The deductive proof of dualism is false because point C of the helper is false. “Your body” is a certain structure of matter. Dying changes that structure, so dying does not leave behind “your body” in the relevant sense to a physicalist perspective.
Compare with “table dualism.” If a table is “just” its boards, legs, and screws, then how can it be the case that removing the screws and rearranging the pieces results in a non-table? Is there a non-physical “table soul”?
I’m surprised you didn’t make this counterargument yourself.
This specific counterargument is addressed in the book! I've quoted it below after the triple hyphens. But I think your specific formulation of the counterargument is much stronger and probably conclusively refutes the deductive proof.
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I was suspicious of this second proof. One cannot challenge A and B, since they’re simply assumed for the sake of the argument. D looks unassailable. Of course, if two things are identical, then if the one exists, so does the other. That leaves C.
“Listen, Noam, maybe a person’s body doesn’t survive his death.”
“Then what are they burying?”
“Maybe it’s a different body, not identical with the one that was alive. Maybe there are two different bodies, before and after.”
“Do you really want to say that? It’s a way of avoiding the conclusion, but think of it. It’s crazy. You’re going to have to say that at the moment of death the old body just vanishes and is instantaneously replaced with a brand-new one. Quite a trick. And all the physical properties of the brand-new one are going to be spatiotemporally continuous with the just vanished one, which is usually, in the case of other material bodies, sufficient for saying they’re identical. Human bodies are going to turn out to be very weird things, quite spooky.”
My interpretation of this passage (haven’t read the book) is that the author intended it as “Renee disproves her Noam’s argument, but struggles to phrase it as a philosopher would. Noam doesn’t respect her, thinks highly of himself, and isn’t really all that good of a philosopher, so he babbles some dismissive sophistry.”
The deductive proof of dualism is false because point C of the helper is false. “Your body” is a certain structure of matter. Dying changes that structure, so dying does not leave behind “your body” in the relevant sense to a physicalist perspective.
Compare with “table dualism.” If a table is “just” its boards, legs, and screws, then how can it be the case that removing the screws and rearranging the pieces results in a non-table? Is there a non-physical “table soul”?
I’m surprised you didn’t make this counterargument yourself.
This specific counterargument is addressed in the book! I've quoted it below after the triple hyphens. But I think your specific formulation of the counterargument is much stronger and probably conclusively refutes the deductive proof.
---
I was suspicious of this second proof. One cannot challenge A and B, since they’re simply assumed for the sake of the argument. D looks unassailable. Of course, if two things are identical, then if the one exists, so does the other. That leaves C.
“Listen, Noam, maybe a person’s body doesn’t survive his death.”
“Then what are they burying?”
“Maybe it’s a different body, not identical with the one that was alive. Maybe there are two different bodies, before and after.”
“Do you really want to say that? It’s a way of avoiding the conclusion, but think of it. It’s crazy. You’re going to have to say that at the moment of death the old body just vanishes and is instantaneously replaced with a brand-new one. Quite a trick. And all the physical properties of the brand-new one are going to be spatiotemporally continuous with the just vanished one, which is usually, in the case of other material bodies, sufficient for saying they’re identical. Human bodies are going to turn out to be very weird things, quite spooky.”
Thanks for sharing!
My interpretation of this passage (haven’t read the book) is that the author intended it as “Renee disproves her Noam’s argument, but struggles to phrase it as a philosopher would. Noam doesn’t respect her, thinks highly of himself, and isn’t really all that good of a philosopher, so he babbles some dismissive sophistry.”