Editing Mind–body dualism (section)

===Arguments from causal interaction===
[[File:Dualism-vs-Monism.png|320px|thumb|right|Cartesian dualism compared to three forms of monism]]

One argument against dualism is with regard to causal interaction. If consciousness (''the mind'') can exist independently of physical reality (''the brain''), one must explain how physical memories are created concerning consciousness. Dualism must therefore explain how consciousness affects physical reality. One of the main objections to dualistic interactionism is lack of explanation of how the material and immaterial are able to interact. Varieties of dualism according to which an immaterial mind causally affects the material body and vice versa have come under strenuous attack from different quarters, especially in the 20th century. Critics of dualism have often asked how something totally immaterial can affect something totally material—this is the basic '''problem of causal interaction'''.

First, it is not clear ''where'' the interaction would take place. For example, burning one's finger causes pain. Apparently there is some chain of events, leading from the burning of skin, to the stimulation of nerve endings, to something happening in the peripheral nerves of one's body that lead to one's brain, to something happening in a particular part of one's brain, and finally resulting in the sensation of pain. But pain is not supposed to be spatially locatable. It might be responded that the pain "takes place in the brain." But evidently, the pain is in the finger. This may not be a devastating criticism.

However, there is a second problem about the interaction. Namely, the question of ''how'' the interaction takes place, where in dualism "the mind" is assumed to be non-physical and by definition outside of the realm of science. The ''mechanism'' which explains the connection between the mental and the physical would therefore be a philosophical proposition as compared to a scientific theory. For example, compare such a mechanism to a physical mechanism that ''is'' well understood. Take a very simple causal relation, such as when a cue ball strikes an eight ball and causes it to go into the pocket. What happens in this case is that the cue ball has a certain amount of momentum as its mass moves across the pool table with a certain velocity, and then that momentum is transferred to the eight ball, which then heads toward the pocket. Compare this to the situation in the brain, where one wants to say that a decision causes some neurons to fire and thus causes a body to move across the room. The intention to "cross the room now" is a mental event and, as such, it does not have physical properties such as force. If it has no force, then it would seem that it could not possibly cause any neuron to fire. However, with Dualism, an explanation is required of how something without any physical properties has physical ''effects''.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|title=c. Problems of Interaction|url=http://www.iep.utm.edu/dualism/#SH7c|encyclopedia=Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy|access-date=15 November 2012|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121028131436/http://www.iep.utm.edu/dualism/#SH7c|archive-date=28 October 2012}}</ref>

====Replies====
[[Alfred North Whitehead]], and later [[David Ray Griffin]], framed a new ontology (''[[process philosophy]]'') seeking precisely to avoid the pitfalls of ontological dualism.<ref>[[Michel Weber|Weber, Michel]], and Anderson Weekes, eds. 2009. ''[https://www.academia.edu/279961/Process_Approaches_to_Consciousness_in_Psychology_Neuroscience_and_Philosophy_of_Mind Process Approaches to Consciousness in Psychology, Neuroscience, and Philosophy of Mind]'', Whitehead Psychology Nexus Studies II. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150408022540/http://www.academia.edu/279961/Process_Approaches_to_Consciousness_in_Psychology_Neuroscience_and_Philosophy_of_Mind|date=2015-04-08}}</ref>

The explanation provided by [[Arnold Geulincx]] and [[Nicolas Malebranche]] is that of [[occasionalism]], where all mind–body interactions require the direct intervention of God.

At the time [[C. S. Lewis]] wrote ''[[Miracles (book)|Miracles]]'',<ref>{{cite book
 |author= Lewis, C.S
 |title= Miracles
 |year= 1947
 |publisher= HarperCollins
 |isbn= 978-0-688-17369-2
 |url= https://archive.org/details/giftofmiraclesma00mill
 }}</ref> [[quantum mechanics]] (and physical [[Quantum indeterminacy|indeterminism]]) was only in the initial stages of acceptance, but still Lewis stated the logical possibility that, if the physical world was proved to be indeterministic, this would provide an entry (interaction) point into the traditionally viewed closed system, where a scientifically described physically probable/improbable event could be philosophically described as an action of a non-physical entity on physical reality. He states, however, that none of the arguments in his book will rely on this. Although some [[interpretations of quantum mechanics]] consider [[wave function collapse]] to be indeterminate, in others this event is defined as deterministic.<ref name="SEPQD">{{cite encyclopedia|title=Causal Determinism of Quantum Mechanics|url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/#QuaMec|encyclopedia=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|access-date=16 November 2012}}</ref>