PHILOS 25B Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Euclidean Geometry, Cartesianism, Occasionalism
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Descartes responds by drawing a distinction between three basic notions: thought, extension, union (of mind and body) One cannot conceive of the union if one conceives of the mind and body as really distinct. It is a mistake to try to conceive of the way body interacts with mind in the same way that body interacts with body, says. Descartes compares the relationship between mind and body to the relationship between corporeal objects and weight. Only the senses can make the union clear to us. The senses only tell us that the union exists, but not how. So descartes purports to give an explanation of the mind-body interaction, but he doesn"t. It seems to be that elizabeth and other critics are asking for an explanation about something that descartes simply believes is unintelligible. Malebranche and occasionalism: malebranche was a lesser known philosopher but had an interesting response to. Ideas can"t exist in human minds, only in the mind of god.
