or material-substance is length, or breadth or depth.
Why does Descartes argue that the body is separate from the mind?
Although Descartes could doubt that he had a body, there was one thing that it was impossible to doubt- the fact he was doubting. This led to his famous saying, cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore i am). As he can doubt the body, but not thought (or the mind) it lead him to believe that the mind can exist independently of matter.
What quote does Descartes’ use about his dualist view of body and mind?
“From this I knew that I was a substance the whole essence or nature of which was simply to think; and which, to exist needs no place and has no dependence on any material thing”
What are the criticisms of Descartes’ dualist view of body and mind?
- If Descartes wants to start with doubt, his initial starting-point should have been ‘there are doubts’, rather than showing that from this you can take the existence of a personal self for grantes
- THere is the problem of how the two distinct substances of body and mind interact to form what we call a person. How can a material substance affect a non-material substance?
What is meant by Cartesian view?
Cartesian is the adjective describing Descartes’ philosophy
How does Descartes believe the body and mind interact?
He rejects Aristotle’s idea of the soul or mind as that which animates the body, but argues that the mind does not influence the body like a switch or a button which sets the body into motion. He insists on a much closer union in which the mind directly moved the body and directly experiences, rather than observes the pleasures and pains of the body. “My soul is not in my body as a pilot in a ship; i am most tightly bound to it…”
What is materialism/physicalism?
The view that thinking is a purely physical activity of the brain; whatever exists is either matter itself, or is dependent on matter for its existence.
What is the dual-aspect theory?
The view that the brain is the centre of consciousness but that it’s conscious states are not just physical. In other words your body, and your brain as a part of your body, is not just physical. It is an object with physical and mental aspects.
What did mental philosophy claim?
They tried to explain the functions of people in terms of ‘mental faculties’ such as reason, will, memory and emotion.
What view does empirical science hold?
They promoted the view that only experiments on observable ‘matter’ were valid.
What did John B. Watson write about consciousness?
“The time seems to have come when psychology must discard all reference to consciousness”
What did John B. Watson believe about the body and soul?
He dismissed the study of consciousness, mental states, mind and soul, and claims that all psychology could be carried out in terms of stimulus and response. His was a scientific view which looked only at how people act to explain what a human being is, and claimed that human behavior could be controlled scientifically. He was a behaviorist.
What quote does John B Watson have about behaviourism?
“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well formed…and I’ll guarantee you to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select.”
What did B.F Skinner believe about people?
- He attacks humanity’s inner ‘freedom’ to have internal states of knowing, will and destiny. Human beings are not autonomous or independent.
- People are completely controlled by an enviroment. We are not the result of our religious views, and neither are we free to shape our own destiny. Skinner believed in the power of a totally controlling environment; operant conditioning
What is B.F. Skinner’s view on human consciousness?
He accepts that human consciousness exists, but;
- Because consciousness is private, it is foolish to say that it is any different from the world outside
- Human consciousness is a social product, which arises when people interact with each other. It does not exist when you are on your own. Human nature is simply the behaviour a person exhibits.
What quotes does B.F. Skinner use on human consciousness?
“The picture which emerges from a scientific analysis is not of a body with a person inside, but of a body which is a person in the sense that it displays a complex repertoire of behaviour”
“Man is much more than a dog, but like a dog he is within range of a scientific analysis.”
“Man is a machine in the sense that he is a complex system behaving in lawful ways, but the complexity is extraordinary”
How has behaviourism been criticized?
- It reduces humankind to a collection of behaviours and therefore dehumanizes us
- It suffers from a lack of reality in its assessment of people. The rich inner lives of people, including imagination, creativity and faith it God, cannot be dismissed in terms of conditioning behaviour. How can you measure this?
- The more persuaded behaviourists are inconsistent in that they use their own awareness to dismiss the self-awareness of those they observe. Thus human nature is reduced to suit the psychologists assumptions.
What quote does Arthur Koestler use to criticise behaviourism?
“Behaviourism is indeed a kind of flat-earth view of the mind. Or to change the metaphor: it has replaced the anthropomorphic fallacy- ascribing to animals human faculties and sentiments- with the opposite fallacy: denying to men faculties not found in lower animals. It has substituted for the erstwhile anthropomorphic view of the rat, a ratomorphic view of man”
What does Aristotle believe about true knowledge?
He took the view that we can have real knowledge of the world in which we live; in fact, this is the only area where we can have true knowledge, because it is through our experience that we come to understand things.
What were Aristotle’s four causes?
- The material cause- what is it made of?
- The efficient cause- what agent brings it about?
- The formal cause- The characteristics that make the object fit into whatever category it fits into
- The final cause- The ultimate reason for its purpose.
How does Aristotle understand a living creature?
As a ‘substance’; he saw the body as being the matter of a living thing, and the soul as its ‘form’, understood as its characteristics and covering every function of living things, including sensation, movement and reproduction. The soul is the structure of the body, its function and its organisation.
What does the particular nature of any soul depend on according to Aristotle?
It depends on the kind of living thing that it is, and these are arranged in a kind of hierarchy. Plants for example, have only a vegetative sort of soul, whilst animals are above plants, and their souls have appetites as well as the powers found in plants, so animals can have desires and feelings which allows them to move. The human soul is at the top as it has the power of reason.
What does the working of the soul lead people to develop according to Aristotle?
Through the working of the soul, people develop their intellects and their ethical characters.
What example does Aristotle give about the nature of the soul?
He gives an example of an axe. If it were a living thing, he says, then the matter from which it is made is its ‘body’, the wood and the metal. Its soul would be the things that make it an axe, rather than just wood and metal: its capacity to chop.
What quote does Aristotle use in his example of an eye in relation to the nature of the soul?
“Suppose then that the eye were an animal- sight would have been its soul…when seeing is removed the eye is no longer an eye, except in name- it is no more a real eye than the eye of a statue or of a painted figure”
What example does Aristotle use to claim that the body and soul are not separate?
For Aristotle, the body and the soul are no two separate elements, but are different parts or aspects of the same thing. He claims that a dead animal is an animal in name only; it has its body, its matter, but it no longer has its soul. When it is dead, it has lost its capacity to do all the things that animals of its kind usually do.
What appears to be the exception to the rule that the soul dies along with the body for Aristotle?
All the faculties of the soul are inseparable from the body, he thought, with the exception of reason. He’s discussion of the different aspects of reason and the extent to which they are dependent on the physical body, are among the most obscure and more debated or all his writings. It is unclear whether the reason was believed to be immortal, but perhaps Aristotle said it was. If the reason lives on after death, it does not seem to be in a personal, individual way; we could not say that this person is immortal, with a recognizable identity.
How does Plato’s Theory of Forms lead him to argue that souls are immortal?
According to Plato’s thinking, because we have concepts of the ideal Forms, without having experienced them, our souls must have know the Forms before we were born. This leads him to the belief that people must therefore have immortal soul.
What quote does Bertran Russell you in an example of using words to make reference to the world of forms?
“Language cannot get on without general words such as ‘cat’ and such words are evidently not meaningless. But if the word cat means anything, it means something which is not this or that cat, but some kind of universal cattiness. This is not born when a particular cat is born, and does not die when it dies. In fact, it has no position in space or time, it is ‘eternal’.”
What quote does Plato use about the hassles of the body?
“The body is the source of endless trouble to us by reason of the mere requirement of food; and is liable also to diseases which overtake and impede us in the search after true being: it fills us full of loves, and lusts, and fears, and fancies of all kinds, and endless foolery, and in fact, as men say, takes away from us all power of thinking at all”
What does Plato believe the human person is made up of?
Of different elements, including the physical body, the mind and the immortal soul.
What is the body according to Plato?
The body is the physical component of each person. The body is the part of a person that others can see and hear, the part that presents an appearance. It is through the body that we receive our senses experiences.
What is the mind according to Plato?
Through our body we receive our sense experience, so that our minds are able to form our opinions. Our minds are also able to achieve an awareness of the eternal truths beyond the physical world, in the realm of ideas, or Forms.
Why did Plato believe the mind and the body were often in opposition?
The mind wants to understand ideas, to gain real knowledge of the Forms; but the body is interested in sense pleasures, and it has needs such as eating and sleeping which are constantly interrupting intellectual pursuits. Often the demands of the body are so great that they take over completely.
What is the soul according to Plato?
It is the directing force of the body. He compares it to a charioteer, in charge of two horses, the mind and the body. The soul tries to guide the two together, rather than allowing them to contradict and be pulled in opposite directions.
Why does Plato believe the soul must pre-exist the body?
It has to pre-exist the body because it is unchanging and part of being unchanging means that it cannot come into existence or go away, it has to stay the same. This concept is also connected with Plato’s view that all real knowledge is remembering, recollection.
What does Plato believe the soul is divided into?
The soul is divided into three different parts, roughly translated as reason, emotion and desire, and Plato becomes less certain about which parts of the soul are immortal.
What are the two arguments that Plato’s presents to justify his belief in the existence of the soul?
- The argument from the Cycle of Opposites
2. The argument from Knowledge.
What is Plato’s argument from the cycle of opposites?
This relies on the idea that every quality comes into being from its own opposite. It depends on the existence of its opposite, or it would not exist at all. Plato argued that it follows the death must come from life, and life from death. That is, people who are dead are just people who were in the past alive but then experienced the change we call dying, and people who are alive are just people who were among the dead but then experienced the change we call birth. This suggests an endless chain of birth, death and rebirth.
What is Plato’s argument from knowledge?
Plato believed that knowledge is really just remembering what we already knew. Plato believed that this knowledge of the Forms must be innate, and must have been gained by our souls before we were born. For Plato, this was evidence that the soul pre-existed the body.
What is Plato’s understanding of the relationship between the soul and the body related to?
His other ideas about duality; he thought of existence in terms of two levels
How does Plato explain the difference between real knowledge grasped by the soul and the confused opinions gained by sense perception?
He explains it using the metaphor of sight. He argues that sight needs not only the eye and an object to look at, but also light. Without the light, the object cannot be clearly seen. The light is compared to the form of the Good; a knowledge of true, essential goodness allows the soul (the eye) to gain real understanding, clarity of vision. Without any light, with no perception of the Form of the Good, the eye cannot see very much, at all, and has to be satisfied with poor appearances. At death, the soul is released fromt he trap of the body where it can re-enter the world of Forms and renew its knowledge of the form of the good.
How does Plato view the soul?
He sees it as simple- it cannot be split up into different parts but at the same time it has different aspects:
1. Reason- rules the soul and seeks truth
2. Emotion- can be trained and controlled
3. Desire- seeks pleasure for oneself
Plato says that we should seek to harmonise the soul so that all the parts work together.
What does Plato say is there evidence for the different aspects of the soul?
His evidence comes from internal conflict- our desires cannot be fulfilled so we become frustrated as we are not allowing reason to rule.
How can criticizing Plato’s theory of forms also undermine his theory of the soul?
Plato’s ideas about the soul depend on his theory of forms and knowledge being a recollection of things that we already know, which can be challenged.
What are the problem with Plato’s ideas?
- It is hard to accept that there might be ideal forms of negative qualities such as jealousy or spite, and harder still to accept that every physical thing in the world has an ideal form
- There is no evidence for the world of Forms/Ideals
3 It is unclear how far the forms relate to specific items - Plato does not value experience enough
- The Third man argument
- Memes
- His definition of learning seems inaccurate
- Not everything has an opposite
What is meant when we criticize Plato because there is no evidence for the world of Forms/Ideals?
The existence of any other world apart from the world of appearances cannot be proved and he does not seem to provide any convincing argument for the realm of ideals. Many would also say the physical world has a very definite reality; and many scientists would claim that the physical world is the only reality there is. E.g. Richard Dawkins believes it is nonsense to talk of a transcendent ‘other world’ beyond the physical.
What is meant when we criticize Plato because it is unclear how far the Forms relate to specific items?
Plato is not very clear about how far the forms relate to the specific items in the ‘world of appearances’. Is there an ideal form of animal, to which all animals relate? Or do Forms have to relate to specific animal species? Is there a form of pig in general, or a separate Form for each variety of pig? SOme argue that the Forms then stop being ‘universal’ and degenerate into something of little meaning or use.
What is meant when we criticize Plato because he does not value experience enough?
Is Plato wrong to say that our senses cannot give us true knowledge? In daily life, most people gain knowledge from experience of the world, which is necessary for survival. Moreover, scientists argue that the physical world is worth studying in its own right and can give us true insights into the nature of reality. Such scientific investigation has led to discoveries such as penicillin and electricity, which is true valuable knowledge which benefits us in our daily lives.
What is meant when we criticize Plato due to the third man argument?
This criticism of the theory of Forms is put forward by Aristotle; suppose that a man is a copy of the Form of the man. What is the origin of the Form of the man? Well, the Form of the man is a copy of a previous Form of a man. That is three men. In effect, Aristotle was saying that a copy of a Form could turn out to be an infinite series that never stopped; that would render the Theory of Forms meaningless.
What is meant when we criticize Plato because of memes?
This is an idea put forward by Richard Dawkins. Forms could just be ideas in people’s minds that they pass on to others such as friends and children. Richard Dawkins has referred to the passing on of ideas like this as ‘memes’.
What is meant when we criticize Plato due to his definition of learning?
Learning usually means acquiring new knowledge, not just remembering
What is meant when we criticize Plato because not everything has an opposite?
The argument from opposites does not work as not everything has an opposite. We can think of many things that are not ‘brought about’ by their opposite; black does not bring about white. We might recognise things for what they are because of their opposites, for example we know when something is warm because we understand coolness, but this does not necessitate any kind of cycle. In otherwords, life can be the opposite of death, without it meaning that life must be brought about by death.
What are the strengths of Plato’s ideas?
- Plato’s theory encourages us to question in order to learn and not to accept things at face value
- Plato had a profound influence in shaping Christian Philosophy
- It explains why we all recognise the same essential elements in something
- Plenty of philosophers would agree that we have an intuitive knowledge of what goodness, or justice is
- Plato is not really interested in the Forms of material objects; he is interested in the Forms of concepts.
- Plato rarely discusses the Forms of material objects; whilst he does mention the Form of a bed in the Republic, it is no clear if this is a serious remark- Charles Griswold has suggested this was a joke.
Why did Plato argue that real knowledge is remembering?
He thought that we have ideas such as the meaning of the ‘perfect circle’ or ‘absolute equality’, not because we have ever seen any examples of them but because these ideas are already with us from a previous existence. As a person discovers different elements of the physical world, this begins a process of remembering.
According to Plato why can the body not be the source of reliable truth?
Because it is changing and is not the same in one moment as it is the next
What is monism?
The view that humans are a single unity of body and soul/mind. The monist approach suggests the soul cannot be separated from the body- humans are a unity, and it is as a unity that they survive death, if at all.
What is dualism?
The dualist approach says that humans are made up of two parts, a body and a soul/mind. It suggests that the soul can be separated from the body.
What is reincarnation?
The belief that the soul of a person is reincarnated after death into a new body.
What is materialism?
The view that humans are solely physical beings.
What is Atman?
A hindu term for the real self or soul
What is Samsara?
The Hindu belief of the cycle of birth, death and rebirth
What is Moksha?
The final release of the soul from the cycle of birth, death and rebirth into a state of bliss.
What does belief in reincarnatin depend on?
The belief in an immortal and eternal soul (atman) that passes from existence to existence depending upon the kind of life lived.
What is rebirth?
Rebirth is different from reincarnation. Rebirth rejects the idea of an eternal soul, but says that there is a consciousness generated by experience and the life stream. At death, the consciousness which has become attached to life, possession and people, craves to continue and so attaches itself to another body.
What is Nirvana?
In Buddhism, this is the final release from the cycle of rebirth attained by extinction of all desires and individual existence, culminating in absolute blessedness.
What is Dharma?
The teachings of the Buddha.
What is Eschaton?
Judgement day at the end of time when God will decide the fates of all individual humans according to the good and evil of their earthly lives.
Why does Peter Geach criticise Plato’s ideas?
He says that it does not make sense for the soul to see the Forms, and that sight is a sense experience linked to the body.
What are memes?
Elements of culture or behaviour that may be passed from one individual to another by non-genetic means, e.g. imitation
What is disembodied existence?
Literally the idea that we are able to exist in some form without our bodies. Resurrection and reincarnation talk about being away from a body for a very short time before acquiring another one or resurrecting soon after death in the same body.
What is the key question about disembodied existence?
Whether the notion of disembodied existence is coherent?
What argument does HH Price put forward to argue that disembodied existence is coherent?
Price maintains that post-mortem perceptions might be broadly similar to ‘experiences’ in dreams. In dreams, our image producing powers provide us with a multitude of objects. A world, he maintains, formed out of such mental images which had been acquired during bodily life could include images of our own bodies and perceptions of the world we have experienced during life and which would be available after death through. He sees no reason why the image world would not be tactile, auditory, and smell images within a 3 dimension world. It would be just as real as the world in bodily life. In other words, we have effectively carried out world with us in memory.
Why does HH Price argue that our post-mortem image world need not be completely private?
The image world would not need to be completely private as Price maintains that it would be possible to communicate by telepathy. There could be groups of telepathically interconnected minds which, together, could form their own worlds.
What quote does HH Price use to summarise his view of life after death?
He maintains that “it is easy enough to conceive that experiences might occur after one’s death which are linked with experiences before death in such a way that personal identity is preserved.”
How does John Hick respond to HH Price’s argument that disembodied existence is coherent?
He argues against the view Price puts forward, saying that if we all live life after death in our own mental self-created worlds, then we have little genuine contact with each other. Hick questions the quality of this sort of life and asks whether it really meets the definition of ‘living’”
What quote does John Hick write in response to HH Price’s argument that disembodied existence is coherent?
“…this amounts to a very truncated sense of being alive, in comparison with normal waking life…in the post-mortem world that we are now imagining his social environment would be unreal and his commerce with other people delusory. This consideration must, surely, count to some extent at least against a theory of this kind”
What argument did Descartes present that suggests disembodied existence is coherent?
In support of the dualist position on life after death, he considered that he could think of himself without a body but he could not deny that we was a thinking thing- “I think therefore I am”. As the body can be doubted, and the soul cannot, it follows that the body and the soul cannot be one and the same.
Why does Brian Davies argue against Descartes view of the body and soul?
The flaw in this argument is pointed out by Brian Davies who argues that the fact that one considers themselves to be sober, does not mean that they are.
What quote does Norman Malcolm use to challenge Descartes’ view of the body and soul?
“If it were valid to argue ‘i can doubt that my body exists but not that I exist, ergo I am not my body,’ it would be equally valid to argue ‘i can doubt that there exists a being whose essential nature is to think, but i cannot doubt that i exist, ego, I am not a being whose essential nature is to think.” Descartes is hoist with his own petard.
How does belief in human freedom support the idea that disembodied existence is coherent?
If the brain is the same as the mind and if consciousness is entirely a matter of material states, then it seems difficult to explain human freedom. If there is no mind, and just simply matter, consciousness would either be entirely determined or random. yet, the fact most people accept human beings are free seem to make more likely the claim that mind and the consciousness is more than simply a product of a series of electrical impulses.
What challenge does Gilbert Ryle present that suggests disembodied existence is incoherent?
He dismissed the idea of a separate soul as ‘the ghost in the machine’. Our minds and consciousness are thus said to be made up of physical matter, just like the rest of us. For him, studying consciousness through neuroscience assumes that a person has no soul. The alternative theory Ryle proposed was ‘philosophical behaviourism’- the view that supposed mental events really just refer to a complex patterns of behaviour. Our interior mental terminology is just a way of referring to something physical (behaviour), e.g. when we say that someone is ‘happy’ we are referring to the behaviour pattern they show.
What does Richard Swinburne argue about personal identity that suggests disembodied existence is coherent?
He argues that continuity of the body or body parts like the brain is not sufficient for continuity of the person. According to Swinburne, although a critical part of our current existence our body is not something we are. We need some sort of immaterial substance for continued identity.
What example does Richard Swinburne present to illustrate that continuity of the body/brain is not sufficient for continuity of the person?
He creates the story of a mad surgeon who informs you that he will transplant your left brain into one brainless body, and your right into another, and that you can noew choose which body will be tortured and which will be made happy after the transplant. But how can you determine which transplant will be you? THe fact that continuity of brain parts does not clearly establish which person is you shows that such continuity is insufficient for personal identity.
What does Bernard Williams argue about personal identity that suggests disembodied existence is incoherent?
He argues that the one sure key to identity is spatio-temporal continuity- this means the continuity of the body through space and time. Bodies are constantly changing throughout a person’s life, yet there is a single, changing, moving developing person that moves through space and time with this process. At death the body dies and rots: it disintergrates or ceases to exist.
Why does Bernard Williams argue that spatio-temporal continuity makes life after death impossible?
He argues that acceptance of spatio-temporal continuity as being necessary for identity would effectively rule out belief in life after death as on death or disembodied existence, spatio-temporal continuity is broken.
How can NDE support the claim that disembodied existence is coherent?
Raymond Moody recorded more than a 100 accounts of people who claim to have had NDE’s; most found that due to the experience their lives radically changed, so money and things no longer mattered, and relationships an people became central. THis is a phenomena that materialism seems unable to explain.
What did Bruce Greyson do?
He developed the NDE Greyson scale which identifies the stages in DE to determine the type of experience a person had.
What does Dr Susan Blackmore argue about NDE’s, which suggest disembodied existence is incoherent?
They argued that there is no evidence that NDE’s are anything more than a function of the brain, an illusion created. She claims that we have all the information in our memories to create such an experience, and all NDE’s can be explained by brain function and chemistry. E.g. THe ‘feel good faction’ is created by the fact that under stress, and with lack of oxygen, the body releases a massive surge of endorphin es, which create good feelings, take away pain, and makes a person feel positive and good about everything.
What does Kant argue about life after death?
He argued that our purpose in life is to attain the highest good (summum bonum) in which virtue meets with happiness. However, not everyone is able to reach this goal in their lifetime. God would surely allow us all the change to realise this good, therefore we must survive death. Therefore, for practical reasons the soul exists and is immortal.
What are the weaknesses of Kant’s arguments about life after death?
- Why must perfect goodness ever be realised?
2. Often goals and ideals towards which a person strives, may be, at best, only partially realisable.
