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The Mind-Body Problem…

A shift from Cartesian Dualism to Peircean Integration (Pragmatic Maxim)

“Health is a state of complete harmony of the body, mind and spirit”…

-B. K. S. Iyengar

The mind-body problem is the relationship between thought and consciousness in the human mind (Mental World), and the brain as part of a physical body embodied in the world (Material World).

Peirce — Triadic of Consciousness: Primisense — feelings — is the consciousness of firstness; Altersense — two modes of sensation and will — is the consciousness of otherness, secondness; Medisense — abstraction, association & suggestion — is the consciousness of a process of bringing to mind (a consciousness of means), thirdness. Note: Logic can be defined as the science of the laws of the stable establishment of belief. Logic is the Study of the Mind. Semeiotics can be defined as the science of the laws of the stable establishment of habits. Metaphysics is the Study of Being. Phenomenology is the Study of Lived Experience.

At its core is a question as to whether the mind and body are separate given how fundamentally different are our Mental and Physical Worlds?

It is an eternal question that has perplexed Philosophy and given rise to alternative views as to the nature of Reality.

In the 17th Century, Rene Descartes addressed the problem via the notion of Cartesian Dualism, where 2 different types of substances exist in the Universe — the Physical, which extends into space (res extensa) — and — the Mind — the Thinking (res cogitans).

Rene believed that whilst the existence of the Mind could not be doubted — I think therefore I am (the cogito) — the existence of the Body could.

By applying Liebniz's Law — the Identity of Indiscernibles — he was able to reconcile this — the different properties of the Mind and Body meant they must therefore be separate things.

Mental World & Material World

Models of the World & the World

Mind & Matter

Abstraction & Experience

Thoughts & Action

It is a perspective anchored in a Dualism view of Reality.

A Cartesian Partition between our Mental World and Material World.

The Digital Revolution

The emergence of the Digital World, Artificial Intelligence and the Metaverse have once again reignited this question and raised a range of fresh questions about the nature of Reality.

The emergence of a Digital form of Dualism and the increasing risk of a collapse in the Semiotic Triadic.

Is Intelligence more than computational complexity compression?

Can Intelligence ever be Artificial?

Are we approaching a Computational Singularity?

Are Algorithms knowledge?

Does language require context, meaning and a lived experience?

Are we living in a Simulation?

Does Reflexivity matter?

What is Data Science?

Does learning require Action & Agency in the World?

Can all Knowledge be Explicit?

Can Trust be Digital ?

What are the consequences of embracing more Algorithms?

Towards Integration — Monism

There remains an alternative to a Dualism way of being in the World.

A shift from separation to integration.

A shift from viewing the World from a Balcony of Abstraction to seeing the World as a Complex, Interdependent and Interconnected Dynamic System.

We are agents in the World, and our actions matter.

A shift to an integrated perspective of Reality where abstraction is combined with experience.

A shift from Dualism to an Integral way of being – our Minds & Body are entangled with the World.

A shift to the Pragmatic Maxim where the guiding normative principle of logic and reason can be revealed in its Practical Effects and Consequences.

The 20th Century US Pragmatist Philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and John Dewey understood the importance of our actions and experiences in the World in shaping our perception of Reality — although Peirce and James/Dewey diverged on the nature of this realism.

“The opinion which is fated to be ultimately agreed to by all who investigate is what we mean by the truth, and the object represented in this opinion is the real. That is the way I would explain reality”…

- Charles Sanders Peirce

Peirce believed in a Monism about truth — renaming his view Pragmaticism— whereas James & Dewey believed in an Alethic Pluralism where there were many ways to be true.

Are we in the process of making a fundamental shift in how perceive Reality in the 21st Century from Dualism to Integration?

A gradual shift to an integral form of consciousness.

Recognising our interdependencies and interconnections.

Acknowledging our entanglement.

A time for Pragmatism.

The emergence of a new networked Science of Cause-Effect

In May 2018, Israeli-American Computer Scientist, Philosopher and 2012 Turing Prize winner — Judea Pearl — published the book — The Book of Why — with Dana Mackenzie.

It's a book that outlines the new Science of Cause-Effect, a radical departure from the approaches anchored in Aristotelian Term Logic and Abstraction – Cartesianism, Reductionism, Deductive Logic and Statistics – that has dominated Human progress for the last 2,000 years.

It was also a departure from the prevailing Artificial Intelligence — Deep Learning.

A narrative that was anchored in a form of digital dualism — an increasing migration to a Mirror World.

Abstraction² or Quantum Abstraction.

Towers of Sleep.

A world eloquently summed up in Rich Sutton’s March 2019 blog post — The Bitter Lesson — where he outlines his perspectives on ~70 years of Ai research.

A world where more & more computation, memory and data coupled with declining processing costs had become the primary engine for the Ai revolution.

A computational singularity.

At each new technological phase, the algorithmic and computational boundaries were extended.

Some 2,000 years ago, Philosophy was at the centre of a new form of disruptive revolutionary Human thinking — the emergence of metaphysics.

Aristotle’s Term Logic saw the separation of thought from the subject – Abstraction — ultimately culminating in the creation of modern-day classical computing, which gave birth to the digital revolution.

Had Judea Pearl done the same by re-introducing Philosophy into the domain of modern-day computer science to revive an integrated way of thinking?

In a lecture he gave at PyData Los Angeles in 2018, he made the following opening observation:

“Data is our window to Reality. Data science is the eye glass which enables us to look through the window. It is not a mirror through which data looks at itself under make up. … that is the essence of things … which means that data is a two body science that connects data and reality… …interpreting Reality in view of the Data”…

A World beyond digital dualism and transition to an integrated way of perceiving the World.

A shift from cartesian dualism and abstract reductive reason to Peircean integration.

Towards a Sense of Coherence.

“in order to ascertain the meaning of an intellectual conception, one should consider what practical consequences might conceivably result by necessity from the truth of that conception, and the sum of these consequences will constitute the entire meaning of the conception”…

— Charles Sanders Peirce