Self, death & the afterlife: AQA A* grade notes

AQA
Philosophy

AO1: Views on the body/soul relationship and the possibility of continuing personal existence after death

The soul is thought to contain the features of personhood, such as consciousness, memory, and personality, so that if the soul survives death, the person survives.
Christians subscribe to the immortality of the soul. It is immaterial, not subject to decay, and survives the death of the body.
In the afterlife the soul does not merge into the divine but retains personal identity.
Plato and Aristotle influenced two diverging views in Christian theology on the nature of the soul.
Plato believed the person is an immaterial soul separate from the body.
This was taken up by early Christian platonists (e.g. Augustine) and later by Descartes’ substance dualism, supporting the idea of the soul leaving the body at death.
Aquinas incorporated Aristotle’s hylomorphic view, that the human person is a unity of soul and body.
The soul is the form that makes a living human body what it is (a rational animal).
For Aristotle it cannot survive death, but Aquinas maintains it can though only in an incomplete state, until resurrection restors the unity of full identity.
Hick argues for psycho-physical unity, that personal identity depends on the body, so the continuity of the self depends on continued embodied existence.
His replica theory aims to explain how this could secure life after death.
He argues an exact psycho-physical replica, identical in all respects, would count as the same person.
This explains how resurrection could secure personal identity after death.
God creates a replica of us in a ‘resurrection world’.
Materialists reject these accounts, holding that only physical things exist.
This is a form of monism, the view that only one type of entity exists.
Materialists claim the evidence of modern science suggests we are purely physical beings, evolved through the biological process of natural selection.
This
The features of our mind like consciousness and reason are ontologically reducible to physical brain processes, leaving no need or room for a soul.
As Bertrand Russell put it, “I believe that when I die I shall rot, and nothing of my ego will survive.”
On this view, personal identity consists in psychological continuity which depends on our brain.
Identity could only persist after death with technology capable of uploading consciousness to a computer.

AO1: Descartes’ argument for the existence of the soul

Descartes is a substance dualist, meaning the mind and body are distinct fundamental types of being:
Physical substance characterised by extension (occupies space).
Mental substance characterised by thinking.
Descartes’ epistemology uses a priori intuition to discover indubitable foundational knowledge.
He claims ‘cogito ergo sum’, ‘I think therefore I am’.
Doubting we exist just presupposes that we do exist.
But the body can be doubted (we could be dreaming about having a body).
This indicates distinction: the body is separable from what we are, while thought is not.
Descartes builds on this distinction with two deductive arguments:
Descartes’ Indivisibility argument:
All extended things can be divided (at some point along the space they occupy).
The mind is indivisible because it is essentially and simply thinking.

P1. Physical substance is divisible (since it’s extended).
P2. The mind is indivisible (since it’s non-extended).
P3. Leibniz’ law is that identical things must have the same properties.
C1. The mind therefore cannot be identical with any physical substance, such as the body.
This argument uses Leibniz’ law that identical things must have the same properties.
Descartes’ conceivability argument:
Identical things are inconceivably separate. E.g. a triangle and having three sides.
A mind without a body seems conceivable (e.g. imagine being a ghost floating through walls).
P1. I have a clear and distinct idea of myself as a thinking non-extended thing.
P2. I have a clear and distinct idea of my body as a non-thinking extended thing.
C1. These opposing properties allow us to conceive of the mind separate to and without the body.
P3. What is conceivably separate is possibly separate.
P4. What is possibly separate is actually non-identical.
C2. Therefore, the mind and body are not identical.

AO2: Descartes’ Indivisibility argument

Descartes argues all extended things are divisible, because they could in principle be divided at some point along the area they occupy.
The mind is indivisible because it is not composed of parts and thinking seems the one thing essential to it.
P1. Physical substance is divisible (since it’s extended).
P2. The mind is indivisible (since it’s non-extended).
P3. Leibniz’ law is that identical things must have the same properties.
C1. The mind therefore cannot be identical with any physical substance, such as the body.
This argument uses a logical principle which came to be known as Leibniz’ law of identity: identical things must have the same properties.
If the body and mind were identical, then that one identical thing would be both divisible and indivisible, which is impossible.

Counter

Scholastics objected that the mind can be divided into feelings, perceptions, memories, etc.
However Descartes replies that by mind he means consciousness.
It is the one undivided consciousness that feels, perceives, remembers, etc. Those are modes of consciousness, not divisions of it.

Evaluation

The stronger counter-example is the modern evidence of split-brain patients.
The right hemisphere controls the left arm, and the left hemisphere controls the right arm.
Sometimes as a treatment for epilepsy, doctors sever the neurons connecting the hemispheres.
Patients can then appear to have their mind divided into two.
E.g., picking up food with one hand, while the other hand hits it out of that hand.
E.g., a patient was with his wife, one hand reached out to hug, the other to push her away.
So, this is good evidence that Descartes’ premise of the mind as indivisible is wrong, undermining his conclusion that it is non-physical.

AO2: Descartes’ conceivability argument

Descartes’ rationalism holds that we can gain knowledge through a priori intuition about clear and distinct ideas.
P1. I have a clear and distinct idea of myself as a thinking non-extended thing.
P2. I have a clear and distinct idea of my body as a non-thinking extended thing.
C1. These opposing properties allow us to conceive of the mind separate to and without the body.
P3. What is conceivably separate is possibly separate.
P4. What is possibly separate is actually non-identical.
C2. Therefore, the mind and body are not identical.
Identical things are inconceivably separate. E.g. you can’t imagine a triangle separate from three sides.
Yet we can imagine a disembodied mind – e.g. imagine being a ghost floating through walls – or having an out of body experience).

Counter:

However, the masked man fallacy shows that we can imagine impossible things.
If someone hears about a masked man robbing a bank, they can imagine that it’s not their father.
But if it really was their father, they just imagined the impossible.
This shows conceivability doesn’t entail possibility (P3 is false).
Descartes could be imagining an impossibility whe imagining a disembodied mind.

Evaluation

Descartes might respond that impossibilities are only conceivable due to ignorance, (e.g., who is under the mask).
Regarding our minds there is no ignorance, in fact we know it with certainty.
However, here Descartes oversteps.
We might know we exist with certainty, but it’s not clear we know what we are simply by thinking about what we are like Descartes’ rationalism assumes.
E.g., Cognitive psychology has shown most mental processing to be unconscious.
“Know thyself” is a central maxim of socratic philosophy, indicating how self-knowledge isn’t immediate.
We don’t know our mind perfectly, so the masked man fallacy applies.
Conceivability of ourselves disembodied may just reflect limits of introspection, not metaphysical possibility.

AO2: Reductive materialism

Reductive materialism claims that the mind is just the brain.
Drugs which stimulate, depress, or anesthetize the brain correspondingly affect consciousness.
Brain damage affects certain mental faculties depending on the area affected.
A brian developing or aging affects the mind.
Brain imaging shows correlation for brain activity patterns for any type of mental state.
J J Smart applies the abductive reasoning of occam’s razor here:
The simplest explanation of this correlation is that types of mental states are identical (ontologically reducible) to types of brain states.
E.g., feeling pain is just f-fiber stimulation.

Counter

However, dualist David Chalmers argues scientists have only explained the ‘easy problem of consciousness’, figuring out which brain part is responsible for which mental process like memory, perception or emotion.
The ‘hard problem of consciousness’ is figuring out consciousness itself, and explaining why any physical process should give rise to subjective experience at all.
Neuroscience has not made comparable progress there.
Chalmers’ point seems to be that since such a mystery remains regarding the central question of consciousness itself, it’s at least premature to use science to justify reductive materialism.

Evaluation

However, we can defend reductive materialism.
The brain is beyond our current understanding.
If the mind were the brain, how that works would likewise be beyond our understanding.
So, we should expect reductive materialism to be inconceivable even if it were true.
So, Chalmers pointing to the inconceivably hard problem cannot count against its truth.
Ultimately, it is methodologically more reasonable to extend known physical explanations than to posit a new non-physical kind of substance or property.
We are justified in expecting advances in neuroscience to solve the hard problem.
So, dualism cannot be disproved, but the abductive balance of considerations laid out by Smart still favours materialism.

AO2: Aristotle (& Aquinas) vs Descartes on the soul

Aristotle ground hylomorphism in psychology:
“The soul never thinks without an image”
Sensory experience produces mental ideas, which provide the basis needed for the functioning of knowledge, imagination and memory.
So, human intellect cannot think, imagine or remember without the body.
Aquinas adds that the soul can subsist in itself after death, but only in an incomplete, “unnatural” state.
It cannot count as the whole person until reunited with the resurrected body.

Counter

Descartes rejected the hylomorphic notion that the soul is incomplete without the body.
He claims personal identity is grounded in the continued existence of a unified immaterial consciousness, not bodily continuity.
His argument is that we could doubt the physical world including our body as illusory, but we would still exist so long as we are thinking.
The “I” that doubts is grasped more clearly and distinctly than any physical body.
So introspective rational intuition provides privileged access to the self.
What we grasp reveals consciousness as a unity, compared to the divisible body.
He concludes personal identity consists in unity of immaterial consciousness, not the unity of an organism.

Evaluation

However, Descartes assumes that the mind’s introspective self-perception is accurate.
He thinks he can imagine the mind disconnected from any bodily input.
But this overlooks the possibility that the mind is already the product of an intrinsically embodied development.
Thought is always ‘about’ something (intentionality), and that something is supplied by the body.
Without images from sense data, thought would have nothing to think about, and then it’s hard to conceive in what form it could exist.
Descartes’ notion of a conceivably disembodied mind is thus a misinterpretation of an abstraction.
This is further justified by modern research in developmental psychology.
Mental faculties are not simply innate, they are co-developed with experience.
Descartes’ reliance on intuition fits his epistemology, but this case shows its flaws compared to more empirical views.

AO2: The resurrection/replication of ailments dilemma

Christian resurrection faces a problem where a person dies with ailments.
Especially with conditions like dementia, which affect aspects of the mind relevant to personal identity, such as rationality, personality and memories.
This creates a dilemma:
If such conditions are not resurrected, then personal identity isn’t preserved.
If they are, then heaven and the raised body aren’t perfected states.

Counter:

However, this dilemma assumes the ‘time-slice’ view of identity as determined by psychological properties at a moment.
This implies that at death, identity requires continuity of the mind that just died.
The ‘narrative’ view counters that identity is diachronic, emerging from a historical process involving change.
This reframes dementia as interfering with the expression of an underlying identity, rather than constituting it.
Resurrection could thus preserve the underlying narrative identity of a person.

Evaluation

Hick cannot adopt the narrative conception, as he thinks survival is instant replication of the psycho-physical state that dies.
A hylomorphic account (Aristotle / Aquinas) is more compatible, as it views the soul as the form of an organism, not a set of mental states, and thus unaffected by bodily damage like dementia.
So removing dementia at resurrection would restore the soul’s proper operation, not remove identity.
However, dementia affects everything we could point to as relevant to personal identity (personality, agency, values).
The notion that the demented person is still “fully there” but with impaired expression seems false.
The hylomorphic narrative account struggles because dementia is not a temporary blockage, but a genuine phase of identity.
The dilemma remains: dementia is either resurrected and heaven is imperfect, or it isn’t and identity isn’t preserved.
So there is no theory of resurrection which can solve this problem.

AO2: evaluating near death experiences

Near-death experiences occur in conditions of extreme physiological and psychological stress.
These conditions are known to produce hallucinations, dissociation, and altered states of consciousness.
They are also known to distort memory.
A naturalistic explanation therefore suggests that NDEs are brain-generated experiences caused by neurochemical processes rather than perceptions of an actual afterlife.
This explanation is simpler, relies on known mechanisms, and does not require positing a non-physical realm.

Counter

However, NDEs are not random or chaotic hallucinations.
Reports across cultures display striking similarities.
We could apply James and Stace’ argument that cross-cultural consistency in mystical experience suggests a common objective source rather than purely subjective imagination.
Richard Swinburne’s principle of credulity further claims that we should trust experiences as veridical unless there is strong reason to doubt them. Since many NDEs are vivid, structured, and life-changing, some argue they should be taken seriously as possible glimpses of an afterlife.

Evaluation

Nevertheless, similarity might point to an objective cause, but not necessarily a supernatural one.
Human brains share similar structures and chemistry, so similar stress conditions can be expected to produce similar experiences.
Moreover, unlike ordinary perception, NDEs occur precisely when the brain is functioning abnormally, giving us independent reasons to doubt their validity.
This also undermines Swinburne’s principle of credulity in this context, since there is positive reason to distrust the experience.
NDEs therefore fall short of establishing the existence of an afterlife.

AO2: Evaluation of past lives evidence

Reports of children remembering past lives are often cited as empirical support for Buddhist rebirth or Hindu reincarnation.
Researchers Stevenson and Tucker collected thousands of cases where children seem to recall memories of dead people.
Some information was verified against historical records in ways difficult to explain by ordinary learning or suggestion.
E.g., James Leininger, a young boy whose statements about being a World War II pilot matched identifiable details about a real pilot’s life and death.

Counter

However, this research faces methodological and interpretive challenges.
Verification often occurs after a previous life has been identified.
It’s possible researchers match children’s statements to history selectively.
They are not testing independently specified claims.
Children have vivid imaginations and are highly suggestible, especially in cultures where rebirth is already believed.
With millions of children imagining countless scenarios, some will produce stories that resemble real historical events by chance.
Such cases may then be seized on by relatives as evidence for their religion.
Coincidence, imagination, suggestibility, and confirmation bias seem more plausible explanations.

Evaluation

Even if the evidence were much better, the phenomenon would remain underdetermined.
It would only show some children have access to information they could not normally have acquired.
That wouldn’t prove they were remembering past lives.
Even if a perfect case emerged, it wouldn’t tell us what caused it.
We could invent many supernatural explanation candidates.
E.g., telepathy, aliens, witches.
Theists will prefer their own explanation, but lack a logical basis to do so.
Only discovery of the mechanism involved could help us know how these memories originate.
So at best, such cases point to something unexplained and that’s all we can justifiably say.
Though given the imperfect messy state of the current evidence, reductive materialism is the clear favored explanation.