Mind/Body Dualism

The idea of mind/body dualism figures in the long-standing philosophical debate about the interaction between mind and matter, which by means of Level Confusion has also become thoroughly entwined with views about whether mental entities such as thoughts, feelings and intentions are real or not. See Dualism (philosophy of mind) for an overview.

We believe that mind is implemented by the brain (and body), so cannot exist without it, but also that mind is an emergent property which is not nearly as constrained by its physical substrate as traditional arguments have supposed. This ultimate dependence of mind on a real physical substrate proves nothing about the reality of mental phenomena.

We also note that mind/body dualism is highly intuitive. Descarte's Baby argues that young children instinctively develop an dualistic theory of mind. Why is this? You could say that dualism is the design philosophy of the user illusion. See also Intentional Design.