Philosophy

Mind-Body dualism is also called the mind-body problem. The problem arises because it is difficult to conceive how merely inert matter can evolve a conscious interiority, i.e., self-awareness and a thinking intelligence within itself. Although a purely mechanistic and scientific view of the world does not acknowledge the existence of anything besides physical matter made up atoms and molecules and the forces that facilitate their interaction such as electromagnetism and gravity, philosophy often resorts to metaphysical ideas in this context. Dualism is an argument against self-contained physicalism. For a dualist, brain is part of the physical body, but mind and consciousness need not be equated with the brain.

In standard biological science, consciousness is simply considered an epiphenomenon, an essentially illusory effect produced by certain complex arrangement of organic molecules in living beings. The brain, which is purely a physical organ, creates the illusion of mind and self. Mental states are just another way of looking at biological states. However, religions as well as many schools of philosophy resort to postulating the existence of a certain substance that transcends purely physical matter, it is known as either spirit or mind or consciousness. Mind, therefore, is seen as being radically different from matter, and something that can exist in its own right, independently. For science though, only that which is measurable and the existence of which is objectively ascertainable is real. Science studies the physical world, but as long as it cannot explain mind completely in terms of matter, thereby succeeding in reducing one to the other, there is ample scope for theories of mind-body dualism to thrive.

In the context of mind-body dualism, the term mind is normally used to indicate consciousness, because consciousness is the basic foundation of the mind. A highly sophisticated robot can display a considerable degree of intelligence in making its decisions, but we know that it does not have any mind that exists independent of the physical matter making it up. In other words, although it may seem to possess a capacity to think and arrive at decisions all by itself, it has no consciousness, no interiority, no self-awareness. Philosophers who subscribe to dualism insist that a robot or any mechanical contraption can never have a mind, i.e, can never attain to consciousness, no matter how complex its artificial intelligence mechanisms could evolve. Mind, as it is experienced in human beings and presumably in other living creatures too, is an altogether different phenomenon that cannot be possessed by a lifeless machine.

In Western philosophy, the concept of mind as opposed to matter originates from Pythagoras and Plato. Before them, the so-called pre-Socratic philosophers from Thales on tried to reduce the universe to one simple element, such as water or fire. They tried to conduct their investigations into the nature of reality more or less on what we would consider scientific lines, though in a very primitive fashion. However Pythagoras and Plato had strong mystic leanings. Plato considered the mind to be the primordial reality of the universe. The physical world we see around us is simply an ephemeral reflection of the realties of the mind. Plato argued for a soul that is separate from the body, which also happens to be the seat of the intellect. While the body is perishable, the soul is not. Plato developed his elaborate metaphysical conception of eternal archetypal Forms to explain the mystery of mind. He believed that the soul inhabited the body  which is still the standard religious and metaphysical credo  however he did not venture into explaining the complex mechanics that would come into play in the union of soul and body in creating a sentient, intelligent being like a man. (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

Aristotle, who followed Plato, did not take such deep metaphysical speculations seriously. He tried to found science mostly on a materialistic and objective basis. However, being the greatest disciple of Plato, he could not outright reject his masters theories and tried to advocate some arguments regarding the immaterial nature of mind. But since Artistotles dabblings into the metaphysical do not fit very well into his overall philosophy, scholars attach relatively less importance to Aristotles views on Platonic Forms, the soul and such things.

During the Renaissance period of the 17th century, the mind-body dualism was advanced with much vigor by none other than one of the fathers of the scientific method, the French philosopher, Ren Descartes. For Descartes mind existed in a totally different dimension from the body and operated upon it from there. Again, as in Plato, this is a vague and general notion and fails to explain the mechanics involved, particularly concerning the way in which these two dimensions are interlinked. As by that time people had some considerable knowledge about the anatomy of the brain, Descartes suggested a particular center of the brain could be acting as the interface between the mind and body and it could be the pineal gland. Besides its unique, central position inside the brain, Descartes had not much of an argument in favor of the pineal gland. Even if we take for granted the pineal gland or some other center inside the brain to be acting as primary conduit for the mind, the puzzle of how the immaterial mind and the material brain could interact with each other remains unsolved.

By stressing on a clear-cut distinction between the body and the mind, Descartes was trying to do two things. With Galileo and Newton the view of a clockwork universe was coming into vogue, and in fact Descartes himself promulgated a highly mechanized version of the universe in which cause and effect follow each other strictly. However, the problem with this stance is that if human mind too is subsumed into this deterministic framework, there is no room left for freewill within man. Human life loses much of its meaning. Therefore, while avidly promoting a universe determined by causal mechanisms, Descartes thought it right to separate mind from matter. Furthermore, as strange as it may seem, Descartes was a firm believer in the Christian God, so while he was engaged in pioneering the cause of science he was also concerned that the rise of science does not completely overshadow religion. Therefore, his mind-body dualism offered the possibility where science can take care of the material world, while religion can address the issues related with mind or soul, there need not be any conflict between these two. (Alanen, 37)

The four major philosophers who followed Descartes, namely, Locke, Kant, Berkeley and Hume, did not share Descartes enthusiasm for positing two radically different but highly interacting substances to account for matter and mind each of them had his own view on this matter, making a separation between body and mind but with some considerable reservations. But by the mid-nineteenth century, a purely mechanistic view of the universe as something that can be totally explainable by the laws of physics became the dominant perspective. And yet Descartes prevailed, the debate he started off would actively continue well into our own times.
 
The mainstream science dismisses the whole notion of mind-body dualism by asserting that the mind is simply a function of the brain, and there is nothing more to it, there cannot be. T.H. Huxley popularized the notion of consciousness in the 19th century as being a simple byproduct of the physical mechanisms of the brain, an epiphenomenon. An epiphenomenon could be an illusion, just as in the way, for example, clouds could come together to give the illusion of a recognizable form, but this form does not have any existence of its own, it is very transient and would disintegrate as soon as the clouds disperse. For well over a century now, it has been generally taken for granted by the mainstream science that consciousness is simply an epiphenomenon, and yet the relationship between mind and body is a huge problem even in the mainstream science, and the concept of mind-body dualism has been explored extensively by philosophers and psychologists for a long time now, and besides them by numerous thinkers in a wide set of fields that fall under the label of cognitive science, during the latter decades of the 20th century.

Today, researchers are very keen to settle this debate in one way or other, since we now have amazing facilities to scan brain processes in real time. It is possible to conduct laboratory testing to prove that the mind is a separate entity from the brain. If mental function and brain function always corresponded, it does not disprove body-mind dualism, since mind could be perfectly channelized by the brain, but if no full correlation was found between the brain function and the function of the mind, there would emerge strong evidence for mind as being distinct from the brain. For instance, if a brain-dead person were to be revived and then he reported any thoughts, sensations and experiences, it could make for a good case on the existence of mind beyond the range of the brain. In fact there have been numerous recorded instances where during an NDE (near-death experience), even as the heart of a person stopped beating and the brain was paralyzed due to deprivation of oxygen, he or she reported heightened perception and an expanded state of being. Hundreds of such closely matching reports made researchers in this field postulate a very novel theory of mind-body dualism in which brain is seen as a blockage, not a medium, of the mind, and hence when the functioning of the brain grinds to a halt during an NDE, it often happens that the mind is kicked into a higher gear accompanied by vastly superior degree of alertness and perceptivity than the norm. If NDE-related experiments can somehow be safely conducted in the controlled conditions of a laboratory, while the brain is under rigorous observation, such research work can go a long way in throwing light on this issue.

As science progressed, many issues that originally belonged to the realm of philosophy were taken over by science, for example the great advances made in our knowledge of genetics in the last several years have helped us gain new insights into the nature vs. nurture debate. Similarly todays science can and has to play a greater role in resolving the mind-body problem. The possible discovery of mind as separate from body can lead modern science to whole new realms of possibilities and exploration.