A) Gertler’s “In Defense of Mind- Body Dualism”
In this essay, I will be defending Brie Gertler in her dualist stance on the mind – body problem. In the paper, Gertler argues that, “it is possible that pain occurs in a disembodied being.” She starts off talking about this argument by giving the example of stubbing ones toe. She then states that even someone who has had both of their feet amputated can still share this toe stubbing experience. She gives example to show a particular instance where someone can feel the mental aspect of pain without having the physical part. The argument that Gertler uses to discuss the notion of pain being present when there is no physical body or state is called the Disembodiment Argument.
To first understand …show more content…
This argument relies on the belief that our physical and mental states are sufficiently comprehensive,” therefore allowing one to conceive of disembodied pain and thus making disembodied pain possible. An analogy that is used within the paper is the comparison between water and not knowing that it is identical to H2O therefore having water be insufficiently comprehensible. The difference in water equaling H2O and pain equaling C-fiber firing is that H2O is the hidden essence of water. In order to indefinitely determine whether or not something is water we must look at its molecular chemistry to determine that it is H2O. This is not the case with pain, once does not need to have a scan to check and see if their C-fibers were firing to make sure that they are actually in pain, instead they just know that they are in …show more content…
Gertler tell us to picture an alien race not quite that unlike our own, but different enough to where the species has a completely different chemical biology to ours. While it is very easy to picture this alien race as having no C-fibers to fire when the sensation of pain is felt, it would still feel rather odd to then state that solely because this alien race didn’t have C-fibers they also did not have any feelings of pain. This creates what is called a problem of chauvinism to materialists because it imposes the question of how can an alien race feel pain if they don’t have C-fibers and pain is simply the firing of
In this essay, I will be defending Brie Gertler in her dualist stance on the mind – body problem. In the paper, Gertler argues that, “it is possible that pain occurs in a disembodied being.” She starts off talking about this argument by giving the example of stubbing ones toe. She then states that even someone who has had both of their feet amputated can still share this toe stubbing experience. She gives example to show a particular instance where someone can feel the mental aspect of pain without having the physical part. The argument that Gertler uses to discuss the notion of pain being present when there is no physical body or state is called the Disembodiment Argument.
To first understand …show more content…
This argument relies on the belief that our physical and mental states are sufficiently comprehensive,” therefore allowing one to conceive of disembodied pain and thus making disembodied pain possible. An analogy that is used within the paper is the comparison between water and not knowing that it is identical to H2O therefore having water be insufficiently comprehensible. The difference in water equaling H2O and pain equaling C-fiber firing is that H2O is the hidden essence of water. In order to indefinitely determine whether or not something is water we must look at its molecular chemistry to determine that it is H2O. This is not the case with pain, once does not need to have a scan to check and see if their C-fibers were firing to make sure that they are actually in pain, instead they just know that they are in …show more content…
Gertler tell us to picture an alien race not quite that unlike our own, but different enough to where the species has a completely different chemical biology to ours. While it is very easy to picture this alien race as having no C-fibers to fire when the sensation of pain is felt, it would still feel rather odd to then state that solely because this alien race didn’t have C-fibers they also did not have any feelings of pain. This creates what is called a problem of chauvinism to materialists because it imposes the question of how can an alien race feel pain if they don’t have C-fibers and pain is simply the firing of