What is dualism in simple terms?

One Answer

1. Simple? Well, as far as possible.

   Dualism – duality or duality, in translation. It is contrasted in philosophy with monism-singularity.

   It is, most often, about what is the primary substance, from which everything else comes, which can be considered the basis of everything that exists. Two versions of monism are well known – materialism (matter is primary) or idealism (spirit/consciousness is primary).

   Dualism, respectively, is the position that there are both such primary substances at once, nafig should be chosen. True, such a statement entails other problems – how they then interact with each other, but this is a different story.

   Descartes refers to this topic in the sense that he first formulated the problem of the difference between the body and consciousness in its modern form. That is, he stated that the mind (consciousness, etc. synonyms) is a non-spatial substance, weightless and generally outside of physics, but still a substance.

   That is, the mind is a thing reducible to matter and, characteristically, independent of the physical brain. Which in itself is “incapable of thinking”, but is simply, in some strange way, “the receptacle of intelligence” (which is already debatable – since mind and matter are completely separated, how the hell do they connect through material matter).

   Thus, Descartes preached the most radical version of dualism – substantial, or essential (it is, in honor of the author, and is called Cartesian). Two more options are identified by philosophers:

   • Dualism of properties is compatible with materialism. Because it claims that highly developed matter, organized in a specific way, allows the properties of consciousness to arise. And, having arisen, they can no longer be reduced to living and even more so inanimate matter. The most popular option for today;
   • Predicate dualism is the weakest version. It says that, sorry for the tautology, it is impossible to talk about mental phenomena and consciousness in terms of ordinary physics. But in terms of its essence and, apparently, properties – consciousness is just as material, just requires a specific language for explanation.

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