On the Soul - Descartes et Aristotle
C. Cheng, March, 1999
On the Soul
The question of immortality has plagued the minds of many great minds ever since the beginning of time. The prospect of lasting through all time is, at the very least, invigorating. The fear of our soul dissolving into nothingness at death has bedeviled every age and every mortal (Search for the Soul, 43). We “fear the loss of ourselves” (Darling, xix). While it is generally agreed that bodily immortality is not realistic, the possibility of the soul surviving forever has fascinated many. Philosophers ranging from Aristotle and Pythagorus to more modern thinkers such as Descartes and Kant have attempted to grasp the implications and the truth of this matter.
Before the immortality of the soul can be adequately analyzed, that life principle itself must first be defined and properly placed in the being of a human. Known in general as the “vital, immaterial, life principle” (Columbia Encyclopedia, 765), the soul completes the body and transforms a mere corporeal creature into a rational being: a human. It houses the conscience and moral principles, as well as a “unique, personal self” (Darling, xix). Souls are essential to being human. They are what sets us apart from all other living organisms: the potential for reasoning and rationality. A universe without souls would lack free will and would doubtlessly not be very desirable to live in (Smullyan, 384).
The Sacred Writings of the Baha'i Faith contain a wealth of new information on the nature of the soul. The beliefs of the Baha’i are surprisingly alike to those of Christians. According to the Baha'i teachings, man's true nature is spiritual. Beyond the physical body, each human being has a rational soul, created by God. This soul is a non-material entity, which does not depend on the body. The soul of the individual is the seat, or locus, of his personality, self, and consciousness (Rafraf, 4G). This is very similar to Christianity’s tenets.
The interaction of the soul and the body has had many professed possibilities. The dominant theory, however, is that of metaphysical dualism, which states that “the human person is essentially an incorruptible eternal soul that happens to sojourn in a corruptible physical body” (Rue, 37). The body and soul are “separate substances” (Smullyan, 381). This is the stance that Christianity takes on the issue.
The origin of the soul is a subject of debate as well. Two points of view have been distinguished: creationism, which states that God creates each individual soul in a special act of creation (at the time of conception), and traducianism, which suggests that the parents in begetting the child beget the soul too (Columbia Encyclopedia, 766). However, the former theory has been the dominant one in Christianity. The prospect of humans “creating” a soul is not very likely. That is the work of an immortal, eternal being. Only the eternal can create an immortal.
According to a survey performed by Omni in 1997, Americans are becoming much more interested in the afterlife and immortality, and the percentage of those who believe in life after death is rising exponentially. Those surveyed showed themselves to be well informed. One reader writes, “‘The nature of a person does not change because of death; death merely frees the soul from the narrow limits of our reality’” (Menagh, 64). However, the basic view of all people was summarized extremely well by a thirty-three year old newspaper editor from New Hampshire. He said, “‘The journey [after death] is one of spiritual progression toward a redeeming goal . . . reaching ultimate union with the universe’” (Menagh, 67).
The destiny of the soul is without a doubt the most hotly debated issue. There are hundreds of different religions who offer their own solutions to the dilemma of immortality, and philosopher after philosopher has tried to unravel the tangled web of truth and falsities. The ancient Egyptians were the first culture to consider the immortality of the soul seriously. They thought that the ba (soul) was “a free-moving spirit ... that survives death.” Mummies were meant to guarantee that the soul could go on living forever in the next world (Casey, 8). An ancient Egyptian funerary ritual begins: “You have not gone away dead, you have gone away alive” (Search for the Soul, 26). There are countless references in the Bible to an eternal life offered by God to deserving souls. Christianity and other religions spread hope to their believers about a post-mortem utopia: paradise. Some cultures believe in reincarnation (or transmigration), the notion of rebirth in a new body after death. Plato speaks of this idea in his Republic and Timaeus, and Pythagoras’ notion of the meandering soul after death is thought to hold the germ of what is now the modern view of the eternal soul (Search for the Soul, 32).
It is sometimes difficult to understand what the objective truth of the matter is.
This is a philosophically important issue, because it deals with the essence of our existence, and “is greatly desired by all,” according to St. Thomas Aquinas (Casey, 8). This issue is worthy of philosophical debate, not only because of its importance to all of us, but as well because of the implications it has on our present life. The destiny of our soul after death should govern the way we act in this life. In some religious backgrounds, good moral lives lead to eternal happiness and bliss after death. Thus if our soul is eternal, we must be concerned with the possible consequences of our earthly actions on our soul’s existence, once it has departed from our body. As no-one has returned from beyond death, we have no first-hand knowledge of post-mortem events. Therefore we must arm ourselves with the sword of knowledge, in order to fend off the attacking demons of eternal annihilation. Two philosophers, Rene Descartes and Aristotle, analyzed the question and decided on their own interpretations. The former revolutionized the world of philosophy with three Latin words, and the latter put forward a trend-setting theory of monism that would stand for centuries.
This seventeenth-century philosopher and mathematician revolutionized Western philosophical thought with three Latin words: cogito, ergo sum. “I think, therefore I am.” This inescapable affirmation of existence and undeniable refutable of existential skepticism, brought about by countless hours in seclusion became the cornerstone for the rationalist philosophy Descartes would embrace.
He contemplated much about the soul and body. He set forth the theory of Cartesian dualism, a modern offshoot of Platonic dualism that emphasizes “mind-over-matter” (Search for the Soul, 50). Its main tenet states that reality consists of two kinds of substance, mental and physical. The physical type (res extensa) has length, breadth and depth, and can therefore be measured and divided. The purely mental variety of substance (res cogitans), is both intangible and indivisible. The body and the material world belong to the former, while the mind and soul belong to the latter. For Descartes, mind and soul are the same and are indistinguishable.
There was nothing in the indubitable fact of his thinking to guarantee that he had a body, or that there even was a material world at all. “Consciousness has to be there in order to be deceived” (Barrett, 16). The only safe conclusion was that he was a purely mental being, and that his mind was completely distinct from the body. He opined that the mind was created by God and placed in a body. Therefore the soul is part of God. This being so, then his mind ought to be able to continue to exist independently after his body was dead. Thus man has an immortal soul (Darling, 34). “Since the soul is part of the Whole, part of God or Absolute Substance, it cannot be thought of as disappearing, but continues as long as God continues” (Frost, 164). In the synopsis of his Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes states: “What I have said is sufficient to show clearly enough that the extinction of the mind does not follow from the corruption of the body, and also to give men the hope of another life after death” (“Meditations on First Philosophy”, 72). He also states the following: “It is certain that this I (that is to say, my soul by which I am what I am), is entirely and absolutely distinct from my body, and can exist without it” (“Meditations”, 102). He thought, “the soul by which I am what I am, is entirely distinct from body ... and even if body were not, the soul would not cease to be what it is” (“Discourse on the Method”, 52). Descartes certainly did not intend to suggest that there are two distinct persons residing within the body. Indeed, during life, the body and mind are connected and “intermingling,” as proven by the “sensations of pain, hunger, thirst, etc.” (“Meditations”, 99). The soul expresses itself in numerous ways, such as willing, feeling, and reasoning (Frost, 164). Alas, the connection between the mind and body is merely temporary, and is completely severed at the moment of death. The body wastes away into nothingness, and the mind is released from its prison. Descartes did not elaborate on the specifics of the afterlife; he merely meant to give his fellow humans hope for a ceaseless existence. If he is correct, then “corporeal death is not annihilation, but a phase transition, a metamorphosis in which we break free of our materiality” (Darling, 35) in favour of immortality. Death of the body is “but a change” (Frost, 164).
Descartes’ partitioning of the human person into body and mind is sensible, and his concept of the immortal soul free from permanent attachment to the body is rational. Since God has created the soul as part of his Absolute Substance, therefore it can never perish. The mind and soul are the core of the person for Descartes; it acts as “a pilot in a vessel” (“Meditations”, 99). He believed the soul to be located in the pineal gland, located in the back of the brain. Considering the information available to him at that time, this is a logical deduction about body-soul interaction that shows his ingenuity and intelligence.
Descartes said that the rational soul was created by God and set into a body. Thus, his doctrine of immortality makes sense. It would not be logical for God to create a rational being in his image, endowed with such amazing faculties and containing a part of Him, if this being were to be confined solely to the temporal world. The soul is divine: therefore it is immortal.
Plato’s student Aristotle took his teacher’s views and modified them slightly. He is said to have brought philosophy down to earth. Aristotelian philosophy combines the study of humanity and nature, with a doctrine of happiness as self-realization and personal growth. His study of the natural world and our place in it has made him one of the most influential philosophers of all time. Indeed, until the Middle Ages, he was merely referred to as “the Philosopher”.
In the beginning of his philosophizing career, Aristotle adopted Plato’s dualistic concept of the soul as a deathless entity temporarily bound to a mortal body. In a surviving fragment from one of his early dialogues, the Eudemus, Aristotle characterizes the soul as a separate substance, in unnatural union with the body. “He compares it to the torture used by Tyrrhenian pirates in which prisoners were lashed to corpses” (Search for the Soul, 49). Thus Aristotle embraced the concept of the immortality of the soul. However, this could be attributed to the influence of Plato’s Academy in his early years.
Later in his life, Aristotle wrote a masterpiece on the subject: De Anima (“On the Soul”). In this work, he addresses the issue and disposes with many incorrect theories that had been put forward by such people as Democritus and Diogenes. He called the soul “substance in the sense which corresponds to the definitive formula of a thing’s existence” (“On the Soul”, 642). The soul gives form to inchoate matter, and directs its potentiality (Search for the Soul, 49). It is the animating form of a living body; all that is living (including plants and animals) has a soul. What differentiates the human soul from all other beings is its rationality. It forms the “real or true person, ... immortal, and intellectual, and uniform, and dissoluble, and unchangeable” (Search for the Soul, 44). Aristotle contends that “we can wholly dismiss as unnecessary the question whether the soul and body are one: it is as meaningless as to ask whether the wax and the shape given to it by the stamp are one” (“On the Soul”, 642). The soul is “united to the body as form to matter” (Search for the Soul, 50). Aristotle became the philosophical founding father of monism, which states that body and soul are a unit, rather than distinct. This postulate, however, has ramifications for the central theme of this paper: the soul’s immortality.
Since every living thing is a union of body and soul, of matter and form, therefore the soul is inseparable from the body, and the death of the body brings with it the death of the soul (Search for the Soul, 50). There is no eternal life for individual human souls. The only immortal soul is that of the “Unmoved Mover” (“Metaphysics”, 504), the eternal first cause of the ceaseless change and motion in the universe. That part of the soul that houses the form of a human, extant before the body or soul, returns to that Unmoved Mover after death. This is because the form is a part of this Mover, and simply returns to it (Frost, 159). Thus, when our corporeal bodies disintegrate into nothingness, all vestiges of our personal self perish as well. Only the impersonal form survives. This monistic point of view denies all possibility of an afterlife, whether it be reincarnation or a religious utopia.
The Aristotelian theory about the temporal existence of our inner self does make sense in the context he sets forth, given that the rational soul is the substance, the essential being, of the human person. Thus, if the soul loses the body, there is no longer any matter to complete the form of “human-ness” into a complete person. The body-less form cannot exist, because of the lack of matter to give meaning to the form. Humans are essentially material beings (albeit endowed with rationality) living temporarily on Earth. Therefore the Aristotelian concept of the temporal soul is very logical.
Most major religions today believe that the soul has an ingrained code of conduct, the conscience, contained within it. This set of moral laws would regulate our behaviour in this world, supposedly in preparation fro the next. A keen critic might notice that Aristotle does not mention this in his dissection of the soul. However, although he does not state this expressly in his writings, it is included in his theory of the soul being the form of a human. If the soul is the “blueprint” for our life, then there must be certain moral instructions written on it, so that the architect of our lives can construct a proper edifice. Basic human rights and justice were very important to Aristotle in the pursuit of happiness, and these are no doubt inscribed on our soul. Since there is no life after death for Aristotle, therefore humans must concentrate on this life, using our soul and its faculties in the pursuit of ultimate happiness: our entelechy. As a result, the soul plays a paramount role.
Descartes set forth the theory of Cartesian dualism, while his Athenian counterpart founded the monistic mode of thought. These are two radically different interpretations of the soul’s role in the human person and its eternal fate. The former emphasizes the separation between the soul (or mind) and the body, while the latter argues for the unity of the human person as a single entity of body and soul inextricably intertwined. Aristotle contended that the soul was the essential substance of the person, while Descartes stated that our existence can only be proven through the contemplative use of our mind, using the cogito argument. The soul is our existence for Plato’s student, and it proves our existence for Descartes.
Descartes spoke of a soul created by God, which retains a spark of the divine, in that the soul is part of God. This is his main reason that the soul is immortal. Similarly, Aristotle thought of the soul as the form of a human, created by the Unmoved Mover. However, when the body perishes, only the form of the human remains. All specific traits are eliminated by the unstoppable scythe of death. Conversely, all of Descartes’ soul survives for an afterlife. They both believed in a divine soul; however the complete Aristotelian soul was decidedly “down-to-earth”.
While for Aristotle, the soul is the core of our person, Descartes equated it with the mind and attributed numerous faculties to it. The pineal gland interprets these bodily sensations for the mind. The Aristotelian soul is eternally united with the body, therefore whatever the body experiences, the soul experiences concurrently. It is not a matter of sensation transfer or interpretation through the pineal gland or any intermediary. A monistic person is an inseparable union; a dualistic person is a connection of body and soul. This is the main difference between Aristotle and Descartes.
Amid the countless theories and tenets about the eternal fate of the soul, there must be an objective truth. In all probability, Descartes was closer to the Truth when he spoke of an immortal soul created by God. However, no-one can be certain about our destiny, because the crux of the debate centers on a post-mortem event. The study of this issue is useful, so that we can put our minds at rest about our eternal fate. Rene Descartes succeeded in doing this. The majority of academics who study this issue side with that contemplative Frenchman. C.G. Jung once said, “The dissolution of our timebound form in eternity brings no loss of meaning” (Jung in Darling, 167). Our person, represented in the soul, will last for all eternity.
In any case, there is no need to fear death; we should sustain all hope and suppress all fear so that we might live this life to its fullest potential. Perhaps that is why Aristotle did not disillusion the people of his time by advocating an afterlife. His utopia for humans was the ideal, happy life; the prospect of an afterlife might distract the person from fulfilling their entelechy. The mean for this issue may be achieved by balancing hope for the future, with awareness of the importance of our earthly lives. We shall see what awaits the soul after death, when that time comes.
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