Brain, Mind, and Soul: Monist and Dualist Theories
Body, Soul, Mind, and Brain
The brain is essential to the human psyche, and therefore, is closely related to the mind. The question arises of whether the brain is the origin of our psyche, or if the brain is only the “vehicle” that uses the mind. Different answers have been given to this question from the point of view of traditional beliefs and science:
- The human brain is like a very powerful computer, and someday we may imitate it (artificial intelligence).
- Genetic engineering gives the opportunity to amend embryonic cells so that future humans have specific characteristics.
- Beliefs, both religious, atheist, and agnostic, wonder about the possibility of a soul that is independent of our body.
In this way, one wonders if the brain and, therefore, our psyche, depend on our genetic information.
Theories About the Brain and Mind
Theories about the brain and the mind can be divided into:
Monistic Materialist Theories
The human psyche is a consequence of our highly developed brain. Man is just a material reality.
Dualistic Theories
Human beings are, at the same time, the matter of their body and a principle called extracorporeal and intangible soul, which is indispensable to explain our behavior.
Monistic Materialist Theories
Started by Democritus in the 5th century BC and Epicurus in the 3rd century BC, it continues until the 16th-17th centuries with Boyle, Gassendi, and La Mettrie, and even the 19th and 20th centuries with a great number of philosophers and scientists. All of them argued that the mental processes of human beings are explained based on their material base, i.e., the brain.
Physicalism or Physicalist Materialism
Mental activities are physical-chemical or neurophysiological processes. The opponents of this approach call it “physicalist reductionism” and accuse it of oversimplification of the complexity of the human being. Cybernetic materialism, another form of physicalism, considers the brain as a complex computer and the human being as a “conscious automaton.”
Emergentist Materialism
This view does not reduce the mental to the physical, but it emerges evolutionarily. According to this view, there is only matter, but a substance with different properties resulting from evolution. Thus, matter is something dynamic that can be divided into the physicochemical, biological, and mental levels.
Dualistic Theories
According to dualistic theories, the human being is a composite of soul and body.
Platonic Dualism
For Plato, the human being is the result of an accidental union between body and soul. The soul is immortal and intangible, while the body is material and mortal. The soul existed before joining the body, so the real man is his soul. His soul is what keeps his body alive, but its main function is knowledge. The soul belongs to the world of ideas, so it always tends to lean towards it. In this way, the body is like a prison for the soul. The body burdens the soul with earthly needs and desires, keeping it away from the celestial world.
Hylomorphism
Contrary to Platonic dualism, Aristotle proposed that the soul and body are two complementary, inseparable principles forming the reality of being human. Matter (hyle) cannot exist without a determined form (morphé): hylomorphism. The body is the material, and the soul is the substantial form of man. The soul gives life, sentience, movement, thought, and speech. The soul and the body cannot exist separately; however, the body can.