Descartes Mind Body Problem Essay

One of the greatest icons in the field of philosophy, who can be described to have inscribed lasting fundamental legacies include Rene Descartes. This legendary philosopher formulated the mind body problem in which he tried to bring out the kind of relationship that exists between the brain of man and the body. This paper looks into discussing the theory in detail and in the course of discussion; reach an agreement as to whether there really are two kinds of distinct substances, in relation to the human brain and the human body, the paper will also look at how the human mind is able to interact with the human body and lastly, the paper will try to formulate to what extent is Rene Descartes’ theory of the mind – body problem is convincing.

As stated, this is a kind of problem that results from the attempt to give a vivid explanation of the relationship between the human brain and the human body and thus establishing if the body of a human being is independent from the brain and vice versa. In what can now be termed as the ‘mind-body dualism.’
Looking at the religious motivation towards Descartes’ theory of mind – body dualism, Descartes, just like numerous other religious believers, believed that the human soul was immortal and since at the point of death the human body became functionless, the soul, which he equated to the human mind was immortal and therefore this was proof that the human body and the human mind were two distinct substances. Looking at the scientific connotation, Descartes looked at the nature of physical things and established that they lacked mentality (Russell,