View allAll Photos Tagged Explains,
Before I explain this MOC of mine, I'd like to thank my followers. You are all honorable individuals of whom I value dearly. Each of you guys have been looking towards my posts when they are uploaded and critique and enjoy them in a constructive and supportive manner. I'd like to especially thank Brickwarrior2016, a follower of mine who was kind enough to give me a shout out on his stream! He is a great builder and has my respect, as you all do. Please Check him Out (:.
Okay so now for the MOC. This is the Consolidated PBY used by the United States Navy in World War Two. It has folding landing gear and has the potential to hold a mini figure (though there are no furnishings within this beast quite yet.) It is, of course, an amphibious craft capable of landing in both land and water. Hope you guys like it!
Women LOVE shoes
cant explain it
dont know why its such a big deal
they just do
they cant get enough of them
every woman i have known
spent hours and hours
adoring them instead of me............................
we all have our causes
our tastes
our FETISHES...............................
anyway here it is my first shoe FETISH a la SYMMETRY
Photography’s new conscience
A couple of months ago, i had this idea about how to help women to feel a little bit safer when the are out on the street at night.
all this ideas that i had back then have finally come to a project.
im working on this in all of my free time since the last 3 months, doing all the research, doing all the talks to women.
this is my project its called homeward, im so proud to be able to show you alittle bit of it today.
it will always be free, for every human to use.
Lets take you home safe!
thank you for your attention.
From the realm of colourful and simple plates, this beauty of a snowflake contains a mysterious feature that I cannot explain. Before reading the rest of the post, can you identify it? View large to see it in better detail! (Press "L" to view in Lightbox mode)
Small hexagonal snowflakes sometimes form with just the right thickness of bubbles to create thin film inference colours within the ice. The thickness of the bubble (and therefore the thickness of the ice surrounding it) determines the colour that is generated by the optical interference. These colours then showcase the growth pattern of the bubble, mostly in a predictable manner… but there is an exception here, in the bottom left.
The bottom left coloured area depicts two small circles that clearly show at least two levels of thickness, but these circles to not conform the natural growth patterns on bubbles in the ice. There is no way (to my knowledge) that this could have formed without outside interference. Very dark tones can be identified within certain interference patterns and it doesn’t look like the snowflake is hollow, but it appears that something made a bubble expand or the surface of the ice shrink to create this shape.
The only thing that comes to mind is some kind of environmental contamination, hitting the snowflake exactly on those two spots and causing this effect, whether it be pollution or some other substance in the atmosphere. However, even this doesn’t fit. If it was a droplet of some contaminant, the outer reddish ring would not be solid, but rather vary in thickness towards the inner black area. A solid red ring means there is a distinct and constant drop in thickness through this region, proceeding to another similar drop in the center. It’s a mystery to me!
…And all of this discussion over a feature in a snowflake measuring 0.04mm (40 microns). That’s the size of the largest of these peculiar circles. The smallest things can be fascinating!
And if you find this interesting, you’ll love all of the mysterious snowflakes discussed in Sky Crystals: www.skycrystals.ca/ - along with all of the photographic techniques used to create images like this. It’s not too late to discover the beauty that winter has… and it might be more appealing to do so as it’s on the way out! :)
This may not explain everything, but it certainly explains a lot. Here, the famed future flickr user, raconteur, and all around wit shouts down a pony for not properly using its bowl. This stood her in good stead for proper hygiene, especially of her friends who seem to have similar troubles in the WCs and on the street curbs of her hometown.
File: E0049
Somewhere around Gloucestershire or South Gloucestershire, England, United Kingdom. Date unknown, possibly around c2008. Will be explained below.
About the photograph.
Tiffany is a model (either amateur, part-time, or professional) whom did a lot of modelling for various British top-shelf adult softcore magazines. Many of the British titles includes the likes of Escort, Razzle, and Fiesta, to name a few.
I saw her in one of those Reader’s Wives pages at the back of those magazines. Usually where a lot of male readers would send pictures of their girlfriends or wives to the softcore magazine for a little bit of cash.
There was a small article, a quick bio that talks about her, and it also included a mention that if anyone wants to get in touch with her, they may write via the magazine.
So I wrote to her, asking if I could book her for a photo-shoot, and we ended up in communications done by writing letters back and forth, even though email would be easier and quicker. Finally arrangements were made, date and time for a photo-shoot set up, booked for a couple of hours, at her partner’s home.
That was sometime around autumn of 2008, I have no idea when exactly as I’ve lost my notes, and the metafile for the photos gets changed, I’ll explain this later.
I can’t remember the exact location either as I’ve not made notes of it. I didn’t start writing a journal until many years later. However it was somewhere around the south part of Gloucestershire, and somewhere closer to the M5 motorway. It was done at her partner’s home.
Even thought I am a deaf person with speech impaired, when I went there, they greeted me warmly and openly.
I had done a few photo-shoots of women before, but they weren’t models, as they were mostly female friends or people I know, posing for me as a favour. Tiffany is my first serious and my first booked model.
Communications with her, directing her to the kind of poses, was not a problem. She is an experienced model and had done a lot of modelling before, all I had to do was to mime the pose I want her to do, and she simply use her experience to do the posing in the ways I wanted.
At the beginning of the two hours session, I started shooting the photos with my Nikon D1, but sadly, my camera started to develop a technical problem, even though I checked the equipment beforehand. In case you’re wondering, it was not a flat battery. The photo-shoot was in danger of being cancelled, but thankfully her partner let me borrow his Nikon DSLR to continue the session.
It was a Nikon, but I don’t remember which model. Could have been one of the mid-range series like the D100, D200, or D300 models. As it was a Nikon brand, it was easy for me to quickly make the translation from my camera to their camera in a short time, as most of the controls are familiar.
In this photograph, she is posing on the first floor landing. Tiffany is wearing a white faux fur jacket manufactured by Astrake, and wearing her own white gloves. Those were the first set of outfits she worn during the photo-shoot.
After the photo-shoot was done, they transferred all the photos from the memory card to a CD-R, and posted the disc to me. There was a problem with the file format, and I could not open them in my computer, so I informed them of incompatibility issues.
Therefore they had to save the files in standard JPEG format, which is why the files are missing the EXIF information about the camera, and the metafile may have the date the files were created on the disc, instead of actual creation date from the camera.
After my first serious photo-shoot with Tiffany, I feel I’ve picked up experience of how to book models, how to communicate with them, and how to work with them. Then in 2016, I booked my next model, and to date (July 2024), I have worked with 7 different models.
Despite myself being deaf, Tiffany and all the other models I worked with afterwards, had got on well.
The Comment Box is NOT an adverting billboard for the groups you are member of. You are welcome to comment on my photos, about the subject, or about your similar experience
If you want to promote the groups you are member of, then do it IN YOUR own Photostream.
©Jane Brown2015 All Rights Reserved. This image is not available for use on websites, blogs or other media without explicit written permission.
view large
Elsie is explaining to me why it is I am not a good pupil in her school (never mind that I'm the only one who is not either an animal or doll). This was taken not long before my camera was confiscated!
title.
In the glass. (Paris 2012 shot)
Several pieces from now.
I will return to Paris.
:)
It is unpublished.
:)
Do you want to hear my voice?
:)
I updated Youtube.
It is only in Japanese.
I explained comments on photos etc.
If your time is permitted, please look.
:)
1
About the composition of the picture posted to Flicker. First type.
2
About the composition of the picture posted to Flicker. Second type.
3
About when I started Fotolog. Architect 's point of view.
Four
Why did not you have a camera so far?
Five
What is the coolest thing? The photo is as it is.
6
About the current YouTube bar. I also want to tell, I want to leave.
7
About Japanese photographers. Japanese YouTube bar is Pistols.
8
The composition of the photograph is sensibility. Meet the designers in Milan. Two questions.
9
What is a good composition? What is a bad composition?
Ten
What is the time to point the camera? It is slow if you are looking into the viewfinder or display.
11
Family photos. I can not take pictures with others. The inside of the subject.
12
About YouTube 's photographer. Camera technology etc. Sensibility is polished by reading books.
13
About the Japanese newspaper. A picture of a good newspaper is Reuters. If you continue to look at useless photographs, it will be useless.
14
About Japanese photographers. About the exhibition.
Summary. I wrote a novel etc. What I want to tell the most.
Paris. France. 2012. shot … 0.9 / 6
(Today's picture. That's unannounced.)
( ( Lumix G3 shot ) )
Images.
Zepherin Saint & Miranda Nicole … Butterflies (Tribe Vocal Mix)
_________________________________
_________________________________
Profile.
In November 2014, we caught the attention of the party selected to undertake the publicity for a mobile phone that changed the face of the world with just a single model, and will conclude a confidentiality agreement with them.
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/03/tokyo-big-s...
_________________________________
_________________________________
Interviews and novels.
About my book.
I published a book in old days.
At that time, I was uploading my interview on the net on the net.
That Japanese and English.
I will make it public for free.
Details were explained to the Amazon site.
How to write a novel.
How to take pictures.
Distance to the work.
They all have a common item.
I made a sentence about what I felt, and left it.
I hope that my text can be read by many people.
Thank you.
Mitsushiro.
1 Interview in English
「interview_eng.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
2 novels. unforgettable 'English version.(This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
「novel_unforgettable_eng.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
3 Interview Japanese version
drive.google.com/file/d/1w5l2hrV5a6lraDiC_Lz2tG_HqatqUCO5...
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
4 novels. unforgettable ' JPN version.
「novel_unforgettable_jpn.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
5 A streamlined trajectory. only Japanese.
「streamlined_trajectory.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
_________________________________
_________________________________
iBooks. Electronic Publishing. It is free now.
0.about the iBooks.
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2017/03/about-digit...
1.unforgettable '(ENG.ver.)(This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
itunes.apple.com/us/book/unforgettable/id1216576828?ls=1&...
2.unforgettable '(JNP.ver.)(This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
itunes.apple.com/us/book/unforgettable/id1216584262?ls=1&...
3. Streamlined trajectory.(For Japanese only.)
itunes.apple.com/us/book/%E6%B5%81%E7%B7%9A%E5%BD%A2%E3%8... =11
_________________________________
_________________________________
My Novel >> Unforgettable'
(This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
Mitsushiro Nakagawa
All Translated by Yumi Ikeda .
images.
U2 - No Line On The Horizon Live in Dublin
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oKwnkYFsiE&feature=related
There are two reasons why a person faces the sea.
One, to enjoy a slice of shine in the sea like children bubbling over in the beach.
The other, to brush the dust of memory like an old man who misses old days, staring at the shine
quietly.
Those lead to only one meaning though they do not seem to overlap. It’s a rebirth.
I face myself to change tomorrow, a vague day into something certain.
That is the meaning of a rebirth.
I had a very sweet girlfriend when I was 18.
After she left, I knew the meaning of gentleness for the first time and also a true pain of loss. After
she left, how many times did I depend too much on her, doubt her, envy her and keep on telling lies
until I realized it is love?
I wonder whether a nobody like me could have given something to her who was struggling in the
daily life in those days. Giving something is arrogant conceit. It is nothing but self-satisfaction.
I had been thinking about such a thing.
However, I guess what she saw in me was because I had nothing. That‘s why she tried to see
something in me. Perhaps she found a slight possibility in me, a guy filled with ambiguous, unstable
tomorrow. But I wasted days depending too much on her gentleness.
Now I finally can convey how I felt in those days when we met.
1/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24577016535/in/dateposted...
2/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24209330259/in/dateposted...
3/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/23975215274/in/dateposted...
4/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24515964952/in/dateposted...
5/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24276473749/in/dateposted...
6/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24548895082/in/dateposted...
7/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24594603711/in/dateposted...
8/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24588215562/in/dateposted...
9/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24100804163/in/dateposted...
Fin.
images.
U2 - No Line On The Horizon
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oKwnkYFsiE&feature=related
_________________________________
_________________________________
Title of my book > unforgettable'
Author : Mitsushiro Nakagawa
Out Now.
ISBN978-4-86264-866-2
in Amazon.
www.amazon.co.jp/Unforgettable’-Mitsushiro-Nakagawa/dp/...
_________________________________
_________________________________
The schedule of the next novel.
Still would stand all time. (Unforgettable '2)
(It will not go away forever)
Please give me some more time. That is Japanese.
_________________________________
_________________________________
An exhibition in 2019.
spring.
theme.
Silence Is the Way. (Tentative title)
place. Tokyo Big Site.
Sponsoring. Design festa.
2020.
Date unknown.
DIC Kawamura Memorial Art Museum attached gallery.
place. Sakura City, Chiba Prefecture.
theme.
From that day, forever ...
_________________________________
_________________________________
flickr.
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/
_________________________________
_________________________________
YouTube.
_________________________________
_________________________________
instagram.
www.instagram.com/mitsushiro_nakagawa/
_________________________________
_________________________________
Pinterest.
_________________________________
_________________________________
_________________________________
_________________________________
fotolog
_________________________________
_________________________________
twitter.
_________________________________
_________________________________
facebook.
www.facebook.com/mitsushiro.nakagawa
_________________________________
_________________________________
Do you want to hear my voice?
:)
I updated Youtube.
It is only in Japanese.
I explained comments on photos etc.
If your time is permitted, please look.
:)
1
About the composition of the picture posted to Flicker. First type.
2
About the composition of the picture posted to Flicker. Second type.
3
About when I started Fotolog. Architect 's point of view.
Four
Why did not you have a camera so far?
Five
What is the coolest thing? The photo is as it is.
6
About the current YouTube bar. I also want to tell, I want to leave.
7
About Japanese photographers. Japanese YouTube bar is Pistols.
8
The composition of the photograph is sensibility. Meet the designers in Milan. Two questions.
9
What is a good composition? What is a bad composition?
Ten
What is the time to point the camera? It is slow if you are looking into the viewfinder or display.
11
Family photos. I can not take pictures with others. The inside of the subject.
12
About YouTube 's photographer. Camera technology etc. Sensibility is polished by reading books.
13
About the Japanese newspaper. A picture of a good newspaper is Reuters. If you continue to look at useless photographs, it will be useless.
14
About Japanese photographers. About the exhibition.
Summary. I wrote a novel etc. What I want to tell the most.
_________________________________
_________________________________
Japanese is the following.
_________________________________
_________________________________
タイトル。
In the glass. ( Paris 2012 shot )
これから数枚。
僕はパリへ戻します。
:)
未発表です。
:)
あなたは僕の声を聞きたいですか？
:)
僕はYoutubeを更新しました。
日本語だけです。
僕は写真などの解説をしました。
もしも、あなたの時間が許されれば、見てください。
:)
1
フリッカーへ投稿した写真の構図について。１種類目。
2
フリッカーへ投稿した写真の構図について。２種類目。
3
Fotologを始めた時について。 建築家の視点。
4
なぜ、今までカメラを手にしなかったのか？
5
何が一番かっこいいのか？ 写真はありのままに。
6
現在のユーチューバーについて。僕も伝え、残したい。
7
日本人の写真家について。日本のユーチューバーはピストルズ。
8
写真の構図は、感性。ミラノのデザイナーに会って。二つの質問。
9
良い構図とは？ 悪い構図とは？
10
カメラを向ける時とは？ ファインダーやディスプレイを覗いていては遅い。
11
家族写真。他人では撮れない。被写体の内面。
12
ユーチューブの写真家について。カメラの技術等。感性は、本を読むことで磨く。
13
日本の新聞について。良い新聞の写真はロイター。ダメな写真を見続けるとダメになる。
14
日本の写真家について。その展示について。
まとめ。僕が書いた小説など。僕が最も伝えたいこと。
次の小説のイメージ。
Still would stand all time.(unforgettable'2)
（いつまでもなくならないだろう）
Paris. France. 2012. shot … 0.9 / 6
(Today's picture. That's unannounced.)
(( Lumix G3 shot ))
Images.
Zepherin Saint & Miranda Nicole … Butterflies (Tribe Vocal Mix)
_________________________________
_________________________________
プロフィール。
2014年11月、たった1機種で世界を塗り替えた携帯電話の広告を請け負った選考者の目に留まり、秘密保持同意書を結ぶ。
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/03/tokyo-big-s...
_________________________________
_________________________________
インタビューと小説。
僕の本について。
僕は、昔に本を出版しました。
その際に、僕のインタビューをPDFでネット上へアップロードしていました。
その日本語と英語。
僕は、無料でを公開します。
詳細は、アマゾンのサイトへ解説しました。
小説の書き方。
写真の撮影方法。
作品への距離感。
これらはすべて共通項があります。
僕は、僕が感じたことを文章にして、残しました。
僕のテキストが多くの人に読んでもらえることを望みます。
ありがとう。
Mitsushiro.
１ インタビュー 英語版
「interview_eng.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
２ 小説。unforgettable’ 英語版。
「novel_unforgettable_eng.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
３ インタビュー 日本語版
drive.google.com/file/d/1w5l2hrV5a6lraDiC_Lz2tG_HqatqUCO5...
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
４ 小説。unforgettable’ 日本語版。(この小説は未来のアーティストへ捧げます)
「novel_unforgettable_jpn.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
５ 流線形の軌跡。 日本語のみ。
「streamlined_trajectory.pdf」
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2018/08/interviews-...
_________________________________
_________________________________
iBooks.電子出版。（現在は無料）
0.about the iBooks.
stealaway.cocolog-nifty.com/stealaway/2017/03/about-digit...
1.unforgettable’ ( ENG.ver.)(This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
itunes.apple.com/us/book/unforgettable/id1216576828?ls=1&...
For Japanese only.
2.unforgettable’ ( JNP.ver.)(この小説は未来のアーティストへ捧げます)
itunes.apple.com/us/book/unforgettable/id1216584262?ls=1&...
3.流線形の軌跡。
itunes.apple.com/us/book/%E6%B5%81%E7%B7%9A%E5%BD%A2%E3%8...
_________________________________
_________________________________
僕の小説。英語版
My Novel Unforgettable' (This book is Dedicated to the future artist.)
Mitsushiro Nakagawa
All Translated by Yumi Ikeda .
1/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24577016535/in/dateposted...
2/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24209330259/in/dateposted...
3/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/23975215274/in/dateposted...
4/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24515964952/in/dateposted...
5/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24276473749/in/dateposted...
6/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24548895082/in/dateposted...
7/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24594603711/in/dateposted...
8/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24588215562/in/dateposted...
9/9
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/24100804163/in/dateposted...
Fin.
images.
U2 - No Line On The Horizon Live in Dublin
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oKwnkYFsiE&feature=related
_________________________________
_________________________________
Title of my book > unforgettable'
Author : Mitsushiro Nakagawa
Out Now.
ISBN978-4-86264-866-2
in Amazon.
www.amazon.co.jp/Unforgettable’-Mitsushiro-Nakagawa/dp/...
_________________________________
_________________________________
次の小説の予定。
Still would stand all time.(unforgettable'2)
（いつまでもなくならないだろう）
もう少し時間をください。それは日本語です。
_________________________________
_________________________________
２０１９年の展示。
春。
テーマ。
Silence Is the Way.(仮題)
場所。東京ビッグサイト。
Sponsoring. Design festa.
２０２０年。
日時未定。
DIC川村記念美術館付属ギャラリー。
場所。千葉県佐倉市。
テーマ。
あの日から、ずっと…
_________________________________
_________________________________
flickr.
www.flickr.com/photos/stealaway/
_________________________________
_________________________________
YouTube.
_________________________________
_________________________________
instagram.
www.instagram.com/mitsushiro_nakagawa/
_________________________________
_________________________________
Pinterest.
_________________________________
_________________________________
_________________________________
_________________________________
fotolog
_________________________________
_________________________________
twitter.
_________________________________
_________________________________
facebook.
www.facebook.com/mitsushiro.nakagawa
_________________________________
_________________________________
あなたは僕の声を聞きたいですか？
:)
僕はYoutubeを更新しました。
日本語だけです。
僕は写真などの解説をしました。
もしも、あなたの時間が許されれば、見てください。
:)
1
フリッカーへ投稿した写真の構図について。１種類目。
2
フリッカーへ投稿した写真の構図について。２種類目。
3
Fotologを始めた時について。 建築家の視点。
4
なぜ、今までカメラを手にしなかったのか？
5
何が一番かっこいいのか？ 写真はありのままに。
6
現在のユーチューバーについて。僕も伝え、残したい。
7
日本人の写真家について。日本のユーチューバーはピストルズ。
8
写真の構図は、感性。ミラノのデザイナーに会って。二つの質問。
9
良い構図とは？ 悪い構図とは？
10
カメラを向ける時とは？ ファインダーやディスプレイを覗いていては遅い。
11
家族写真。他人では撮れない。被写体の内面。
12
ユーチューブの写真家について。カメラの技術等。感性は、本を読むことで磨く。
13
日本の新聞について。良い新聞の写真はロイター。ダメな写真を見続けるとダメになる。
14
日本の写真家について。その展示について。
まとめ。僕が書いた小説など。僕が最も伝えたいこと。
_________________________________
_________________________________
Japanese is the following.
_________________________________
_________________________________
E.
_Blog Deets_
Brior- The Harper Dress
Location- Tres Chic
Instagram: www.instagram.com/p/C_HRwQpPNOP/?igsh=MWtxMjIzaXk4ZGRtZQ==
1. The Mind-Body Problem and the History of Dualism
1.1 The Mind-Body Problem
The mind-body problem is the problem: what is the relationship between mind and body? Or alternatively: what is the relationship between mental properties and physical properties?
Humans have (or seem to have) both physical properties and mental properties. People have (or seem to have)the sort of properties attributed in the physical sciences. These physical properties include size, weight, shape, colour, motion through space and time, etc. But they also have (or seem to have) mental properties, which we do not attribute to typical physical objects These properties involve consciousness (including perceptual experience, emotional experience, and much else), intentionality (including beliefs, desires, and much else), and they are possessed by a subject or a self. Physical properties are public, in the sense that they are, in principle, equally observable by anyone. Some physical properties – like those of an electron – are not directly observable at all, but they are equally available to all, to the same degree, with scientific equipment and techniques. The same is not true of mental properties. I may be able to tell that you are in pain by your behaviour, but only you can feel it directly. Similarly, you just know how something looks to you, and I can only surmise. Conscious mental events are private to the subject, who has a privileged access to them of a kind no-one has to the physical. The mind-body problem concerns the relationship between these two sets of properties. The mind-body problem breaks down into a number of components. The ontological question: what are mental states and what are physical states? Is one class a subclass of the other, so that all mental states are physical, or vice versa? Or are mental states and physical states entirely distinct?
The causal question: do physical states influence mental states? Do mental states influence physical states? If so, how?
Different aspects of the mind-body problem arise for different aspects of the mental, such as consciousness, intentionality, the self. The problem of consciousness: what is consciousness? How is it related to the brain and the body? The problem of intentionality: what is intentionality? How is it related to the brain and the body? The problem of the self: what is the self? How is it related to the brain and the body? Other aspects of the mind-body problem arise for aspects of the physical. For example:
The problem of embodiment: what is it for the mind to be housed in a body? What is it for a body to belong to a particular subject?
The seemingly intractable nature of these problems have given rise to many different philosophical views.
Materialist views say that, despite appearances to the contrary, mental states are just physical states. Behaviourism, functionalism, mind-brain identity theory and the computational theory of mind are examples of how materialists attempt to explain how this can be so. The most common factor in such theories is the attempt to explicate the nature of mind and consciousness in terms of their ability to directly or indirectly modify behaviour, but there are versions of materialism that try to tie the mental to the physical without explicitly explaining the mental in terms of its behaviour-modifying role. The latter are often grouped together under the label ‘non-reductive physicalism’, though this label is itself rendered elusive because of the controversial nature of the term ‘reduction’.
Idealist views say that physical states are really mental. This is because the physical world is an empirical world and, as such, it is the intersubjective product of our collective experience.
Dualist views (the subject of this entry) say that the mental and the physical are both real and neither can be assimilated to the other. For the various forms that dualism can take and the associated problems, see below.
In sum, we can say that there is a mind-body problem because both consciousness and thought, broadly construed, seem very different from anything physical and there is no convincing consensus on how to build a satisfactorily unified picture of creatures possessed of both a mind and a body.
Other entries which concern aspects of the mind-body problem include (among many others): behaviorism, consciousness, eliminative materialism, epiphenomenalism, functionalism, identity theory, intentionality, mental causation, neutral monism, and physicalism.
1.2 History of dualism
In dualism, ‘mind’ is contrasted with ‘body’, but at different times, different aspects of the mind have been the centre of attention. In the classical and mediaeval periods, it was the intellect that was thought to be most obviously resistant to a materialistic account: from Descartes on, the main stumbling block to materialist monism was supposed to be ‘consciousness’, of which phenomenal consciousness or sensation came to be considered as the paradigm instance.
The classical emphasis originates in Plato’s Phaedo. Plato believed that the true substances are not physical bodies, which are ephemeral, but the eternal Forms of which bodies are imperfect copies. These Forms not only make the world possible, they also make it intelligible, because they perform the role of universals, or what Frege called ‘concepts’. It is their connection with intelligibility that is relevant to the philosophy of mind. Because Forms are the grounds of intelligibility, they are what the intellect must grasp in the process of understanding. In Phaedo Plato presents a variety of arguments for the immortality of the soul, but the one that is relevant for our purposes is that the intellect is immaterial because Forms are immaterial and intellect must have an affinity with the Forms it apprehends (78b4–84b8). This affinity is so strong that the soul strives to leave the body in which it is imprisoned and to dwell in the realm of Forms. It may take many reincarnations before this is achieved. Plato’s dualism is not, therefore, simply a doctrine in the philosophy of mind, but an integral part of his whole metaphysics.
One problem with Plato’s dualism was that, though he speaks of the soul as imprisoned in the body, there is no clear account of what binds a particular soul to a particular body. Their difference in nature makes the union a mystery.
Aristotle did not believe in Platonic Forms, existing independently of their instances. Aristotelian forms (the capital ‘F’ has disappeared with their standing as autonomous entities) are the natures and properties of things and exist embodied in those things. This enabled Aristotle to explain the union of body and soul by saying that the soul is the form of the body. This means that a particular person’s soul is no more than his nature as a human being. Because this seems to make the soul into a property of the body, it led many interpreters, both ancient and modern, to interpret his theory as materialistic. The interpretation of Aristotle’s philosophy of mind – and, indeed, of his whole doctrine of form – remains as live an issue today as it was immediately after his death (Robinson 1983 and 1991; Nussbaum 1984; Rorty and Nussbaum, eds, 1992). Nevertheless, the text makes it clear that Aristotle believed that the intellect, though part of the soul, differs from other faculties in not having a bodily organ. His argument for this constitutes a more tightly argued case than Plato’s for the immateriality of thought and, hence, for a kind of dualism. He argued that the intellect must be immaterial because if it were material it could not receive all forms. Just as the eye, because of its particular physical nature, is sensitive to light but not to sound, and the ear to sound and not to light, so, if the intellect were in a physical organ it could be sensitive only to a restricted range of physical things; but this is not the case, for we can think about any kind of material object (De Anima III,4; 429a10–b9). As it does not have a material organ, its activity must be essentially immaterial.
It is common for modern Aristotelians, who otherwise have a high view of Aristotle’s relevance to modern philosophy, to treat this argument as being of purely historical interest, and not essential to Aristotle’s system as a whole. They emphasize that he was not a ‘Cartesian’ dualist, because the intellect is an aspect of the soul and the soul is the form of the body, not a separate substance. Kenny (1989) argues that Aristotle’s theory of mind as form gives him an account similar to Ryle (1949), for it makes the soul equivalent to the dispositions possessed by a living body. This ‘anti-Cartesian’ approach to Aristotle arguably ignores the fact that, for Aristotle, the form is the substance.
These issues might seem to be of purely historical interest. But we shall see in below, in section 4.5, that this is not so.
The identification of form and substance is a feature of Aristotle’s system that Aquinas effectively exploits in this context, identifying soul, intellect and form, and treating them as a substance. (See, for example, Aquinas (1912), Part I, questions 75 and 76.) But though the form (and, hence, the intellect with which it is identical) are the substance of the human person, they are not the person itself. Aquinas says that when one addresses prayers to a saint – other than the Blessed Virgin Mary, who is believed to retain her body in heaven and is, therefore, always a complete person – one should say, not, for example, ‘Saint Peter pray for us’, but ‘soul of Saint Peter pray for us’. The soul, though an immaterial substance, is the person only when united with its body. Without the body, those aspects of its personal memory that depend on images (which are held to be corporeal) will be lost.(See Aquinas (1912), Part I, question 89.)
The more modern versions of dualism have their origin in Descartes’ Meditations, and in the debate that was consequent upon Descartes’ theory. Descartes was a substance dualist. He believed that there were two kinds of substance: matter, of which the essential property is that it is spatially extended; and mind, of which the essential property is that it thinks. Descartes’ conception of the relation between mind and body was quite different from that held in the Aristotelian tradition. For Aristotle, there is no exact science of matter. How matter behaves is essentially affected by the form that is in it. You cannot combine just any matter with any form – you cannot make a knife out of butter, nor a human being out of paper – so the nature of the matter is a necessary condition for the nature of the substance. But the nature of the substance does not follow from the nature of its matter alone: there is no ‘bottom up’ account of substances. Matter is a determinable made determinate by form. This was how Aristotle thought that he was able to explain the connection of soul to body: a particular soul exists as the organizing principle in a particular parcel of matter.
The belief in the relative indeterminacy of matter is one reason for Aristotle’s rejection of atomism. If matter is atomic, then it is already a collection of determinate objects in its own right, and it becomes natural to regard the properties of macroscopic substances as mere summations of the natures of the atoms.
Although, unlike most of his fashionable contemporaries and immediate successors, Descartes was not an atomist, he was, like the others, a mechanist about the properties of matter. Bodies are machines that work according to their own laws. Except where there are minds interfering with it, matter proceeds deterministically, in its own right. Where there are minds requiring to influence bodies, they must work by ‘pulling levers’ in a piece of machinery that already has its own laws of operation. This raises the question of where those ‘levers’ are in the body. Descartes opted for the pineal gland, mainly because it is not duplicated on both sides of the brain, so it is a candidate for having a unique, unifying function.
The main uncertainty that faced Descartes and his contemporaries, however, was not where interaction took place, but how two things so different as thought and extension could interact at all. This would be particularly mysterious if one had an impact view of causal interaction, as would anyone influenced by atomism, for whom the paradigm of causation is like two billiard balls cannoning off one another.
Various of Descartes’ disciples, such as Arnold Geulincx and Nicholas Malebranche, concluded that all mind-body interactions required the direct intervention of God. The appropriate states of mind and body were only the occasions for such intervention, not real causes. Now it would be convenient to think that occasionalists held that all causation was natural except for that between mind and body. In fact they generalized their conclusion and treated all causation as directly dependent on God. Why this was so, we cannot discuss here.
Descartes’ conception of a dualism of substances came under attack from the more radical empiricists, who found it difficult to attach sense to the concept of substance at all. Locke, as a moderate empiricist, accepted that there were both material and immaterial substances. Berkeley famously rejected material substance, because he rejected all existence outside the mind. In his early Notebooks, he toyed with the idea of rejecting immaterial substance, because we could have no idea of it, and reducing the self to a collection of the ‘ideas’ that constituted its contents. Finally, he decided that the self, conceived as something over and above the ideas of which it was aware, was essential for an adequate understanding of the human person. Although the self and its acts are not presented to consciousness as objects of awareness, we are obliquely aware of them simply by dint of being active subjects. Hume rejected such claims, and proclaimed the self to be nothing more than a concatenation of its ephemeral contents.
In fact, Hume criticised the whole conception of substance for lacking in empirical content: when you search for the owner of the properties that make up a substance, you find nothing but further properties. Consequently, the mind is, he claimed, nothing but a ‘bundle’ or ‘heap’ of impressions and ideas – that is, of particular mental states or events, without an owner. This position has been labelled bundle dualism, and it is a special case of a general bundle theory of substance, according to which objects in general are just organised collections of properties. The problem for the Humean is to explain what binds the elements in the bundle together. This is an issue for any kind of substance, but for material bodies the solution seems fairly straightforward: the unity of a physical bundle is constituted by some form of causal interaction between the elements in the bundle. For the mind, mere causal connection is not enough; some further relation of co-consciousness is required. We shall see in 5.2.1 that it is problematic whether one can treat such a relation as more primitive than the notion of belonging to a subject.
One should note the following about Hume’s theory. His bundle theory is a theory about the nature of the unity of the mind. As a theory about this unity, it is not necessarily dualist. Parfit (1970, 1984) and Shoemaker (1984, ch. 2), for example, accept it as physicalists. In general, physicalists will accept it unless they wish to ascribe the unity to the brain or the organism as a whole. Before the bundle theory can be dualist one must accept property dualism, for more about which, see the next section.
A crisis in the history of dualism came, however, with the growing popularity of mechanism in science in the nineteenth century. According to the mechanist, the world is, as it would now be expressed, ‘closed under physics’. This means that everything that happens follows from and is in accord with the laws of physics. There is, therefore, no scope for interference in the physical world by the mind in the way that interactionism seems to require. According to the mechanist, the conscious mind is an epiphenomenon (a notion given general currency by T. H. Huxley 1893): that is, it is a by-product of the physical system which has no influence back on it. In this way, the facts of consciousness are acknowledged but the integrity of physical science is preserved. However, many philosophers found it implausible to claim such things as the following; the pain that I have when you hit me, the visual sensations I have when I see the ferocious lion bearing down on me or the conscious sense of understanding I have when I hear your argument – all have nothing directly to do with the way I respond. It is very largely due to the need to avoid this counterintuitiveness that we owe the concern of twentieth century philosophy to devise a plausible form of materialist monism. But, although dualism has been out of fashion in psychology since the advent of behaviourism (Watson 1913) and in philosophy since Ryle (1949), the argument is by no means over. Some distinguished neurologists, such as Sherrington (1940) and Eccles (Popper and Eccles 1977) have continued to defend dualism as the only theory that can preserve the data of consciousness. Amongst mainstream philosophers, discontent with physicalism led to a modest revival of property dualism in the last decade of the twentieth century. At least some of the reasons for this should become clear below.
2. Varieties of Dualism: Ontology
There are various ways of dividing up kinds of dualism. One natural way is in terms of what sorts of things one chooses to be dualistic about. The most common categories lighted upon for these purposes are substance and property, giving one substance dualism and property dualism. There is, however, an important third category, namely predicate dualism. As this last is the weakest theory, in the sense that it claims least, I shall begin by characterizing it.
2.1 Predicate dualism
Predicate dualism is the theory that psychological or mentalistic predicates are (a) essential for a full description of the world and (b) are not reducible to physicalistic predicates. For a mental predicate to be reducible, there would be bridging laws connecting types of psychological states to types of physical ones in such a way that the use of the mental predicate carried no information that could not be expressed without it. An example of what we believe to be a true type reduction outside psychology is the case of water, where water is always H2O: something is water if and only if it is H2O. If one were to replace the word ‘water’ by ‘H2O’, it is plausible to say that one could convey all the same information. But the terms in many of the special sciences (that is, any science except physics itself) are not reducible in this way. Not every hurricane or every infectious disease, let alone every devaluation of the currency or every coup d’etat has the same constitutive structure. These states are defined more by what they do than by their composition or structure. Their names are classified as functional terms rather than natural kind terms. It goes with this that such kinds of state are multiply realizable; that is, they may be constituted by different kinds of physical structures under different circumstances. Because of this, unlike in the case of water and H2O, one could not replace these terms by some more basic physical description and still convey the same information. There is no particular description, using the language of physics or chemistry, that would do the work of the word ‘hurricane’, in the way that ‘H2O’ would do the work of ‘water’. It is widely agreed that many, if not all, psychological states are similarly irreducible, and so psychological predicates are not reducible to physical descriptions and one has predicate dualism. (The classic source for irreducibility in the special sciences in general is Fodor (1974), and for irreducibility in the philosophy of mind, Davidson (1971).)
2.2 Property Dualism
Whereas predicate dualism says that there are two essentially different kinds of predicates in our language, property dualism says that there are two essentially different kinds of property out in the world. Property dualism can be seen as a step stronger than predicate dualism. Although the predicate ‘hurricane’ is not equivalent to any single description using the language of physics, we believe that each individual hurricane is nothing but a collection of physical atoms behaving in a certain way: one need have no more than the physical atoms, with their normal physical properties, following normal physical laws, for there to be a hurricane. One might say that we need more than the language of physics to describe and explain the weather, but we do not need more than its ontology. There is token identity between each individual hurricane and a mass of atoms, even if there is no type identity between hurricanes as kinds and some particular structure of atoms as a kind. Genuine property dualism occurs when, even at the individual level, the ontology of physics is not sufficient to constitute what is there. The irreducible language is not just another way of describing what there is, it requires that there be something more there than was allowed for in the initial ontology. Until the early part of the twentieth century, it was common to think that biological phenomena (‘life’) required property dualism (an irreducible ‘vital force’), but nowadays the special physical sciences other than psychology are generally thought to involve only predicate dualism. In the case of mind, property dualism is defended by those who argue that the qualitative nature of consciousness is not merely another way of categorizing states of the brain or of behaviour, but a genuinely emergent phenomenon.
2.3 Substance Dualism
There are two important concepts deployed in this notion. One is that of substance, the other is the dualism of these substances. A substance is characterized by its properties, but, according to those who believe in substances, it is more than the collection of the properties it possesses, it is the thing which possesses them. So the mind is not just a collection of thoughts, but is that which thinks, an immaterial substance over and above its immaterial states. Properties are the properties of objects. If one is a property dualist, one may wonder what kinds of objects possess the irreducible or immaterial properties in which one believes. One can use a neutral expression and attribute them to persons, but, until one has an account of person, this is not explanatory. One might attribute them to human beings qua animals, or to the brains of these animals. Then one will be holding that these immaterial properties are possessed by what is otherwise a purely material thing. But one may also think that not only mental states are immaterial, but that the subject that possesses them must also be immaterial. Then one will be a dualist about that to which mental states and properties belong as well about the properties themselves. Now one might try to think of these subjects as just bundles of the immaterial states. This is Hume’s view. But if one thinks that the owner of these states is something quite over and above the states themselves, and is immaterial, as they are, one will be a substance dualist.
Substance dualism is also often dubbed ‘Cartesian dualism’, but some substance dualists are keen to distinguish their theories from Descartes’s. E. J. Lowe, for example, is a substance dualist, in the following sense. He holds that a normal human being involves two substances, one a body and the other a person. The latter is not, however, a purely mental substance that can be defined in terms of thought or consciousness alone, as Descartes claimed. But persons and their bodies have different identity conditions and are both substances, so there are two substances essentially involved in a human being, hence this is a form of substance dualism. Lowe (2006) claims that his theory is close to P. F. Strawson’s (1959), whilst admitting that Strawson would not have called it substance dualism.
3. Varieties of Dualism: Interaction
If mind and body are different realms, in the way required by either property or substance dualism, then there arises the question of how they are related. Common sense tells us that they interact: thoughts and feelings are at least sometimes caused by bodily events and at least sometimes themselves give rise to bodily responses. I shall now consider briefly the problems for interactionism, and its main rivals, epiphenomenalism and parallelism.
3.1 Interactionism
Interactionism is the view that mind and body – or mental events and physical events – causally influence each other. That this is so is one of our common-sense beliefs, because it appears to be a feature of everyday experience. The physical world influences my experience through my senses, and I often react behaviourally to those experiences. My thinking, too, influences my speech and my actions. There is, therefore, a massive natural prejudice in favour of interactionism. It has been claimed, however, that it faces serious problems (some of which were anticipated in section 1).
The simplest objection to interaction is that, in so far as mental properties, states or substances are of radically different kinds from each other, they lack that communality necessary for interaction. It is generally agreed that, in its most naive form, this objection to interactionism rests on a ‘billiard ball’ picture of causation: if all causation is by impact, how can the material and the immaterial impact upon each other? But if causation is either by a more ethereal force or energy or only a matter of constant conjunction, there would appear to be no problem in principle with the idea of interaction of mind and body.
Even if there is no objection in principle, there appears to be a conflict between interactionism and some basic principles of physical science. For example, if causal power was flowing in and out of the physical system, energy would not be conserved, and the conservation of energy is a fundamental scientific law. Various responses have been made to this. One suggestion is that it might be possible for mind to influence the distribution of energy, without altering its quantity. (See Averill and Keating 1981). Another response is to challenge the relevance of the conservation principle in this context. The conservation principle states that ‘in a causally isolated system the total amount of energy will remain constant’. Whereas ‘[t]he interactionist denies…that the human body is an isolated system’, so the principle is irrelevant (Larmer (1986), 282: this article presents a good brief survey of the options). This approach has been termed conditionality, namely the view that conservation is conditional on the physical system being closed, that is, that nothing non-physical is interacting or interfering with it, and, of course, the interactionist claims that this condition is, trivially, not met. That conditionality is the best line for the dualist to take, and that other approaches do not work, is defended in Pitts (2019) and Cucu and Pitts (2019). This, they claim, makes the plausibility of interactionism an empirical matter which only close investigation on the fine operation of the brain could hope to settle. Cucu, in a separate article (2018), claims to find critical neuronal events which do not have sufficient physical explanation.This claim clearly needs further investigation.
Robins Collins (2011) has claimed that the appeal to conservation by opponents of interactionism is something of a red herring because conservation principles are not ubiquitous in physics. He argues that energy is not conserved in general relativity, in quantum theory, or in the universe taken as a whole. Why then, should we insist on it in mind-brain interaction?
Most discussion of interactionism takes place in the context of the assumption that it is incompatible with the world’s being ‘closed under physics’. This is a very natural assumption, but it is not justified if causal overdetermination of behaviour is possible. There could then be a complete physical cause of behaviour, and a mental one. The strongest intuitive objection against overdetermination is clearly stated by Mills (1996: 112), who is himself a defender of overdetermination.
For X to be a cause of Y, X must contribute something to Y. The only way a purely mental event could contribute to a purely physical one would be to contribute some feature not already determined by a purely physical event. But if physical closure is true, there is no feature of the purely physical effect that is not contributed by the purely physical cause. Hence interactionism violates physical closure after all.
Mills says that this argument is invalid, because a physical event can have features not explained by the event which is its sufficient cause. For example, “the rock’s hitting the window is causally sufficient for the window’s breaking, and the window’s breaking has the feature of being the third window-breaking in the house this year; but the facts about prior window-breakings, rather than the rock’s hitting the window, are what cause this window-breaking to have this feature.”
The opponent of overdetermination could perhaps reply that his principle applies, not to every feature of events, but to a subgroup – say, intrinsic features, not merely relational or comparative ones. It is this kind of feature that the mental event would have to cause, but physical closure leaves no room for this. These matters are still controversial.
The problem with closure of physics may be radically altered if physical laws are indeterministic, as quantum theory seems to assert. If physical laws are deterministic, then any interference from outside would lead to a breach of those laws. But if they are indeterministic, might not interference produce a result that has a probability greater than zero, and so be consistent with the laws? This way, one might have interaction yet preserve a kind of nomological closure, in the sense that no laws are infringed. Because it involves assessing the significance and consequences of quantum theory, this is a difficult matter for the non-physicist to assess. Some argue that indeterminacy manifests itself only on the subatomic level, being cancelled out by the time one reaches even very tiny macroscopic objects: and human behaviour is a macroscopic phenomenon. Others argue that the structure of the brain is so finely tuned that minute variations could have macroscopic effects, rather in the way that, according to ‘chaos theory’, the flapping of a butterfly’s wings in China might affect the weather in New York. (For discussion of this, see Eccles (1980), (1987), and Popper and Eccles (1977).) Still others argue that quantum indeterminacy manifests itself directly at a high level, when acts of observation collapse the wave function, suggesting that the mind may play a direct role in affecting the state of the world (Hodgson 1988; Stapp 1993).
3.2 Epiphenomenalism
If the reality of property dualism is not to be denied, but the problem of how the immaterial is to affect the material is to be avoided, then epiphenomenalism may seem to be the answer. According to this theory, mental events are caused by physical events, but have no causal influence on the physical. I have introduced this theory as if its point were to avoid the problem of how two different categories of thing might interact. In fact, it is, at best, an incomplete solution to this problem. If it is mysterious how the non-physical can have it in its nature to influence the physical, it ought to be equally mysterious how the physical can have it in its nature to produce something non-physical. But that this latter is what occurs is an essential claim of epiphenomenalism. (For development of this point, see Green (2003), 149–51). In fact, epiphenomenalism is more effective as a way of saving the autonomy of the physical (the world as ‘closed under physics’) than as a contribution to avoiding the need for the physical and non-physical to have causal commerce.
There are at least three serious problems for epiphenomenalism. First, as I indicated in section 1, it is profoundly counterintuitive. What could be more apparent than that it is the pain that I feel that makes me cry, or the visual experience of the boulder rolling towards me that makes me run away? At least one can say that epiphenomenalism is a fall-back position: it tends to be adopted because other options are held to be unacceptable.
The second problem is that, if mental states do nothing, there is no reason why they should have evolved. This objection ties in with the first: the intuition there was that conscious states clearly modify our behaviour in certain ways, such as avoiding danger, and it is plain that they are very useful from an evolutionary perspective.
Frank Jackson (1982) replies to this objection by saying that it is the brain state associated with pain that evolves for this reason: the sensation is a by-product. Evolution is full of useless or even harmful by-products. For example, polar bears have evolved thick coats to keep them warm, even though this has the damaging side effect that they are heavy to carry. Jackson’s point is true in general, but does not seem to apply very happily to the case of mind. The heaviness of the polar bear’s coat follows directly from those properties and laws which make it warm: one could not, in any simple way, have one without the other. But with mental states, dualistically conceived, the situation is quite the opposite. The laws of physical nature which, the mechanist says, make brain states cause behaviour, in no way explain why brain states should give rise to conscious ones. The laws linking mind and brain are what Feigl (1958) calls nomological danglers, that is, brute facts added onto the body of integrated physical law. Why there should have been by-products of that kind seems to have no evolutionary explanation.
The third problem concerns the rationality of belief in epiphenomenalism, via its effect on the problem of other minds. It is natural to say that I know that I have mental states because I experience them directly. But how can I justify my belief that others have them? The simple version of the ‘argument from analogy’ says that I can extrapolate from my own case. I know that certain of my mental states are correlated with certain pieces of behaviour, and so I infer that similar behaviour in others is also accompanied by similar mental states. Many hold that this is a weak argument because it is induction from one instance, namely, my own. The argument is stronger if it is not a simple induction but an ‘argument to the best explanation’. I seem to know from my own case that mental events can be the explanation of behaviour, and I know of no other candidate explanation for typical human behaviour, so I postulate the same explanation for the behaviour of others. But if epiphenomenalism is true, my mental states do not explain my behaviour and there is a physical explanation for the behaviour of others. It is explanatorily redundant to postulate such states for others. I know, by introspection, that I have them, but is it not just as likely that I alone am subject to this quirk of nature, rather than that everyone is?
For more detailed treatment and further reading on this topic, see the entry epiphenomenalism.
3.3 Parallelism
The epiphenomenalist wishes to preserve the integrity of physical science and the physical world, and appends those mental features that he cannot reduce. The parallelist preserves both realms intact, but denies all causal interaction between them. They run in harmony with each other, but not because their mutual influence keeps each other in line. That they should behave as if they were interacting would seem to be a bizarre coincidence. This is why parallelism has tended to be adopted only by those – like Leibniz – who believe in a pre-established harmony, set in place by God. The progression of thought can be seen as follows. Descartes believes in a more or less natural form of interaction between immaterial mind and material body. Malebranche thought that this was impossible naturally, and so required God to intervene specifically on each occasion on which interaction was required. Leibniz decided that God might as well set things up so that they always behaved as if they were interacting, without particular intervention being required. Outside such a theistic framework, the theory is incredible. Even within such a framework, one might well sympathise with Berkeley’s instinct that once genuine interaction is ruled out one is best advised to allow that God creates the physical world directly, within the mental realm itself, as a construct out of experience.
4. Arguments for Dualism
4.1 The Knowledge Argument Against Physicalism
One category of arguments for dualism is constituted by the standard objections against physicalism. Prime examples are those based on the existence of qualia, the most important of which is the so-called ‘knowledge argument’. Because this argument has its own entry (see the entry qualia: the knowledge argument), I shall deal relatively briefly with it here. One should bear in mind, however, that all arguments against physicalism are also arguments for the irreducible and hence immaterial nature of the mind and, given the existence of the material world, are thus arguments for dualism.
The knowledge argument asks us to imagine a future scientist who has lacked a certain sensory modality from birth, but who has acquired a perfect scientific understanding of how this modality operates in others. This scientist – call him Harpo – may have been born stone deaf, but become the world’s greatest expert on the machinery of hearing: he knows everything that there is to know within the range of the physical and behavioural sciences about hearing. Suppose that Harpo, thanks to developments in neurosurgery, has an operation which finally enables him to hear. It is suggested that he will then learn something he did not know before, which can be expressed as what it is like to hear, or the qualitative or phenomenal nature of sound. These qualitative features of experience are generally referred to as qualia. If Harpo learns something new, he did not know everything before. He knew all the physical facts before. So what he learns on coming to hear – the facts about the nature of experience or the nature of qualia – are non-physical. This establishes at least a state or property dualism. (See Jackson 1982; Robinson 1982.)
There are at least two lines of response to this popular but controversial argument. First is the ‘ability’ response. According to this, Harpo does not acquire any new factual knowledge, only ‘knowledge how’, in the form of the ability to respond directly to sounds, which he could not do before. This essentially behaviouristic account is exactly what the intuition behind the argument is meant to overthrow. Putting ourselves in Harpo’s position, it is meant to be obvious that what he acquires is knowledge of what something is like, not just how to do something. Such appeals to intuition are always, of course, open to denial by those who claim not to share the intuition. Some ability theorists seem to blur the distinction between knowing what something is like and knowing how to do something, by saying that the ability Harpo acquires is to imagine or remember the nature of sound. In this case, what he acquires the ability to do involves the representation to himself of what the thing is like. But this conception of representing to oneself, especially in the form of imagination, seems sufficiently close to producing in oneself something very like a sensory experience that it only defers the problem: until one has a physicalist gloss on what constitutes such representations as those involved in conscious memory and imagination, no progress has been made.
The other line of response is to argue that, although Harpo’s new knowledge is factual, it is not knowledge of a new fact. Rather, it is new way of grasping something that he already knew. He does not realise this, because the concepts employed to capture experience (such as ‘looks red’ or ‘sounds C-sharp’) are similar to demonstratives, and demonstrative concepts lack the kind of descriptive content that allow one to infer what they express from other pieces of information that one may already possess. A total scientific knowledge of the world would not enable you to say which time was ‘now’ or which place was ‘here’. Demonstrative concepts pick something out without saying anything extra about it. Similarly, the scientific knowledge that Harpo originally possessed did not enable him to anticipate what it would be like to re-express some parts of that knowledge using the demonstrative concepts that only experience can give one. The knowledge, therefore, appears to be genuinely new, whereas only the mode of conceiving it is novel.
Proponents of the epistemic argument respond that it is problematic to maintain both that the qualitative nature of experience can be genuinely novel, and that the quality itself be the same as some property already grasped scientifically: does not the experience’s phenomenal nature, which the demonstrative concepts capture, constitute a property in its own right? Another way to put this is to say that phenomenal concepts are not pure demonstratives, like ‘here’ and ‘now’, or ‘this’ and ‘that’, because they do capture a genuine qualitative content. Furthermore, experiencing does not seem to consist simply in exercising a particular kind of concept, demonstrative or not. When Harpo has his new form of experience, he does not simply exercise a new concept; he also grasps something new – the phenomenal quality – with that concept. How decisive these considerations are, remains controversial.
4.2 The Argument from Predicate Dualism to Property Dualism
I said above that predicate dualism might seem to have no ontological consequences, because it is concerned only with the different way things can be described within the contexts of the different sciences, not with any real difference in the things themselves. This, however, can be disputed.
The argument from predicate to property dualism moves in two steps, both controversial. The first claims that the irreducible special sciences, which are the sources of irreducible predicates, are not wholly objective in the way that physics is, but depend for their subject matter upon interest-relative perspectives on the world. This means that they, and the predicates special to them, depend on the existence of minds and mental states, for only minds have interest-relative perspectives. The second claim is that psychology – the science of the mental – is itself an irreducible special science, and so it, too, presupposes the existence of the mental. Mental predicates therefore presuppose the mentality that creates them: mentality cannot consist simply in the applicability of the predicates themselves.
First, let us consider the claim that the special sciences are not fully objective, but are interest-relative.
No-one would deny, of course, that the very same subject matter or ‘hunk of reality’ can be described in irreducibly different ways and it still be just that subject matter or piece of reality. A mass of matter could be characterized as a hurricane, or as a collection of chemical elements, or as mass of sub-atomic particles, and there be only the one mass of matter. But such different explanatory frameworks seem to presuppose different perspectives on that subject matter.
This is where basic physics, and perhaps those sciences reducible to basic physics, differ from irreducible special sciences. On a realist construal, the completed physics cuts physical reality up at its ultimate joints: any special science which is nomically strictly reducible to physics also, in virtue of this reduction, it could be argued, cuts reality at its joints, but not at its minutest ones. If scientific realism is true, a completed physics will tell one how the world is, independently of any special interest or concern: it is just how the world is. It would seem that, by contrast, a science which is not nomically reducible to physics does not take its legitimation from the underlying reality in this direct way. Rather, such a science is formed from the collaboration between, on the one hand, objective similarities in the world and, on the other, perspectives and interests of those who devise the science. The concept of hurricane is brought to bear from the perspective of creatures concerned about the weather. Creatures totally indifferent to the weather would have no reason to take the real patterns of phenomena that hurricanes share as constituting a single kind of thing. With the irreducible special sciences, there is an issue of salience , which involves a subjective component: a selection of phenomena with a certain teleology in mind is required before their structures or patterns are reified. The entities of metereology or biology are, in this respect, rather like Gestalt phenomena.
Even accepting this, why might it be thought that the perspectivality of the special sciences leads to a genuine property dualism in the philosophy of mind? It might seem to do so for the following reason. Having a perspective on the world, perceptual or intellectual, is a psychological state. So the irreducible special sciences presuppose the existence of mind. If one is to avoid an ontological dualism, the mind that has this perspective must be part of the physical reality on which it has its perspective. But psychology, it seems to be almost universally agreed, is one of those special sciences that is not reducible to physics, so if its subject matter is to be physical, it itself presupposes a perspective and, hence, the existence of a mind to see matter as psychological. If this mind is physical and irreducible, it presupposes mind to see it as such. We seem to be in a vicious circle or regress.
We can now understand the motivation for full-blown reduction. A true basic physics represents the world as it is in itself, and if the special sciences were reducible, then the existence of their ontologies would make sense as expressions of the physical, not just as ways of seeing or interpreting it. They could be understood ‘from the bottom up’, not from top down. The irreducibility of the special sciences creates no problem for the dualist, who sees the explanatory endeavor of the physical sciences as something carried on from a perspective conceptually outside of the physical world. Nor need this worry a physicalist, if he can reduce psychology, for then he could understand ‘from the bottom up’ the acts (with their internal, intentional contents) which created the irreducible ontologies of the other sciences. But psychology is one of the least likely of sciences to be reduced. If psychology cannot be reduced, this line of reasoning leads to real emergence for mental acts and hence to a real dualism for the properties those acts instantiate (Robinson 2003).
4.3 The Modal Argument
There is an argument, which has roots in Descartes (Meditation VI), which is a modal argument for dualism. One might put it as follows:
It is imaginable that one’s mind might exist without one’s body.
therefore
It is conceivable that one’s mind might exist without one’s body.
therefore
It is possible one’s mind might exist without one’s body.
therefore
One’s mind is a different entity from one’s body.
The rationale of the argument is a move from imaginability to real possibility. I include (2) because the notion of conceivability has one foot in the psychological camp, like imaginability, and one in the camp of pure logical possibility and therefore helps in the transition from one to the other.
This argument should be distinguished from a similar ‘conceivability’ argument, often known as the ‘zombie hypothesis’, which claims the imaginability and possibility of my body (or, in some forms, a body physically just like it) existing without there being any conscious states associated with it. (See, for example, Chalmers (1996), 94–9.) This latter argument, if sound, would show that conscious states were something over and above physical states. It is a different argument because the hypothesis that the unaltered body could exist without the mind is not the same as the suggestion that the mind might continue to exist without the body, nor are they trivially equivalent. The zombie argument establishes only property dualism and a property dualist might think disembodied existence inconceivable – for example, if he thought the identity of a mind through time depended on its relation to a body (e.g., Penelhum 1970).
Before Kripke (1972/80), the first challenge to such an argument would have concerned the move from (3) to (4). When philosophers generally believed in contingent identity, that move seemed to them invalid. But nowadays that inference is generally accepted and the issue concerns the relation between imaginability and possibility. No-one would nowadays identify the two (except, perhaps, for certain quasi-realists and anti-realists), but the view that imaginability is a solid test for possibility has been strongly defended. W. D. Hart ((1994), 266), for example, argues that no clear example has been produced such that “one can imagine that p (and tell less imaginative folk a story that enables them to imagine that p) plus a good argument that it is impossible that p. No such counterexamples have been forthcoming…” This claim is at least contentious. There seem to be good arguments that time-travel is incoherent, but every episode of Star-Trek or Doctor Who shows how one can imagine what it might be like were it possible.
It is worth relating the appeal to possibility in this argument to that involved in the more modest, anti-physicalist, zombie argument. The possibility of this hypothesis is also challenged, but all that is necessary for a zombie to be possible is that all and only the things that the physical sciences say about the body be true of such a creature. As the concepts involved in such sciences – e.g., neuron, cell, muscle – seem to make no reference, explicit or implicit, to their association with consciousness, and are defined in purely physical terms in the relevant science texts, there is a very powerful prima facie case for thinking that something could meet the condition of being just like them and lack any connection with consciousness. There is no parallel clear, uncontroversial and regimented account of mental concepts as a whole that fails to invoke, explicitly or implicitly, physical (e.g., behavioural) states.
For an analytical behaviourist the appeal to imaginability made in the argument fails, not because imagination is not a reliable guide to possibility, but because we cannot imagine such a thing, as it is a priori impossible. The impossibility of disembodiment is rather like that of time travel, because it is demonstrable a priori, though only by arguments that are controversial. The argument can only get under way for those philosophers who accept that the issue cannot be settled a priori, so the possibility of the disembodiment that we can imagine is still prima facie open.
A major rationale of those who think that imagination is not a safe indication of possibility, even when such possibility is not eliminable a priori, is that we can imagine that a posteriori necessities might be false – for example, that Hesperus might not be identical to Phosphorus. But if Kripke is correct, that is not a real possibility. Another way of putting this point is that there are many epistemic possibilities which are imaginable because they are epistemic possibilities, but which are not real possibilities. Richard Swinburne (1997, New Appendix C), whilst accepting this argument in general, has interesting reasons for thinking that it cannot apply in the mind-body case. He argues that in cases that involve a posteriori necessities, such as those identities that need discovering, it is because we identify those entities only by their ‘stereotypes’ (that is, by their superficial features observable by the layman) that we can be wrong about their essences. In the case of our experience of ourselves this is not true.
Now it is true that the essence of Hesperus cannot be discovered by a mere thought experiment. That is because what makes Hesperus Hesperus is not the stereotype, but what underlies it. But it does not follow that no one can ever have access to the essence of a substance, but must always rely for identification on a fallible stereotype. One might think that for the person him or herself, while what makes that person that person underlies what is observable to others, it does not underlie what is experienceable by that person, but is given directly in their own self-awareness.
This is a very appealing Cartesian intuition: my identity as the thinking thing that I am is revealed to me in consciousness, it is not something beyond the veil of consciousness. Now it could be replied to this that though I do access myself as a conscious subject, so classifying myself is rather like considering myself qua cyclist. Just as I might never have been a cyclist, I might never have been conscious, if things had gone wrong in my very early life. I am the organism, the animal, which might not have developed to the point of consciousness, and that essence as animal is not revealed to me just by introspection.
But there are vital differences between these cases. A cyclist is explicitly presented as a human being (or creature of some other animal species) cycling: there is no temptation to think of a cyclist as a basic kind of thing in its own right. Consciousness is not presented as a property of something, but as the subject itself. Swinburne’s claim that when we refer to ourselves we are referring to something we think we are directly aware of and not to ‘something we know not what’ that underlies our experience seemingly ‘of ourselves’ has powerful intuitive appeal and could only be overthrown by very forceful arguments. Yet, even if we are not referring primarily to a substrate, but to what is revealed in consciousness, could it not still be the case that there is a necessity stronger than causal connecting this consciousness to something physical? To consider this further we must investigate what the limits are of the possible analogy between cases of the water-H2O kind, and the mind-body relation.
We start from the analogy between the water stereotype – how water presents itself – and how consciousness is given first-personally to the subject. It is plausible to claim that something like water could exist without being H2O, but hardly that it could exist without some underlying nature. There is, however, no reason to deny that this underlying nature could be homogenous with its manifest nature: that is, it would seem to be possible that there is a world in which the water-like stuff is an element, as the ancients thought, and is water-like all the way down. The claim of the proponents of the dualist argument is that this latter kind of situation can be known to be true a priori in the case of the mind: that is, one can tell by introspection that it is not more-than-causally dependent on something of a radically different nature, such as a brain or body. What grounds might one have for thinking that one could tell that a priori?
The only general argument that seem to be available for this would be the principle that, for any two levels of discourse, A and B, they are more-than-causally connected only if one entails the other a priori. And the argument for accepting this principle would be that the relatively uncontroversial cases of a posteriori necessary connections are in fact cases in which one can argue a priori from facts about the microstructure to the manifest facts. In the case of water, for example, it would be claimed that it follows a priori that if there were something with the properties attributed to H2O by chemistry on a micro level, then that thing would possess waterish properties on a macro level. What is established a posteriori is that it is in fact H2O that underlies and explains the waterish properties round here, not something else: the sufficiency of the base – were it to obtain – to explain the phenomena, can be deduced a priori from the supposed nature of the base. This is, in effect, the argument that Chalmers uses to defend the zombie hypothesis. The suggestion is that the whole category of a posteriori more-than-causally necessary connections (often identified as a separate category of metaphysical necessity) comes to no more than this. If we accept that this is the correct account of a posteriori necessities, and also deny the analytically reductionist theories that would be necessary for a priori connections between mind and body, as conceived, for example, by the behaviourist or the functionalist, does it follow that we can tell a priori that consciousness is not more-than-causally dependent on the body?
It is helpful in considering this question to employ a distinction like Berkeley’s between ideas and notions. Ideas are the objects of our mental acts, and they capture transparently – ‘by way of image or likeness’ (Principles, sect. 27) – that of which they are the ideas. The self and its faculties are not the objects of our mental acts, but are captured only obliquely in the performance of its acts, and of these Berkeley says we have notions, meaning by this that what we capture of the nature of the dynamic agent does not seem to have the same transparency as what we capture as the normal objects of the agent’s mental acts. It is not necessary to become involved in Berkeley’s metaphysics in general to feel the force of the claim that the contents and internal objects of our mental acts are grasped with a lucidity that exceeds that of our grasp of the agent and the acts per se. Because of this, notions of the self perhaps have a ‘thickness’ and are permanently contestable: there seems always to be room for more dispute as to what is involved in that concept. (Though we shall see later, in 5.2.2, that there is a ‘non-thick’ way of taking the Berkeleyan concept of a notion.)
Because ‘thickness’ always leaves room for dispute, this is one of those cases in philosophy in which one is at the mercy of the arguments philosophers happen to think up. The conceivability argument creates a prima facie case for thinking that mind has no more than causal ontological dependence on the body. Let us assume that one rejects analytical (behaviourist or functionalist) accounts of mental predicates. Then the above arguments show that any necessary dependence of mind on body does not follow the model that applies in other scientific cases. This does not show that there may not be other reasons for believing in such dependence, for so many of the concepts in the area are still contested. For example, it might be argued that identity through time requires the kind of spatial existence that only body can give: or that the causal continuity required by a stream of consciousness cannot be a property of mere phenomena. All these might be put forward as ways of filling out those aspects of our understanding of the self that are only obliquely, not transparently, presented in self-awareness. The dualist must respond to any claim as it arises: the conceivability argument does not pre-empt them.......
5.2 The Unity of the Mind
Whether one believes that the mind is a substance or just a bundle of properties, the same challenge arises, which is to explain the nature of the unity of the immaterial mind. For the Cartesian, that means explaining how he understands the notion of immaterial substance. For the Humean, the issue is to explain the nature of the relationship between the different elements in the bundle that binds them into one thing. Neither tradition has been notably successful in this latter task: indeed, Hume, in the appendix to the Treatise, declared himself wholly mystified by the problem, rejecting his own initial solution (though quite why is not clear from the text).
Burning down our own green lung - on purpose. How would we explain that to an interplanetary visitor?
Brandrodungen unserer grünen Lunge. Wie würden wir das wohl einem außerirdischen Besucher erklären?
Credits: ESA/NASA
892_7644
"I missed the last bus
I'll take the next train
I'll try but you'll see
It's hard to explain
I say the right thing
But act the wrong way
I like it right here
But I cannot stay ..."
Julian Casablancas
High potential? Parents want to know
Psychological examinations are increasingly common to identify gifted children. It’s a trend that hides a complex reality, as gifted children can also be prone to failure.
Enéa gets good marks. But she disturbs the class, talks a lot and complains often. This situation surprises her mother, Stéphanie Laurent. At home, this seven-year old schoolgirl from Lausanne is quiet, responsible and not the type to bother others. What’s wrong? School. Enéa is bored. A teacher friend advised Stéphanie Laurent to enter her daughter for tests to determine whether she was “high potential”. And the result came back positive.
High potential (HP) children are referred to as gifted or precocious. They are sometimes compared with child prodigies, which is one reason for the increase in requests for psychological examinations. “Interest in these tests is growing,” states Pierre Fumeaux, a child psychiatrist at Lausanne University Hospital who is currently conducting a study on the subject. “A few years ago when parents or teachers had to deal with a difficult student, they would ask the doctor if the child was hyperactive. Now the term ‘high potential’ has taken centre stage in the media.” Contrary to popular belief, gifted is not always synonymous with success. High potential children can also be prone to failure.
A different brain
To be diagnosed as “HP”, an individual has to obtain a score of at least 130 on IQ tests. “But the score isn’t enough,” explains Claudia Jankech, a psychotherapist in Lausanne specialised in child and teenager psychology. “We also need to understand their family and social context and their personality.”
Surprisingly, a high number of HP children have trouble in school. “When it’s too easy for them, they get used to being on autopilot,” says the psychologist. “They’ve never learnt how to learn.” These difficulties are partly due to what specialists call arborescent thinking. “Normal people develop logical reasoning through linear, sequential thinking. However, the thought process in HP children is like fireworks exploding with ideas and impressive intuition. They can solve complex equations but will have difficulty explaining how they came up with the answer,” explains Pierre Fumeaux.
Surprisingly, a high number of HP children have trouble in school. “When it’s too easy for them, they get used to being on autopilot,” says the psychologist. “They’ve never learnt how to learn.”
Studies suggest that HP children’s brains function differently. Information moves better between the two cerebral hemispheres. “We assume that they use both their left and right brains easily and have excellent abilities in both logic and creativity,” says the child psychiatrist. “Other work has shown that HP children can more easily juggle with concepts and think in the abstract, such as performing mental calculations. “In a functional MRI, a dye is injected to highlight the areas of the brain with the highest blood flow.
Using a scanner, we can then see which areas are activated,” Pierre Fumeaux explains. “A stimulus or given task will activate certain areas of the brain in normal individuals. In HP children, sometimes several larger areas are activated at the same time,” he adds. These indicators help doctors understand how an HP mind works. “But our knowledge in neuroscience remains limited,” the researcher admits. “Being high potential is not an illness, but a special cognitive ability. And that’s not a priority for researchers.”
INTERVIEW: “The methods of diagnosis are debatable”
In a survey conducted on gifted children, the French sociologist Wilfried Lignier noted that specialists do not agree about the tests designed to diagnose giftedness.
In Vivo You observe that most gifted children don’t have difficulty in school or psychological problems. Why then do parents have them take tests?
Wilfried Lignier These parents are very concerned that their children will face difficulties, whereas they actually have every chance of success. They think that the school’s assessment is not enough. Psychology offers greater legitimacy for their concerns.
IV You approach giftedness as a “debated and debatable” issue. Why?
WL Many psychologists don’t recognise giftedness mainly because they doubt the credibility of IQ tests. These tests are meant to assess something other than academic skills, but in form they are quite similar to the exercises performed in school. Furthermore, children also have this impression. After the test is over, some say that they did well in the “maths” section, referring to the logical reasoning, or the “language” section, referring to the vocabulary. Being so similar to exercises done in school, these tests contradict the idea that intelligence isn’t the same as academic performance. Yet most of the social repercussions expected from test results are based on the idea that they tell a truth that school does not.
IV You show that the diagnosis swings in favour of one gender. How do you explain that high potential is more often diagnosed in boys?
WL Parents tend to express greater concern about their future, as it more readily carries their hopes of upward social mobility. The fact that boys have greater chances of having “symptoms”, such as openly expressing their boredom or not being able to stay still, also plays a role.
Hyper-sensitivity
HP children also typically have emotional characteristics featuring high sensitivity or a high level of empathy. Stéphanie Laurent’s two other children, boys, have also been diagnosed as high potential. “Nathael, age six, cries at Christmas because poor people are cold and have nothing to eat.” His hyper-sensitivity distresses him. “It can take on huge proportions. At one point, Mathys, age eight, felt unreasonable fear because he knew that there was a core on fire at the centre of the earth.” Myriam Bickle Graz, a developmental paediatrician at Lausanne University Hospital who wrote a thesis on the subject, says, “The children seen at consultations were often overwhelmed by their emotions. For some, it was incredibly difficult; they have no filter,” she explains. “The fear of death, for example, comes very early.” They develop symptoms such as anxiety, sleep disorders, strained relationships with other children and aggression.
THE HAPPIEST HP CHILDREN ARE THOSE WHO ARE NOT IDENTIFIED AS SUCH AND MANAGE TO ADAPT.
As in the Laurent family, there are often several gifted siblings. “Not all siblings are necessarily going to be HP, but there is a certain degree of genetic heritage. However, that hasn’t been proven scientifically,” explains Myriam Bickle Graz. “It remains a clinical observation.”
Although some high potential children suffer, the majority of them lead normal lives. As summed up by Pierre Fumeaux, “the happiest HP children are those who are not identified as such and manage to adapt.”
Arborescent thinking deploying in several directions, simultaneously, extremely fast and without boundaries. While it is a important source of creativity, it also implies: Difficulties to identify relevant information; all these thoughts in all directions may be confusing when the child is faced with a question, a problem or a task at school, An absolute need to organise these thoughts within a sturdy frame so that the child feels affectively, emotionally and socially secure. A “global” information processing system, with analogic and intuitive thinking. While it enables a very rich and deep understanding, with photographic memory, it also implies: Serious difficulties to adapt to the traditional schooling systems which treat information in details and sequentially (one thing after the other), An inability to develop arguments or justify their reasoning. Gifted children usually can’t explain their results, they consider the answers obvious, they know intuitively. The necessity to use in parallel the traditional school learning methods and their own knowledge aquisition systems; they do not want to feel useless, rejected or stupid. A thinking mode that needs meaning to function and complexity to develop and bloom. While it is an endless source of information data stored in an exceptional memory, it also implies: Difficulties or even refusal to acquire skills or information which they consider useless, too simple or not exciting enough to justify their attention and efforts, Constant challenges of established rules and norms, to satisfy their needs for meaning, To “learn how to learn” while taming their impatience through inventive and stimulating methodologies, with deep enrichment on all subjects. A way of thinking constantly integrating affective aspects of its environment. While it is a rich incentive to learning, it also implies: Frustration, even rejection of some teachers whom they see as incompetent in their teaching methods or behaviours, Excessive, even pathological reactions if these children, who try to master their environment and their variations, cannot find reassurance. They are scared by what they do not understand and they know, from a very young age, many things that they cannot put in perspective due to their short life experience. A need for constant reassurance on their learning progress, with a learning methodology adapted to their needs and offering a long-term continuity and homogeneity, thus reducing affective disruptions as much as possible.
anhugar.wifeo.com/arborescent-way-of-thinking.php A difficulty encountered by many gifed children is the fact that they think in an arborescent way instead of a linear one. The usual teaching methods are linear - when forced to learn in that mode, gifted children need to make a lot of efforts to voluntarily slow-down their “processing” thinking pace.
Arborescent thinking is very adequate for gifted people; it allows them to use all their mental capacities and their knowledge simultaneously. However, it needs to be guided and framed otherwise their thinking takes them far away from the subject of that day.
Here is an example from Jeanne Siaud-Fachin: The teacher gives a spelling test. He dictates “the boat sails on the sea”. The gifted child will initially visualize an image of a boat on the sea before seeing the sentence made of 6 words. Following the image, her thoughts will go in all directions: well, it is not a good idea to sail today because there is a lot of wind are there any people on that boat? my friend Frank owns a boat, he’s lucky but his parents are divorced, that is not fun I hope my parents will never get divorced yet, Frank has twice as many presents for Christmas now that he has 2 homes which reminds me, I have not yet prepared a wish-list for Christmas etc. While the other children have finished writing the initial sentance, the gifted child does not remember it at all and if she’s pressed, she may write the last sentence that went through her head “ I have not yet prepared a wish-list for Christmas ”.
Also
www.talentdifferent.com/la-pensee-en-arborescence-901.htm...
www.asep-suisse.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_docman&am... (pdf) How to help such children overcome their ‘handicap’
From the main link in the title (translated from the French by Google Chrome, I think): Surprisingly, a high number of high potential children have trouble in school. “When it’s too easy for them, they get used to being on autopilot,” says the psychologist. “They’ve never learnt how to learn.” These difficulties are partly due to what specialists call arborescent thinking. “Normal people develop logical reasoning through linear, sequential thinking. However, the thought process in HP children is like fireworks exploding with ideas and impressive intuition. They can solve complex equations but will have difficulty explaining how they came up with the answer,” explains Pierre Fumeaux.
Surprisingly, a high number of HP children have trouble in school. “When it’s too easy for them, they get used to being on autopilot,” says the psychologist. “They’ve never learnt how to learn.”
Studies suggest that HP children’s brains function differently. Information moves better between the two cerebral hemispheres. “We assume that they use both their left and right brains easily and have excellent abilities in both logic and creativity,” says the child psychiatrist. “Other work has shown that HP children can more easily juggle with concepts and think in the abstract, such as performing mental calculations. “In a functional MRI, a dye is injected to highlight the areas of the brain with the highest blood flow.
Se me perguntar o sentido dessa foto eu não saberei dizer, é só eu escovando os dentes (ou o aparelho). Coloquei pelo simples motivo de não ter mais fotos coloridas, as próximas provavelmente serão em preto e branco. Ah, minha internet não estava funcionando, por isso eu estava meio desaparecida, responderei os comentarios antigos agora. :)
(song today: Stereophonics - I Miss You Now)
Countdown Day #27
One of our favorite places for simple rest & relaxation is Chena Hot Springs. It's truly off the beaten path and a mecca for geothermal renewable energy as well. Quite interesting I might add. Besides relaxing in the hot springs for which it became known for, another activity has become very popular ...let me explain.
See, the first year we came to Fairbanks, Alaska, it was in the very late summer - August 29th precisely. We were just passing through on our way back down the other side of the "circle" (circle within the road system, that is). Tom was out pumping gas in our rental RV, when he noticed something bizarre in the sky. He told me to jump out and check it out, but of course, it was cold ... I was comfortably in my "relaxing attire" ... I didn't want to get out. But I did ... and I'm sure glad that I did. What we were witnessing was the aurora borealis - aka northern lights. We drove to a darker area of Fairbanks to get better contrast in the night sky. I desperately failed at capturing their beauty, but I was equally amazed at their magnetic pull to my spirit. We decided to drive to Chena Hot Springs the next day and try our luck again. This time I was educated with the knowledge needed to be successful. We drove the 60 miles out of Fairbanks to CHS, ate a nice dinner, had a few drinks, then readied for the show ... and what a show it was. For about 4 hours we watched as the curtain of light danced its way across the skies. We immediately fell in love with CHS and the northern lights. We were moved so much by the display that we decided to return the following year and to make it even more special, we got married on the river bank there. Fabulous memories and dedication to our union as well as the aurora later evening. We were totally blessed and fortunate.
Every so often when we return to Alaska, we venture to CHS. It obviously holds a special place in our hearts. We hope to return there again this year. :-)
Thanks so much for stopping by to view and especially for all of your thoughts and comments.
© Debbie Tubridy / © TNWA Photography - All of my images are protected by copyright and may not be used on any site, blog, or forum without my permission.
Website: www.tnwaphotography.comBlog: www.tnwaphotography.wordpress.com
Ever wonder about the orange triangle on the subway walls? It's a marker for how far the rear guard should keep watching the platform with his head out the window as the train exits the station
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Captured with a manual Nikkor 50 mm ƒ1:1.2 on my Nikon Df, post processed in Lightroom using the new VSCO Film Pack 05.
The old crow king explains to his daughter about love...
KING CROW: The Moon chases after the Sun but it is shy. The Sea crashes against the Land because it is jealous. The Stars watch everything silently, not daring to judge. All of these things are love.
PRINCESS BLACKBIRD: Then how do you love me?
KING CROW: That is simple my darling. I love you not for what you are, but for what you will become.
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ACEO stands for "Art Cards, Editions and Originals". These cards have one rule - they are 3.5 inches by 2.5 inches - the size of a trading card. Art Cards can be bought or traded and can be either limited edition or originals.
the street arts festival in worcester on sunday (9/25/16) featured demonstrations of fencing and dancing and martial arts and acrobatic tumblers, among others. here a fencers lets a young man try out the heft of the sword.
Hilda and I toured this Historic home Sunday.
It was beautifully decorated for Christmas. There were young girls in every room dressed in beautiful evening gowns explaining about the rooms and the furnishings. Much of the furniture is original with the house and everything else is of the time period.
The down side was that no cameras were allowed inside.The history is below if you are interested.
EAST TERRACE HOUSE (JW MANN HOUSE)
East Terrace House Museum
John Wesley Mann built East Terrance at 100 Mill Street in 1872, and the house was given to the Heritage Society in 1960 by F.M., R.T. and B.W. Young. Gifts from the Cooper Foundation, Eleanor Jurney Pape, Lucille Massey, and the others enabled restoration of the house by 1966. The house is Italianate Villa, a style popular along the Hudson River, and in that area referred to as Hudson River Architecture. The dining room, and large bedroom above it, was added about 1880. The second addition, the Entertainment Wing with its own entrance hall was added in 1884. Mr. Mann, whom had a brick kiln business, had his workmen put aside the most perfect bricks to use for his house, the terraces, storm cellar and the large chimneys of the four servant houses that once stood on the property.
May 1, 1997
Kevin Johnson / The Baylor Lariat
The East Terrace House, built in 1872, is one of the many historic homes in Waco.
By Alison Hovanec
Lariat Reporter
On the east bank of the Brazos River, surrounded by elm and pecan trees, is East Terrace House.
John Wesley Mann and his wife Cemira built East Terrace House using Italianate Villa architecture. The house was built in three stages between 1872 and 1884.
Italianate Villa architecture is characterized by hooded windows, arched door ways, a cupola and a mansard roof.
A cupola is a tower with three windows placed on top of the house. The family used this to watch barges and boats travel up and down the Brazos River.
East Terrace House was named for the brick terraces landscaping the lawn to the bank of the river.
Mann was president of the Suspension Bridge Company and First National Bank of Waco. He also owned the brick company that supplied the bricks for the Suspension Bridge. This contributed to his wealth since 2.9 million bricks were used to construct the bridge.
According to Bruce Lipscombe, Curator of Collections for the historic Waco Foundation, the Mann family members liked to entertain guests in their upstairs ballroom. After an evening of music and dancing, their guests were invited to spend the night in the 'dormitory room.' The dormitory room contained six beds allowing their company to relax and get a good night sleep.
The master bedroom was decorated with conservative furniture because the Victorians never let people see their private quarters. There is also a true nursery adjoining the parents room by a door.
In 1884 East Terrace House received the first indoor plumbing in Waco.
Silver moon roses, the flower of Waco, line the fence at the entrance of the house providing a sense of pride and tradition.
Copyright © 1997 The Lariat
ps I explain this diptych photo in the description and comments of the previous photo. If someone knows how to include a photo in a flickr comment without making it public I'd appreciate knowing how! Thanks!
Before I explain its benefits, Nephila clavipes is a very big spider that occurs in middle Americas including the Caribbean. The females like this one are about three inches long and are about four times bigger than the males. They are called Golden Orb-web spiders because the "anchor lines" on the web are a bright yellow colour. Now for the useful bit. It has recently been discovered that the silk of Nephila clavipes can surgically improve the regeneration of damaged mammalian neurones (nerves). In vitro experiments have shown that a thread of silk can lead a neurone to the site from which it was severed. Further, the silk elicits no reaction from the immune system so is not rejected by the host's body. I photographed this individual on her massive web at Corcovado National Park in Costa Rica.
Explained the gentleman giving me a tour of Bath's Masonic Lodge in exchange for photos.
Theatre Royal until 1805, Catholic Church until 1866 when freemasons bought the building.
Additional pictures in comment.
Vaudeville Games
A villainous study in 2 actes.
Acte 1
When I first saw the two of them, I knew that they were up to something no good.
It had been a pleasant afternoon spent amusing myself by mixing in during a black-tied occasion haunted by a group of the ultra-rich.
The place was an elegantly large, leased Ballroom, where a wedding reception with what seemed like a thousand gaily attired attendees had been in progress most of the afternoon. I had been amazed, dazzled may be a better word, when I had first walked in as the guests had already begun to gather. I had never seen a such a beautifully sparkling display of lovely jewels being worn by the ladies and lassies in attendance to a mere wedding reception before. I thought I was at some sort of convention for a Tiffanies or DeBeers, with models in long flowing gowns of satin, silk, and taffeta, all loaded to the gills with enticing jewels.
Later I learned, to my benefit, that a good number of them would be attending a local catholic charities ball held at the Cathedral’s large main hall later that evenin. Which explains the total overkillin with the fancy dress, and baubles.
Now, with the females in attendance wearing ample jewels expensive enough that any piece would have been profitable, there would be a temptation even the most unskilled of thieves could not resist. This is precisely one of the reasons why I was there. And I was determined to make the most out of the situation in all ways possible!
I soon found meself shadowing an unsuspecting, rather dipsy, female partier, whose steady drinking habit had first piqued my interest. She was wearing too many jewels than was good for her ( in my opinion), totally taking away notice from the rather fetching long taffeta gown she was poshly wearing over her delightfully young figure. I caught up to her just as she was making yet another quick swirling turn , letting her brush up against me. Almost on que ( and with the help of a foot on her dress’s hem) she lost her balance and I held her gloved arm to help steady her up. In the process I snagged one of her vulgarly large diamond bracelets from her satin clad wrist, secreting it to my vest pocket in the commotion.
I walked away, realizing yet once again, that the thrill I used to receive when lifting a piece of jewelry from a lady had noticeably been diminishing over the course of the last couple of years. Like any profession that has been worked at for a while, it had almost become too routinely easy anymore; my almost ghostlike hovering over receptions, ballroom dances and the ilk. Admiring the rich gowns and dresses, and savoring their sparkling jewels were becoming almost mundane. Even the snagging of a flashy bauble or two along the way was losing its appeal. Even though it was my primary source for putting the bread on the table , I felt sometimes that I needed a break. Sure, I held a second, loosely related, profession to seem respectable to the outside world, but it did not pay nearly as much. I sighed deeply to myself, wallowing in my rather dubious self-pity as I made my way through the thickly congregated crowd of guests at the reception. I also was finding meself pining for my place of birth, Merry old England( or wales to be specific) and a sweet ginger haired lass who I had once known, and still kept in touch with for the 7 long years since I had left my homeland.
With those thoughts whirling about in me head, I made my way to the bar, deciding to now settled back to have a few free drinks and try to enjoy the show. Soon I found myself cheered up, even lazily toying with the idea of making a second score later that evening. And then, well now, given what valuables were being displayed, it was not surprising that soon I spotted a second source of amusement. For it was at that point that I saw the two of them making their way in.
There appeared to be only two of them, together; An older woman, grandmotherly in appearance, with long silver hair, and a foxy expression. Along with the “Grandmother” was what appeared to be her 16 year old granddaughter. “Granddaughter” was a slender sprite with a long sheet of freely hanging long silky blonde hair and deep enchantingly blue eyes, and a rather charming smile, with was noticeably pasted upon her impish face as she took it in all the splendor.
The grandmother wore a blue silk skirt and white silky top, ¾ sleeved. The granddaughter was wearing a tea length black satin skirt and a gold satin long sleeved blouse with ruffles and frills, which was uncharacteristic when compared to the dresses and long gowns of the other girls around her age in attendance. The “Grandmother” was adorned with silver chains, and earrings. The “Granddaughter” wore ruby earrings and matching necklace, like the kind of imitation jewelry one receives as a promotion when buying overpriced perfume. Both newcomers out of place with some of the fancier costumes and gems on display, worn by the older rich ladies as well as quite a number of their younger female issue’s as well.
The granddaughter also wore gold plated rings and bracelets, so pick pocketing was probably not her game; she was probably the “ferret” or the lure. But the grandmother on the other hand, had clean fingers, nimble and long and with nothing around her bare wrists, and decidedly was dressed for quick movements; she was probably the dip, or lift. They also did not appear to be known personally by any of the other guests in attendance, but in a gathering that large, with so many snobs ignoring everything that was going on outside their immediate area, this was not surprising. After all, I was there not really knowing anyone either, except for the ones who had hired me.
The pair split off on their own separate courses. The granddaughter soon began mingling with girls in her own age bracket, whom, as was typical of the very rich, were totally unsupervised by any adult. I noticed she was mingling with only those who displayed the most expensive clothing, then zeroing in upon those wearing the largest quantity of expensive jewelry. The Grandmother soon fell into step with a group of older ladies, whose blazing jewels had attracted her notice.
The playing field was getting too crowded I thought, and so I made myself content by watching the (pair) work the room. I wasn’t shocked: Hunting grounds this fertile were bound to attract multiple predators. The appetite of my curiosity was wetted and I drifted to a corner table with my refilled drink ( an old fashion) , where I could watch over them without notice.
The grandmother was ever watchful, as she chatted up her new, satin gowned, acquaintances, but did not appear to be posed to strike. Her eyes were relentlessly on the move, I figured she was on the look for something special, and was ready to pounce when the situation arose.
Meanwhile the granddaughter seemed to have hooked one. A shy fifteen-year-old clad in a eye-catching sky blue long satin sheath gown, with a matching cape that hung from her shoulders to her elbows. The cut of her gown, and her heavy makeup, made the 15 year old look far too much like an adult. Her dangling earrings were at least a full caret, a long thin gold chain dangling from her gowns neckline held diamond studded heart with a sapphire center that swished expensively against her soft gown. A matching ring and bracelet to the pendent rounded out her jewels. But her cape also had a sapphire pin that swayed, shooting out flames of fiery brilliance, whenever the lights caught it.
I looked for the grandmother, she was now chatting to a young be speckled twenty something, diamonds glittered from the thin necklace that hung shimmering down the front of her satin turtleneck like blouse, an ideal setup. A long, midnight black, tiered skirt fell flowing to her feet, with a diamond brooch centered on the satin sash that encircled her waist. Rings glittered from the fingers that nervously twirled a locket of long , hanging hair as she talked to the “Grandmother”, who had her hand (seemingly nonchalantly) upon the girl’s silken covered shoulder as she made conversation.
I turned my attention back to the “Granddaughter” locating her by the stage, whispering conspiratorially into her newly made friends ear, the girl’s dangling earring shining ever so richly. I watched as the pair left and started to wander towards the dance floor, where they started to watch the dancing couples assembling for the bands next piece. As they stood there the “grandmother” walked up to the pair, and the “granddaughter” introduced her to her new found friend in the shiny blue sheath gown.
As they did so, I looked around for the be speckled 20 something the “grandmother” had been chatting up, she couldn’t have gotten far. I soon spotted her on the dance floor, in the arms of a young man in a monkey suite. I quickly noticed that her necklace was noticeably no longer adorning the neckline of her pretty blouse. I had a good idea where it was, but how had it been accomplished, removed from around her neck without notice, ahh, that was the rub. I was sorry I had missed the performance of the disappearing necklace trick!
My analysis of the pairs game had been spot on, and it was obvious that they were not armatures by any means. It appeared that the “Grandmother was the expert, The younger looking “Granddaughter “ probably her protégé. I quickly looked back at the small group of three hovering on the edge of the dance floor not wanting to miss a trick.
The three were chatted on, the “grandmother” admiring the young ladies gown flowing liquidly down over her perky figure. As she then admired blue gowns glimmering necklace, the “granddaughter” had moved and positioned herself behind the unwary young lady. As the necklace was raised I saw her look about and reach up, pulling up and back the chain, efficiently unhooking it. The grandmother held onto the pendant with one hand as she lifted the unsuspecting girls satin gloved hand with her other , all the while chatting her up. Then ever so slowly the “Grandmother” pulled the necklace down freeing it from around the unsuspecting lass’s neck, letting it drop to the carpeted floor at her feet. The “granddaughter” scrunched down behind their cute victim, ( totally unaware that she was being robbed), and reaching around, scarfed the necklace up, stood and moved off. The “grandmother gave the unwilling girl a hug, and when they broke off I noticed the sapphire pin had been lifted, adding unwary insult to undiscovered injury. I saw the girl in the blue sheath look around for her new friend, but the “Granddaughter” had disappeared, moving off to greener pastures.
I soon spotted the “granddaughter” as she resurfaced, obviously she was on the move again, which was surprising, I would have not risked any further attempts so soon if I had been in her dainty heels. I watched, trying to spot her next victim. She headed over towards a table that she had passed earlier, on one of the chairs was a mink jacket, and another was a feathery boa that I had seen her admiring, fingering on the then deserted table.
But the chair that the mink was hanging from now had an occupant. A girl of about 15, wearing a soft velvet dress with long sleeves, had picked up the boa and was sitting on the chair wearing it. She was happily playing with the long feather boa, not a concern in the world. I looked her over, on one side of her dress was a diamond sunburst pin, and on her chubby fingers, were two diamond rings, small but real, and from her ears dangled a pair of long pear shaped diamonds suspended from diamond solitaries clasped to her earlobes.... I was amazed that she would have been trusted to wear such valuable trinkets, but I was not surprised that she was in all probability about to lose them!
The “granddaughter” came upon the girl and asked if she could try on the boa. The unsuspecting girl helped her happily on with it , then the “granddaughter picked up one end, tickling the richly clad lass with the fluffy feathers, then allowed the girl to do the same, eyeing her victims shimmering rings in the process.
The grandmother soon approached to join in the fun. She put on the boa next and tickled both girls with its ends, getting them to giggle uncontrollably. The two devious ladies’s routine had been well honed, as their chosen victim became caught up in the middle of the pair’s rapid fire bantering, and teasing. But it was not all play for two of the three! The 15 year olds diamond starburst pin was the first item to disappear! As the giggling girl, her eyes closed, was doubled over trying to catch a breath, the “Grandmother” took rude advantage of the situation by smoothly reaching under and unsnapping the shimmering pin from the bent over girl’s shiny dress as it had fallen loosely away from her chest for a few seconds. Soon the purloined pin was followed by her sparkling rings, slipped off her fingers when it was her turn to have her hands held behind her by the “Grandmother” and be tickled with the boa by the “Granddaughter” during the course of their horsing around. I thought the pair were finished at that point, but no, they were going for the full Tribeca!
The “Grandmother” held the young ladies attention by kneeling in front of the 15 year old, and helping her on with the boa, wrapping it around the girls neck. As this was being done, the “granddaughter busied herself with coolly slipping off each of the girls old fashioned dangling clasp earrings ! I watched in wonder as the laughing girls expensive earrings were each effortlessly plucked away. The giggling 15 year old clad in the velvet dress had been stripped (tickled) of all her jewels with surgical precision, as the boa was being wily used to its full feathery advantage, and she had never noticed a thing!
The “Grandmother” then stood and moved off to one side, as the girls continued to giggle and play. Unnoticed, she gingerly lifting the mink from the chair behind the now less shimmering 15-year-old, as said child was still being entertained by the “granddaughter”, who I saw had now her hand inside a purse laying on the table behind their cheerful victim. The “grandmother”, carrying the expensive mink over her arm, slipped around and out of sight down the hidden entrance to a side corridor that I knew led down to the building’s work area. The show was probably ending. The pair had acted swiftly, and I knew they would be fished out soon. But I waited; the “granddaughter” was still there, apparently in no hurry to follow the “Grandmother” and disappear down the corridor with her. So probably there may possibly be another act to their scoundrel like play I surmised, although it was risking it in my professional opinion.
End Acte 1
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Walking around on the Kom Ombo Temple on the Nile after dark is a magical experience.
For the story, please visit : www.ursulasweeklywanders.com/travel/after-dark-in-the-tem...