Oderberg - Hylemorphic Dualism

8/12/2019 Oderberg - Hylemorphic Dualism

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PERSONAL DENTITY

Edited yEllen FrankelPaul,FredD. Mille\ IL ,and jeffrey Paul

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HYLEMORPHIC DUALISM*By Davro S. Oprnsrnc

I. IwtnooucrtoruDespite the fact that it continues to have followers, and that it can besaid to hav e enjoyed something of a micro-revival in recentyears,dual-ism either in the philosophy of mind or in the theory of personal dentitypersists n being more the objectof ridicule than of serious ational engage-ment. It is held by the vast majority of p'rhilosopherso be anything from(and not mutually exclusively) false,mysterious, and bizarre, to obscu-rantist, unintel l igible, and/or dangerous o morals. I ts adherentsareassumed o be biased,scientifically ll-informed, motivated by prior theo-logical dogma,cursedby metaphysical nachronism,and/or to have akenleave of their senses.Dualists who otherwise appear relatively sane ntheir philosophi cal writings areoften treated with a certainbenign, quasi-

parental indulp;ence.* I am grateful to Stephcn Braude, John Cottingham, John Haldane, David Jehlc, JoelKatzav, Eduardo Ortiz, and Fred Sommers or helpful comments and discussionof a draftof this essay. would also ike to thank Ellen Paul, whose suggestionshave helped greatlyto improve the essay's style and content.1Here, in no special order, are some typical examples illustrating the claims of thisparagraph, nearly all in the context of discussions f Cartesiandualism or property dualism(see the text below). (1) For David Braddon-Mitchell and Frank Jackson,dualism is akin toexplaining lightning in terms of Thor's anger, and hence is fundamentally primitive andprescientific. See Braddon-Mitchell and Jackson, Philosolthrld Mind and Cognition (C)xford:Blackwell, 1996), . (2) For Colin McCinn, to believe in dualism is ipso facto to believe n"supematural enfitiesor divine intervcntions," the attribution being clearly peiorative.SeMcGinn, "Can We Solve the Mind-Body Problem?" reprinted in Richard Wamer and TadeuszSzubka, eds.,TheMind-BodyProbltn: A Guide o hr CurrentDebatc Oxford: Blackwell, 1994),100. 3) For PatriciaChurchland, "the conceptof a non-physical soul looks ncreasingly ike

an outdated theoretical curiosity." See Churchland, Brain-wise: Studies in Neurophllosophy(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002), 173.(4) Robert Cummins gives a one-page caricature,and a highly inaccurate and misleading one at that, of the sort of position definded in thisessay,which involves putting the word "fom" in upper-case letters rather than seekrng toexplain just what form is supposed to be: "Mind-stuff inFORMed," etc. See Cummins,Meaning and Mental RepresentotronCambridge,MA: MIT Press, 989),2. 5) Needless o say,Gilbert Ryle's vivid metaphor of the "ghost in the machine" has helped to stifle senousdebate for decades.See RVle,Thc Ctmceltt f Mind (Chicago: Universitv of Chicago Press,1949). 6) Daniel Dennett, or instance, efersapprovingly to Ryle's having "danced quite aiig on the corpseof Cartesiandualism." SeeDennett, Thc ntmtional Stance Cambridgc,MA:MIT Press, 1,987),214. 7) David Armstrong describes Cartcsian dualism as "curiouslyformal and empty." SeeArmstrong, A Mat,,riaiist lrory of theMind (London: Routledgc aniKegan Paul, 1968),23.Thcse and countlessother examples arc not mcant to imply tha t thecritics do not always offer arguments,of varying degreesof insight, against dualism in itsseveral forms; but in general he oprposition ends toward the curt, thc dismissive,and tlrcincredulous.

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HYI-EMORPHIC DUALISM

The "dualism problem," as one might call i t -the problem of the oddplace of dualism as no more than an intel lectualcuriosity in currentiebate, ts adl 'rerents haracterizecls "swimming against he tide"2-iscomplicated by the fact that when it comes to attemPts to describeandthen, predictably, efute dualism, it is almost without exception the Car-tesian form that takes center stage.There is, true to say, a resPectableplace for property dualism,3 he theory that although the mind is mate-rial, mental properties uch as consciousnes s re not reducible to materialproperties such as states of the brain; and event dualism has begun toattractattention,4 his being the view that the correctdistinction is betweenmental and physical eaents, uch as thoughts on the one hand, which areirreducible to brain processes n the other. Still, Cartesian dualism hasclear and unassailable ride of place as the whipping post on whichdualists are ritualistically flailed. The idea that the mind is a seParate,immaterial substance n its own right, with only a contingent relation tothe body it inhab its, is said to raise a host of problems. How could suchan entity interact causally with a physical body? Exactly what sort ofrelationship does this spiritual substancehave to a body? What are theidentity conditions for such a substance, nd how in the end can such anobscurekind of thing explain anything about human mental life?

My aim in this essay s not to defend Cartesia n dualism. Rather, t is toset out the groundwork for the sort of dualism that gets little atte ntionand that, f any form of dualism is defensible, s by far the best candidate.It is called "hylemorphic dualism," and is the dualism of Aristotle and theAristotelians, most notably St. Thomas Aquinas a nd his followers. It haslagged behind the other dualisms as far as the number and Prominenceof its contemporary defenders are concerned, though there are siSns ofrenewed nterestand serious ntellectual attention.s Until it acquiresmoresupporters, t will continue to be conspicuous by its absence rom stan-2To use Keith Campbell's term in his discussionof John Foster'sbook The mmaterialSelf:A Dcfence f the CartesianDualist Conception f Mind (London: Routledge, 1991): see Camp-bell, "Swimming against the Tide," Inquiry 36 ("1993): .67-77.3This is mainly associated with Thomas Nagel: see Nagel, "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?"PhilosophicalRninu 83 (7974): 435-50,and reprinted in many places; seealso Frank Jackson,"Epiphenomenal Qualia," PhilosophicalQuarterly 32 (1982): 127-36, and Jackson, "WhatMary Didn't Know," lournal of Philosophy 3 (1986):291-95. David Chalmers's so-callednaturalistic dualism looks also ike a kind of property dualism, identifying mental proper-ties with irreducibly nonphysical properties, but these are wholly material in the broadsense nd governed by unknown laws of natural science: eeChalmers, TheConscious ind(Oxford: Oxford University Press,1996).a See,e.g., Paul Pietroski, Cau,sin34clions Oxford: Oxford University Press,2000),s Defenders of hylemorphic dualism include John Haldane, "A Return to Form in thePhilosophy of Mind," in David S. Oderberg, ed.,Fornt and Mattcr: Themes rt ContentporaryMetaphrlsicsOxford: Blackwell, 7999),40-64;Hddane, "Analytical Philosophy and the Natureof Mind: Time for Another Rebirth?" in Richard Warner and Tadeusz Szubka, eds., Tftt'Mind-BodyProblenr: Guide Lt heCurrcntDcbalc Oxford: Blackwell, 1'994),195-2O3;nd J. P.Moreland and Scott B. Rae,Bod.y nd Soul:Hunnn Nnture and the Crisis n Ethics DownersGrove. L: lnterVarsitv Press. 000).Secalso Edn'ard Feser'scontribution to this collection.

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/- )2 DAVID S. Oi)lr l t l l l l l t(:dard accounts f personal dentitv and ex;.rosit ionsf thc philosophyofmind.Dualism s a thesis n both of these ields.Thc account l 'rat ol lowswil lconcentrate n dualism as a posit ion n the theory of pt 'rsr'rnaldentity;though he materialwil l incvitablyoverlap with issues n the philosophyof mind per se. will setout and defend he primary thes es f hl'lemorphicdualism,with thc aim not of a comprehensive ccount hatdefends gainstal l reasonable bject ions nd explains very unclarity, ut of showing hatthe theses aken together presenta coherent, distinctive, and compellingpicture of the nature and identity of the person.Briefly, the central theses o be def'ended are as follows. (1) All sub-stances, n other words all self-subsistingentities that are the bearersofproperties and attributes but are not themselvesproperties or attributesof anvth ing, are compounds of matter (hyle) and form (nnrphc). (2) Thefornr is sultstantial ince t actualizes matter and gives the substance tsvery essence nd identity. (3) The human person, being a substance, salso a compound of matter and subs tantial form. (4) Since a person lsdefined as an individual substance f a rat ional nature, he substantialform of the person s the rational nature of the person. (5)The exercise frationality, howevel, is an essentially mmaterial operation. (6) Hence,human natur e itself is essentially mmaterial. (7) But since t is immate-rial, it does not depend for its existenceon being united to matter. (8)Soa person s capable of existing, by meansof his rational nature, which i straditionally called the soul, inclependently of the existenceof his body.(9) Hence, human beings are irnmortal; but their identity and individu-ality does require that they be united to a body at some time in theirexistence.

II. Iprrsrrry, CoNscroust'rEss, ND PsvcnolocvThe questions of pers onal identity and of the nature of mind have, Iwould argue,been skewed in recentyears by the thought that f there sa residual przzle that has not yet been solved by the twentieth-century' s

onslaught of materialism, naturalism, and physicalism, it must be theproblem of consciousness.ence he attention hat David Chalmersattractedwhen he published Thc Conscious ind,6 a book that for many peoplesummed up wha t has come to be known as the "hard problem." If therereally s something hat material ists annotsuccessfully rapplewith, i t isthe phenomenology f conscious xperience,he felt quality of our inter-actionwith theworld. Everythingelseabout the mind, according o Chalnr-ers,canbe capturedwithin a physicalist icunctionalistmodel.Tb be surc',there is still the problem of explaining how to itlcntify the correct func-t ional analysisof human psychological peratiorr; ut that there s onc,6 See note 3 above.

HYI-EMORPHICDUALISM

and that t is at least n principle realizablen inorganicsystems uch ascomputermodels, s somethingalready aught o us by cognit ivescience.Thisbifurcationof the questionof the natureof the mind-into a ques-tion about human cognition on the one hand, and a separatequestionabout the special problem of consciousness" n the other-and then thesubsequentocuson the "problem of consciottsness"s f/ le outstandingconceptualssue n thequest or a total naturalist ic heory, s, n mv vit 'rv,the biggestwrong turn in the recenthistory c-rfhe subiect.First, howe'r'er,I shouldexplainwhat I am rof claiming. clonot deny that here s ndeeda "problem of corrsciousness,"nd that many of the centralclaimsof th enonreductionists,ncluding so-calleclnaturalist icdualists" l ike Chalm-ers,are correct:principally,, hat there is no explanation of the subjectivenature of conscious experience n physicalistic terms. What I do deny,however, s that this is rrot a problem affecting the psycl"rologicaln gen-eral. For it is at leastplausible to claim that there is also a TtlnnnwnlttgtlofTtsychologysmuch asof conscious xperience, nd the typical resPonsesto such a claim ook, as theydo in respect f conscious xperience,o bequestion-begging.By a phenomenolog y of psychologyI mean simply the "what it is like"of ordinary psychological operations such as judging, reasoning, andcalculat ing. here s, claim, even "something hat i t is l ike" to calculatethat two plus two equals our. It may not be qualitatively identical for allpeople, but then neither is the taste of strawberry ice cream exactly thesame for al l people, one might suppose,while at the same time notingthat our similar physiological structures mply that the individual expe-riences or eachkind of act should be highly similar. Indeed, one mightassert hat these experiencescontain a certain phenomenological core,and that the class of such experiences s such that its members are allmore similar to each other, all things being equal, than they are to anyexperienceof a different mental act, state, or process.It might be obiected hat the phenomenology of calculating that twoand two make fout if there were such a thing, would hardly be differentfrom that attending the calculation that four and four make eight, thusreducing the dea to absurdity-a distinction without a difference.Yet hiswould be asmisplacedas denying the distinct phenomen ologiesof seeingreddish yellow and yellowish red because hey are so similar. That therearesuch phenomenologicaldifferences n calculation s not something forwhich there is nonintrospective proof any more than there is for thestandard kinds of qualia to which nonreductionists (such as Chalmersand Frank Jackson) raw attention.TYet introspectiondoes, I believc',make apparent he qualitat ivecharacter f calculat ion, character asilyheightened y comparing, ay, he exFrerierlcef doing al5;ebra ith that

7 For a use fu l and do ta i led l i s t . se r ' ( l r a lmers , T l t t 'Cor lsc io l t s M in t l ,6 -11 . For fnckson 'swork, st 'e notes I arrd 3 above.


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75't 7 4 HYLEMORPHIC DUALISMDAVID S. ODERBh[t(;of doing calculus. gain, there s a conscious xperience f performingapiece of deductive reasoning that differs from that attending the judg-ment of a single proposition. I cannot offer here a taxonomy of suchexperiences,nor anything like a catalogue of dimensions of similaritysuchas can be done, to somedegree, or the usual perceptual experienceson which the debatealways settles.All I propose or consideration s thatthere is a phenomenology of psychology, whatever the details.It will not do to respond (as would most defenders of the idea thatartificial intelligencecaptures he essence f human cognition) that sincecomputers can do arithmetic, and by their very nature have no consciousexperience, t must be the case hat what I claim to exis t for people is anillusion. For the responseassumes hat what we do and what computersdo when they calculate hat two and two make four is the same n the irstplace.As a matter of scientific sociology, or what it is worth, no one hasthe faintest dea of what humans o when they do arithmetic, specifically,what goes on in the brain when even the simplest of calculations iscarried out. Ipso facto her e s no agreementon what physical systembestmodelswhat we do.6But the ogicalpoint is thatone may not assume ha twhat humans and computersdo is fundamentally the same; athet this sa proposition that has to be proven. Moreover, the phenomenologicalevidence n the human case s so strong that we have a priori reason orthinking that whateuer hysical model is proposed, it will not capturewhat we do. One could, of course, eek o show that somephysical modelcaptures what we do t' one took there to be no problem conceming thereduction of conscious experience n the first place. However, this is aclaim that dualists of all stripes deny,so minimizing the problem will gainno traction. Nor, again, s it o f any force to claim that since humans canperform unconscious calculation, such an activity can have no phenom-enology. For the question is not about what we can do unconsciously.Similarly, f unconsciousperception were a genuine phenomenon (a mat-ter of dispute),e his would not disprove the existenceof subjectiveexpe-rience during conscious perception. Thus, one cannot neutralize the claimthat there s a phenomenology of psychological activity by appealing tounconscious kinds of the same or similar activity.It might seem o be a somewhat exotic if not irrelevant claim to assertthat there is a problem of consciousnessor psychology as much as forsensory experience.Yet it is important for our purposes, since it high-lights the error for the theory of personal dentiLy of corralling conscious-ness nto a comer of the mind, particularly that comer associatedwith the

8 For an idea of the vast difference bctween kinds of physical models of cognition thrtcurrently have supportcrs, see Timothy van (lelder, "What Might Cognition Bc, lf NotComputation?" ltturnal of PhilosoThy 2 (1995): 345-81.'See, for example, Philip M. Merikle, and Eyal M. I{e ingold, "On Dc.monstrating -Jncon-scious Perception:Conment on Draine and Creenwald," lounnl of Expr:rinrntalPxlclnlogy:Ccnera[127 1998]:304 10.

mind's owest unction,namely perception' t is no more than a perPet-...rinn of the Cartesian "..o. of id".,tifying the soul with awareness. t::::;;;J; invitesa dichotomizingof the human being into a.consciousself plus the Pnyslcal add-ons, *nltn for the Cartesian dualist means;,tpntifvinghe personwith the soul' and' for the reductionist eacting n'""Ijo;;J;;il .'r,i".rtunauble way to the ontological split' means doing'1*|,.u ;;;i1 the Cartesiansoul as a pieceof obscuremetaphysicalbaggageffiil;;r;;;;r.." ro some otlection or other of physical statesofffi;;;;pl"*ity tu Dualistsmust resistboth errors'and they canonlyi.'r" Ut t"tirti.,g o.t the essentialunity of the person'To point to,the fact;"^;l;;"" pryJnotogy is shot through with phenomel?l9gy.is,but one;;; ;;;*ptuiui.,g i(at unitv; and ii is. hat unity which is at the heartoiit" t i"a of dualism I will set out and defend'"'ff',ri,n" problem of personal dentity is not primarily a problem about.oar.iorrrr,uss-at least in the narrow sense that dominates currentdebate- isalsoshownbythefact thatconsciousnessdoesnotcot tst i tutef".runt ooa; rathet it prlsup.posesnd rcuealst' The point-is well knowni-* af,"classicobiectionsof'Thomas Reid and JosephButler to the I ock-"u. , -an"oryofpersonal ident i ty:11-thereisaviciousci rcular i ty int ryingto"""ffr" prro.ut identity, as Locke does'

in terms of memory or of con-,.io,1r.,"r, in general, since these phenomena PresuPPos:.dentity (i'e''that it is thesame erson who remembersor is conscious)'Yet t is a pointthat cannot be repeatedofterrenough' A person is not merely aware-heis aware ofsometiing,and that 'o*ut"hittg is' fundamentally' himself' Therehas, of course,been an attemPt to get around the problem by invokingnon-identity-presupposing reiationJ tyth ?: "quasi-memory"' but such.rotior,, ur" of ao.rUiful Joherenceat best'r2 Any attempt-to synthesizepersonal identity out of a manifold of consciousstateswill founder on theiask of specifying ust what the content of those states s supposed o be'

lo In speakinq f theCartesian osition n thisessay' recognizehatDscartc-soesnol"t*"il;;;";,?;i.;;;ifi;iiion iraditionauy ttributed'.to

im. n the reafse nManii6#);; :;"L ti t'. p".toi u" "composedof soul and bodv"' while at the same imeattemptingwhat oots ite a furely -utn'a"istic-"*planationof humanaction; eeDescartes'ir"i,{r' i"uri,'i rn" inin1J,iiirl/d'w-rii/l;; foes'carfes,rans.J.

Cottingham-\ stoothoff,and D. Murdoch Cambrlagl ^-utlJ '" dnlygrsi ^lress' 1985)' ol' 1:99{f' (See lsoDescartes, hcPritrciples"f P'hir;i;;, ";ltss, iuia ' }ig-8lc) when I.speak f

the Cartesianview then, am eferringo it" tiltJlit"aitionally ascribedohim'which salso hepositionu."i ltt"ii .i*iry "-".g t r.o* ttt" centralworkspublished uringhis ife'r1Seeosepl.r utter, he it"i iinitigior, first'appendix. 736,eprintedn JohnPerry,"a.,"piir;r"oi'lirrr,4.1'O"rtt"y, University f Califomia

press, 975),99-712;nd rhomasReid, ,of Mr.Locke,s ..orrrit'oiori p"ironut dentity," hapter of "of Memory," n hisEssaysotrhcl tr tc l lectualP".;; ; ; io',1785,repr intedinp"r tved'Ptrsonol ldnti tv'71378'Locke,s heorv s in his trroiVo,"rrr"^g-'Hr'r,o,, lndcrstattcling,1.27,d.P-H- Nidditch(Oxford:Clarendon rcss, 975),328-48-tt SeeSvdn.'ySto"*ut "., :''p.'rron,u"d TheirPasts"' neticanPhilosophicaluartcrly(7970\:269-85; nd l)erek tutfit, Rto'un'' nd PcrsottsOxford: Oxford UniversityPress'1gt 1),220ti.1riticizen" .,ot-n in pavictS Oderberg' hr Metaphysicsf dcntity t'er ittrt(NewYork:St Martin'sPress' 993), 80-85


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76 DAVID S.ODEITBERL;and I take his to be a point extendable eyondpcrsons o the dentitv ofany conscious eing,such as an animal. More gcnerally, he circularityobject ion s a special aseof the general tnc againstal l attempts o givt,a non-identity-presupposing,nd hencenoncircular,heoryof diachronicidentity (identityover time) for any kind of object-about which I wiltsoon have more to say.It r.r'ouldbe specious o deny that either phe'nomenologyor conscious-ness n generalwere relevant o the problem of pcrsonal dentity:an yplausible heory must, or example, ccount or a person's ense f selfasan enduring entity, capacity or higher-orderconsciousstates,and aware-nessof itself as a being endowed r.t'ith reedom and responsibility.WhatI am dent'ing, hor.t'ever,s that the problem of persorr dentity is primarilyone about phcnomenologyor consciousness. ather, t is about psychol-ogy in general, aken n the broad, raditional sense:he problem concernsthespecif icmentaloperationof thehuman being n part icular, nd of an yperson at al l , whether herebe arrgels, nimals hirt arepersons, r otherdisembodiedminds. To broach the problem, we must begin with th econceptotifornr,since his n'i l l take us direct ly to the conceptof identityby focusir-rg onsideration on the nature, function, and operation ofsubstances.

II I . Fonrra uo lpENrrryHere is a standard definition of form: "The intrinsic incomplete con-st ituentprinciple n a substance 4richactualizeshe potencies f matterand together with the matter composesa definite material substanceornatural body." 13 It is "intrinsic" because t is a constituent of the sub-stance and solely of the substance. t is a "constituent" in the senseofbeing a real part or element of it, though not on the same level as thesubstance's atural parts, for example, he branch of a tree or the leg of adog; rather, t is a radical or fundamental part of the substance n thesenseof constituting it as the kind of substance t is. It is a "principle" inthe senseof being that from which the dentity of the substance s derived -that in airtueof uthich he substance s what it is. It is "incomplete" in the

sense hat it does not and ca nnot exist apart from its instantiation by aparticular individual, contra Platonism.(This does not, however, contra-dict the possibility of a certain kind of form's existing independently ofllresent nstantiation n matter, s we shall see.) t "actualizes he potenciesof matter" in the sensc' f being the principle that unites n,ith matter toproducea f inite ndividual with l imited powersand an existence ircum-scribed by spaceand time. Togetherwith matter, t cttmposes he distinctindividual substance.

13Bernard Wuellner, 5.J.,Dic iLtnartl f Scholnstic hilosophrlMiln,aukee: Bruce Pub. Co.,1956) . U.

HYI-EMT)RI'IIC DUALISMThese deaswil l be expandedas 4/e roceed.For the moment, t is th e

questionof identity tself hat rreeclslarif icat ion. he problemof personalidentity is a problemabout dentity ovcr time. Since here'is o non-identitv-presupposing nalysisof diachronic dentity in general, here s no non-icientity-presupposingnalvsisof personal dentity.taThe most popularcurrent proposal or analyzing dentity over titne s the four-dimensionalistaccount, ccording o which every Persist ing bject s taken o bc'a four-dimensional space-t imeworm." lnspired (if not necessari lyiust if ied)bvcontemporary elat ivist ic lrysics nd the supPosed malgamatiorr f th ethreespatialdimensionsand that of t ime into a "four-dimensionalman-ifold," this theory has t that persistingobjects re eally complexes f "tem-poral parts."moreor lessmomentarv slices"or "stages"of matteracrossspace-t i lne.What we think of as three-dimensionalobiectspersist ingthrough time are, on this view, four-climensionalobiects "smeared out"across he space-t imemanifold. lsYet four-dimensionalism, hatever tsversion,suffers rotn mauv flalt 's,r" tne of the fundamental onesbeingthat there s no lvay of analyzing temporal parts that does not eithcrin', 'oke hc \,eryphenomenon f identity that s supposed o be analvzed,or else reduce o absurdity by the invocationof l i teral ly instantaneousobject-stageshat cannot give rise to any temporally extended object.One way out that has gained a little in popularity is to take identity tobe primit ive. lTYet here s a right way and a wrong way of interpret ingthis.The right way is to take hc phcnomenon of identity per se o be prim-itive. In other words, there s no way of defining identity across ime inother terms: t is a basic,unanalyzablephenomenon.The wrong rt'ay s tcltake it as meaning that the identity of specificmaterial substanceshem-selvess primitive: in other words, t would be ncorrect o claim that whenit comes o identity, nothing.further anhesaid aboutwhy it is that an obiectof a certainkind, existingat a given ime, s numerically dentical o an objectof a certain kind identified at a later time; or why an objectat one time isidentical to fftlsobject rather than fftnf object at a later time. It would, tcrelaboratea little, be wrong to claim that when it comes o kitrds f things,

la I argue for the general claim in TheMctaphysics f dentityouerTime,with brief referenceto personal dcntity at 59 62 and 185-95.Othcr authors to cast doubt in one way or anotheron the idea of finding a non-identity-presupposing criterion of identity include MichaelJubien, The Myth of ldentity Conditions," in JamesE. Tomberlin, ed.,Philosoliltical erspcc'tiucs 10:MctalthtlsicsOxford: Blackwell, 1996),343-56;Trenton Mcrricks, "There Are NoCriteria of ldentity ovcr Time," Noiis 32 (7998\:106-24;and MichaerlRea, Tenlporal PartsUnmotivated," pllil1r5ir1;/rit'rl1llclit'l, 1(17I998): 225-6().ro For somt'stand.rrtl expositions,sec Eli Hirsch, Tlr Ctntc4tt i ldtntity (Oxiord: OxfordUrriversity Press, 1982);Mark Heller, Tlr Ontologtlof PhysicalO&7cclsCambridge: Canr-bridge Univcrsity Press, 990); nti Tht'otlore Sider, orrr-L)irrlt'nsitnnlismC)xford:Clart'ndor.tPress, 001 .

"' fu", .-.g.,nty Tlrr \4rlnphtTsirr/ ,iricrrtrlyti,L'rl rtrrt'; er'also mv "Temporal Parts and tht'lbssibif ty trf Changt'," l'ltilosoplty rd Phunnttttohyicai Rcscarc/r 9 (2004): r86-7(Xl; lea,"Tt'mporal Parts Unnrotivatecl"; ancl lloclcrick Chisholm, Persttrt rrd Ohirct (l'a Sallc, IL:Opcl 6.,,.1, 1976) , ppcndi r A.r7See ht, authors l r r rot t '14, ncltrdingntvself.

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78 DAVID S. ODERBERC;the criterionof identity for a p;iven ind is primit ivc, that nothing furthercan be said about why, say,objectsof kind K continue to exist in certaincondit ionsbut ceasc o exist n others-other than that 's ust how thingsare for things of kind K. But even f a sympathizer with nominalism wereto say that there nrr no r eal kindsof objects, hat e"'ery object s purely anindividual, it n'ould still be wrong to assert hat nothing further can besaidabout why individuals persist n thesecircumstance'sather than those.The reaso n the wrong way is wrong is that it simply ignores self-evident truths of identity. We can explain why it is , for instance, hatBessie he cow seenat tr is not identical to Rover the dog observed at tr,and why Rover at t, is not the same as Fido at t.-and why, say,a Legohouse at t: is distinct from the pile of Lego bricks at t, that constituted tat t.. In all such cases,we do no t rest content with saying that Bessie sBessie nd Rover s Rover, hat Fido and Rover are ust not the same,andthat a Lego house s something different from its Lego bricks. Even f thecriteria of iclentity nvoked are quite simple, they are nfo rmative: a cowand a dog are dif ferent kinds of animals; his cow and this dog havedifferent properties; he two dogs are of different breeds,or e lse differotherwise n their properties;a pile of Lego bricks does not make a house;and so on. The notion of primitive substance dentity does not explainwhat we do when we account for the identity of substances.

Clearly what we do is more than simply make assertionsabout what isidentical with wh at. And what emerges s that the criteria we invoke all,whether directly or indirectly, refer back to the forms of things , and, pacethe nominalist, to those forms consider ed as universal entities instanti-ated in particular cases.The identity of th e substance s primitive in thissense-that it cannot be decomposed nto elements that do not them-selvespresupposeeither the identity that is the subjectof analysis n thefirst place or the dentity of other things on which the dentity in questionis dependent. So the identity of Rover, for instance, is eoidenced y thosefeatureswe typically point to as eaturesof Rover-Rover's bark, Rover'sbite, Rover's characteristic way of chasing postmen. But it would bepatently circular to claim that Rover's identity consistedn these things.Or, n the caseof a bare natural formation, say,such as a river, the dentityis evidencedby typical featuresof that thing-its characteristic hape orflow. Aggregatessuch as a pile of bricks have an identity wholly depen-dent on the identity of their constituents,which need not commit us tomereologicalessentialism-the idea that even the slightest addition to orreplacementof parts destroys a thing-even though it is notoriously dif-ficult to say ust how many bricks need to stay the same or the pile to bethe samepile. We refer to evidence,and evidence s all we have to go on.Even the much-vaunted phen omenon of spatiotemporal continuity onlygivesus evidence ather than an analysis. l8

tn Seemy Thc Mttnlthrlsics f ILil:ntity ucr I'inrc,csp. chap. 2.

HYLEMORIHIC DUALISM

The sorts of features to which we point, however, when we try-impossibly-to analyze dentity (as dist inct from the actual practiceofreidentification, which w e do successfully all the time) are notable forhaving this in common: they are all features eferableback to, and derrv-ing from, the form of the object n question. n general,what matter s arethe congeries of powers, operations, activities, organization, structure,and function of the oblect,whether it be s omething as bare as shape n thecaseof the diachronic identity of a circle drawn on a piece of paper, orsomething as complex as character n the case of the identity of a re'la-tively higher animal such as a dog. Hence, t is Rover's special way ofbarking at dinner time that is of more relevance han his color-after all,he could have been swapped for a twin from thc littcr-and it is hismournful mien when refused a walk in th e park that is of more relevancethan his enthusiasm or chasi ng postmen. There seems o be a hierarchyof attributes o which we attach relative mportance n graspinga thing'sidentity; it is better,perhaps, o think of it as a seriesof concentriccircles,moving from the periphery where certain attributes-perhaps (but notnecessarily)color, shape, posture, having been at a certain place at acertain ime-have a fairly transitory mportance, oward the centerwhere,in the caseof say,a higher animal, featur es such as manner of behaviorand characteristic unction assume dominance. The closerwe get to thecenter, he nearer we approach what we think of as the essencc f thething.Why can we not simply refer identity criteria back to spatiotemporalcharacteristics? part from the impossibility of an analysis n terms ofspatiotemporal continuity, and apart also from the well-known Max Black-style counterexampleso the Identity of Indiscemibles,re he possibility ofexact spatiotemporal coincidence of objects precludes any analysis interms solely of such characteristics. have argued elsewhere hat coinci-dence s impossible or substances f the samekind because f the prob-lem of individuation, and that for non-substances at least of certainkinds) it is possiblesince ndividuation is effectedby appeal to the iden-tity of the coincident objects' ontological sources,since non-substancesare ontologically dependent entities.For instance, oinciding objectssuchas two shadows or two beams of light, one on top of the other, areindividuated by their sources the distinct occluding objectsand the dis-

1eBlack invites us to consider two qualitatively identical spheres existing in a homo-geneousspacedevoid of any other entity. Since,according o tl're dentity of Indiscernibles,obiects hat have all their features in contnton must really be one and the samc thingnumerically, these distinct spheres must be discernible in res pect of their qualities. Yet,argues Black, what quality distinguishes hem? They are intrinsically the same; urther, alltheir relational properties and spatiotcmporal propertie'sare the sa me, since they arc theonly two things n an otherwise void, homogcnt.ollsspace.Thus, he concludcs, he Identityof Indiscerniblesmust be false.The allcgcd counterexampleand his interp retation of it arL.,to say the lcast, controvL.rsial. et Max Black, "-flit. Identity of lndiscernibles," Mind 67(1952):153,64.

7A


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80 HYI-EMOIII 'HIC DUAI-ISM 81IIAVID S. ODERBF,I{(,t inct ight soLlrces,espectively).20gain, or substarrct 'sf cl i f fererrt inds,if coincidences possible t n, i l l be referredback to t l ist irrct dentitv cri-tcr i . r or thrrse uhstanccs, . rndhis may includt 'nrrr t l , r lt , . r turcs,hat s,featuresconcerninS; orv things llclrl have been r,r,ith cspect to one orboth objects thesebeing genuine featuresof objcctsas mucll as theirnonmodal features uch as shapeor size).For instance, f a statue s asubstarrcelren t is dist inct rom the ump ef marbleconstitut ing t becauseof the dif ferent dcntity criteria or statues nd lumpsof nrarblc;one corrlr/haveexistedwithout thc othe.r, ay, f the ump had been earranged nt oa dif ferentlvshapedobject.2rn all caseswhere coincidence s possible,reference o distinct identity criteria entails reference o the distinct fctrmspossessed v the entit ies n question,substances r not. (In the caseofnon-substances f the same kind, such as property instances,or suchentit ies sshadowsand beamsof l ight, references to the dentity criteriafor the substances n which they are ontologicallydependent.)The moral of the story is that form is the root causeof identity: anotherwav of putt ing it is that identity has a.forrnnl arr.sc.ince, owever,sub-stances re ndividuals and form is rrot of i tself ndividual, we have toposit a nutteri l l auseof identity as well: in other words, the clentityof asubstance s giverr by th e form as instantiated n matter. That the matteris not the root calrseof identity is shown by the. act that most macro-scopic objects an and often do changcall their matter without ceasing opersist.22 o substance an change ts form-that is, ts sultstsntialorm-and continue o exist.Another way of expressing he proposit ion that

20SeeDavid S. Oderberg, "Coincidence under a Sorta'|,"Pltilosophical euiew 05 (1996):145-77,sec.5; call examples such as shadows and beams of light "Leibnizian cases."Forthe concept of ontological depentlence,see E. J. Lowe, "Ontological DependcncV," Phiktso1thicolapers 3 (1994):31-48,substantially reprinted in chapter 6 of his Tlrc PossibilitV fMetaphysits Oxford: Clarendon Press,1998);see also Roderick Chisholm, "OntologicallyDcpendent Entities," PltilosophLtnd Phcnomcnologrcnlt'senrclr4 (199.1): 99-5O7.2r See note 20, and also E. f. Lon'c., Coinciding Objects: In Defence of the 'standarciAccount'," Atnlqsis55 (1995):777 78, replying to Michael B. Burke, "Coppcr StatuesandPiecesof Copper," Annlqsis ? (1992):72-17.22Despitewhat is often proposed o philosophy undergradu.rtes, owever, human beingsdo not turn over all of their cells during their adult life. Most neuronsand muscle cells arenot replaced.A girl is born with all thc egg cellsshe will ever have, all in an arrested stageof cell division. Then, after puberty', rdinarily iust onc cell each nronth fiuishcs its processof cell division to produce he released gg.Someorganismshave fixc'dnumbers of cells: helobster has exactly nine nervc cells n its cardiac ganglion that are fixt-d for life.; ht'aclultrountlworm Catnorlnbdilis.L'qrlns as exactly 959 sonratic cells (not counting spl.rm andeggs) vhich ar'never eplact'd.Much of the phvsical m.rtc'rial orrning our cells s rt'placetl,thougJr. Even tht' minoral in trur bo nes is constantly be.ing urncd ovcr. Tht DNA is aprominent exct'ption.Although there are somc attempts to correct .rrors in thc scqut'nct'thatmay accumulatt 'with irnt , oncea DNA molt 'culr s product ' t l , t staysurrchangeclnti lthe ccl l dividesor die's.Wlren l.ro t 'l l divicles, nt 'of tht -old st rands 'nds up in eachne ncel l unchangccl . hat one st rand mav go unchangeclhrough many ct'l l l ivi i ions rrnti l ht 'ccll it happens to rcsiclc n dirs. Another structur(' not rcpl.rcctl s tht' lens of tho cyt'.Damage o these ellsor to thc proteins n them tends o a.ci lmulatc so that our visrorr rconstantlv eteriorating.Thanki o [t ichardNormalr,Associate rofcssor f Biologt,.rt ht 'Univtrsi t\ , of )\4ichigan, tarborn, or this nfonnat ion.)

identityhas a formalcause s to say hat iorm is t l 're cnlcr f identitV.Fo ra subs[anceo persist s for it to PosseSS/risstrbstantialorm: not merelvd substantial orm, but a form instantiatedby f/rismatter-where f/rismatter snot identif iedby thereneccssari ly einga singleparcelof atomsor otl-\er tuff, sinceas noted this may itself changeover time. The matteris simply the matter of the persistingsubstance. nly if this u'ere offcredas an ;nalysisof identity r'ould thcre be a problem of circularity; ather,what is offertd is an analvsisof the causes f identity,and seenas slrchthere s no circularity:a sulrstance ersists ecauset consists f a forn-linstantiatedn matter, he orm being he actualizingprinciple n virtue ofwhich the sllbstances rn'hat t is, and the matterbeing the imit ing prin-cipieof that form in virtue of which the substances individual.2lsince a person is, following the classicdefinition of Boethius (480-524A.D.), n individual substance f a rat ional nature,2at fol lows that apersonpersistsn virtue of its form. The form just s the prerson'satitrnalnature; t is alsocalled he persorl 's ()l t l . nyone who obiects o the term"soul" asmetaphysically r theologicallyoadedcansimply use he' erm"rat ional nature" wherever "soul" aPPears n what fol lor't 's' t is nclwnecessaryo understand exactly of tolnt the soul is the form'

IV. Bopv, UNtctrv oF FoRM, AND PRIMoRDIAL N{ATTEIIWe can only grasp what the soul is the form of, however, via a defenseof two centrai dtctrines of hylemorphism, namely, hose of the unicity ofsubstantial orm and of the existence f primordial (or prime) matter.Unicity of form means hat for any substance, here s one and only onesubstantial orm that it possesses. his is becausea substance s one kinclof thing, and substantial orm determines the kind of thing it is. Hence,when i substancecomes into being, it does so in virtue of acquiring asingle substantial form, and when it loses that form it ceases o existaltogetheras that kind of thing, even if something else s left over that isnot that kind of thing. Thus, when a lump of clay is smashed o pieces t

ceaseso exist altogether even though othet numerically distinct lumpsof clay may come nto existence n virtue of the Persistence f clay mate-rial that is not itself a lump of any kind but rather the referentof the massterm "clay." Suppose,on the contrary, hat the lump of claypossessedwosubstantial orms, that of lun4t and that of r/ay. Then we would have tcrsay that if the lump form were removed, say by smilshin8, the clay formwould remainand the umprsf clay,not having beencomplctely destroved,would continue'o exist.But hor.r' ould it exist?One might think it exists23L)n mat tc . r as tho p r inc ip lc r r f inL l i t ( iu r t r o r ) , sL ,cDav id S . Oderbcrg , " l J ) ' lomorph is tn_

and l r rd i r , id r r . r t ion , " in 'John Ha l . l r n r , e t l . , A J i r r r / , l r ' l n i lnTs ics , t tu l V n l i l t i t t t l t l 'T l0 i l t i ; t t L ' t l t t dAnalvt ical Trat l i t ]ot ts (South Bencl, IN: UniVcrsit | of Notro Damc [>ress,2002\,125 17.2a Boetlr ius. Libtr dt'rtcrstnn t ' t durtbtts ntturis conlr t Lutrlclu'rt cl Ni 'slr r r i i r l t r, c' ii'


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82 DAVIDS.ODERBERGas the clay itself .But this is absurd: n what senschas the lrrrrpof claypersisted-as clay? But a lump of clay is nclt mere clay. Or suppose texistsas n some espect partially identical" to the cl;ry.Yct this is unintel-l igible, whatever he proponents f "degrecsof identity" or peddlersofthe idea of "survival" (a kind of persistence hort of ful l identity) maythink. Further, t would then se'em mpossible even to dcstroya lump ofclay n'i thout removing the clay form as well, r.r 'hichwould requiredis-integrating t into its atomic or subatomic arts-but surelydestroyingalump of clay cannotbe thst difficult.Whatever one might say about the substantiality of such objects aslumps of clay-and some recentwriters have cast doubt on it2s-theunicity doctrine s even more apparent n the caseoi objects ver whosesubstantial i tyhere s no dispute,such as iving things.Let us go back oFido. If substantial orms were multiple in Fido, the multiplicity theoristwould have o say either hat one substance, ido, nstantiated wo sub-stantial orms, or that therewere actually two subs tancesvhere t lookedas f therewere only one.Take he f irst aiternative.Supposewe say thatFido, being both a l iving thing and a dog, fal ls under the two substantialkinds /iirilg thing and do.g. hesebeing distinct forms, why could they notcome apart, \^'ith Fido instantiating one but not the other? One scenariois that Fido goes the way of all doggy flesh, leaving behind a caninecorpse. t might be said, pointing at the colpse, "There is Fido," meaningthat Fido is still a dog, albeit a deaclone. But a dead dog is not a kind ofdog any more than the proverbial rubber duck i s a kind of duck, or, tochange he analogy, han a dead parrot is anything other tha n an ex-parrot.A substantial orm, as defined earlier,supplies the proper func tions andoperations of its instances.Sinceno such functions and operations takeplace in a dead dog26-indeed, the processes ndergone by and takingplace in a corpse are n general the very reoerse f those undergone by andtaking place n a functioning dog-clearly a dead dog does not fall underthe substantial kind dog.Another scenario s that Fido acquires he powers of Proteusand morphsinto various other kinds of substance,while retaining the form of liuingcreature. oes this indicate that Fido would ha ve ceased o fall under thesubstantial form dog while continuing to instantiate he separate orm ofa living creature?No, becausen the caseof Proteanchange he transientforms are not substantial but accidental: hey do not determine the kindof thing Prote an Fido is in hi s essencer rtature, ut merely the diversityof forms which tlrat essence r nature allows hin.r o take on. Observine

rs The writers are not thcmselves at leastovert) hylemorphists, t should be rrott'd.Scc,e.g. , oshua {of fman and (lary Roscnkrantz, ulrslrrncc;fs Nnltrre'nnr/ r isfurir ( l-onrlon:Routledgc, 1997); frenton Merricks, Objccts ntl Prrsors (Oxford: Oxforcl Univcrsity I'rcss,2001);Peter van Tnwagcn,Mnttrial Beings lthaca, NY: Cornell University Prcss, 990).?6We can safely eaveaside such transientphenomena as thc continued growing of hairanrl nai ls postmortem.

HYLEMOITPHIC DUALISM

ProteanFido in his canine orm, we do not behold a substance hat isessential ly dog and a Protean iving thing, but an essential lyProteanliving thing that has taken on the form of a dog. Therefore,neither of thescenariosust describedgives us a way of posit ing dist inct substantialforms possessed y a single substance.Might there, aking the other alternative,be two substances here thereonly appeared to be one? We can easily dispense with this thouglrt inrespectof Protean Fido, becausen'e cannot plausibly say,observing the'living creature n its canine form, that here there are ztto hings, namely,a dogand a Proteanorganism: rather, l'rere s one thing, a Proteanorgan-ism appearing as a dog. For th e organism, the sortal "dog" is as much aphasesortal2T s the sortal "teenager" s for a thirteen-year-oldpersotr, rrwhich latter case there do not exist two things, a human being nrld ateenager.More plausibly, howevea it might be argued in the case ofnormal Fido that there are wo substantial orms, namely, hoseof riogandof body,and that either there are trvo substances for example, a certainbody constituting a dog) or there s one substance nstantiating the formsof both body and dog. The basicconfusion at the root of both proposalsis that they misunderstand the concept of substantial orm. Substantialforms do not make up a hierarchy within a substance-the canine orm isnot an add-on to the inferior corporeal orm, for example.For how wouldone specify exactly what kind of body the canine form was superaddedto? We can eliminate the idea that the canine orm is the form of a certainkind of corpse. t is tempting to think that a living dog just is a dead dogplus something extra, and one might imagine dead Fido's being mirac-ulously brought back to life and call that the re-addition of canine orm tocanine matter. But dead flesh is not a formally impoverished kind ofliving flesh: n dead flesh, rom th e moment death occurs,not only is thesubstantialorganic canine orm absentbut it is replacedby the very formof a dead thing, in which new functions of decay and disintegrationimmediately begin to oc cur. The reanimati on of dead Fido by me ans ofthe re-addition of the organic canine orm would involve not merely thesuper-addition of something to a corpse, but the actual reoersal f disin-tegrative processes lready commenced. n other words, Fido's form qualiving dog is the form of living flesh; that is, the living flesh has a formalcause n Fido's substantial form. There simply is no metaphysical spacefor another kind of flesh to which the organic canine form is added toproduce a living, breathinS; og.Another way of putting the point is to say that substantial orm per-nrcateshe entirety of the substance hat possessest, not merely hori:orr-

27A sortal ernr,here "dog," tel ls us what sor t of thing- in the most iberal sense'-anobiect s. A phasc sortal is a sortal term applying to a thing that goes hrough a temporarystageor phasc denoted by the term; e.g., teenagL'r" s a phasesortal under which humanbeings alf. A subs tnnce ortal, n contrast, s such that an object that falls under it nrrsl fallunder it or else cease o xist alk)gether,e.g., "human" for hrrman beings.

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84 DAVIDS.ODERBEITC]tul l t l rt ts parts-there'is as much dogginessn Ficio's oscand tai l as nFic-losa u'holcrs-trut alsourt ically,dortn to thc'r't r 'chcmicalelementsthat const i tutc 'F ido'siving lesh. o use he radi t ional chcl last icermi-nology, lrechemical lementsexist t irtrrnl lyn Fido,n()tas compounds ntheir own right but as elements ully harnessedo the operationsof theorganism n u,hich hey exist, ia the compounds heyconstitute. rnd hefurther conrprourrclshe latter cor-rst itute,hrough levels of com;rounds,proteins, he DNA the latter code for, the organelles hat make up thccells, he organsmade up of the cells,arld so on.2e upposing here o beelementary particles (a proposal I denv),30and supposing these to bequarks, t doesnot fol low from the fact that every materialsubstancesntaLla f quarks that every strbstantialorm is the.ft trrrt f a bundle ofquarks,becauserr the exist inp; ubstancc'he quarks ntreno substantialidentity of their on'n, their behaviorhaving been ully yoked to the unc-tion and operations of the substance n n'hich they exist. The substantialforms of the part iclesexist ' irfrrnl/ l /n the substanceshey constitute. notherwords, he quark is ontologically eperrdent n the whole of u'hich

26Note that this cl()cs rol mp11, bsurdll; that Fido's nose s a ciog,only that Fido' s noseis nothing other tharr a canint one. The canine orm is not partially present n the nose: t iswholly presentbut it informs the ntrscand eYeryother part according o its own exigenciesqua canine form. Thc rtay a sulrstantial orm informs the parts of, sry, a dog is thus notessentiallvdiffcrent from the rvar,an accidental orm suchas n'hiteness nforms the parts ofa uhi te object , uhi tc trbir.ct as whitc prr ts, a caninc substanco as canint 'pr i t r. Th"difference ies n the relative heterogeneityof the parts,which depends on the forms them-sclves. Organisms generally have sharply differentiated parts, whereas color is re lativelyhomogeneous.See also St. Thomas Aquinas, Sumnn contra Centilcs, L72, trans. james F.Anderson (Carden Cit'', NY: Image Books, 1956), 13-152eThe same point applies to such phenomena as the transplantaiion of foreign DNA orcells nto another species.Fido may have had mouse cells nserted nto him by an experi-menter,but if those cells really do enter nto the dog's very makeup, taking their operativeplace within the genome, hen they have no substantial dentity of their own any more thanthey did in the body of the mouse from which they were taken- Outside any creature-sitting, say,on a ptri clish-the cellsare substancesn their own right, but whcn yoked tothe nature of the creature nto which they are inserted, heir existence s virtual, not sub-stantial. Contrast the caseof p.rrasitism,n,here he parasite nsirle thc organism retains tssubstantial dentity because,hou,ever closely t may interact with and depend upon thefunctioning of its host, t does not enter nto ihe very naturc- f that host, t does not becomepart of what infortns hat host or dete'rmines ts spt'cific dentity.soTo be clear on n'hat my denial amounts to: I recognize hat physicistscurrently believethere o be "elementarl, particles," .e.,particleswith no structure and no parts, n particular,leptons and quarks. But I regard it as a metaphvsical, ather than a physical, truth that nospatially extendetlobject can be essentially lemontaryand hence ndivisible. Thus, I take tthat strict metaphvsica l atomism is falsea priori. I-eavingasidc tho raised eyebrows such aphilosophical claim might causegiven the supposedempirical evidt'nce o the contrary,notcthat what physicistsnclanl/.y old is that if quarks (for instanct-) ave a structure, t rnust besnral lcr han 0 r t 'cnr ,but measureme.ntsannotvet reach hat far Fur ther , f i t turnrclou tt l rat quarksdrr lhave a structurr.. ht 'y would, as physrcrsts tr i te ightly admit, no longernrcri t he nameclL.mcntary. hat his shows s (a) hat hcre s at lcastno law of n.rturc,.rscurrently understooc l, hat prcvcnts qutrrks rom having structure and hcnce parts, anci b)that merelycai l ing a par t ic le tl tnrt 'ntary" does not mcan that it re'al ly s so. t is, hcn,unjustified to claim that m)' denial of the existencc f eleme.ntary r.irticlcs as simlrlv t'ttnprtrvcn false by phvsics.

HYLEMORPHIC DUALISMit is a part, but its causalpowers persist, lbeit n a way radically imiteclby thc'whole. The substantial orm is what determines he permissibleand mpermissible ehaviorof thequarks n thebody,which is why somechemical eactions ypically occur,othersrarely,and others not at all. Noris there any particular bundle of quarks of lvhich the form could even bethe form, given the familiar fact that every body losesand gains quarksall the ime.Again, t is the orm that determines he rn,hen, ow,and ho wmuch of the loss and gain that may occut with externalcircumstancL.smerely operating upon predetermined possibilities.3rAccording to the hylemorphic theory, the unique substantial form ofany material substance must be united to something to produce thatsubstance,ince n itself t is only an actualizingprinciple.What does tactualize? t does not actualize anything whose actuality already prc-supposes the existence of the substantial form. Here it is useful todistinguish between two sensesof "of" in the expression x is the formof y." ln one sense, he substituend for "y" is simply that whose iden-tit,vdependson the substituend or "x," as when we say that a fatheris the fatherof his son ("He is his father's son"). n the other sense, hesubstituend for "y" is the object whose identity does not so depend,the object with its own real existence apart from that to which it isfunctionally related, as when we say that a father is the father of ;.rperson. n the first sense, hen, we can sa V with Aristotle, when speak-ing about life, that the soul, understood as the organic principle, is thefirst actuality of a natural body with organs.32 n other words, the soulis the form of an organism, that which makes the organism an organ-ism; we could also say that the soul is the form of a body that has tlrcsckinds of properties. In terms of the real unify relation, however, thesoul is the form of something else, something not itself shot throughby the very soul to which it is united-and this is what the hylemorphistcalls primordial matter. There is no spacehere to enter into a detailedexplanation and defense of primordial matter: for our purposes, it isenough to know that although I have called it a somethinB, t is, in thewell-worn phrase, not a something but not a nothing either. It is theclosest here is in the universe to nothingness without being nothing-ness,since it has no features of its own but for the potential to receivesubstantial orms. There has to be something to whiih form unites, andprimordial matter is the only thing that ca; f i l l that role.3rJoelKatzavhasdraw,nmy attention o thesimilar p.si t ionadopted y A-N.whiteneacr:seewhiteh(rrJ. sri


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86 DAVID S. ODERBERGTo return now to our main concern,which is persons, hc situation sthis. A person, ike any other substance,s actualizedby a substantialform. For human beings, the kind of person that is our focus, thesubstantial form is that principle in virtue of which the person is aperson, and that means the principle of life, of consciousness, nd ofrationality. These are all one principle since the doctrine of unicityapplies as much to persons as to any other substance. The fa ct thatpersonsare also sentientand alive does not mean that there are three

forms, the form of life, the form of sentience,and the form of rational-ity, for what could this mean?There are not three distinct substances-the organism, the animal, and the rat ional creature. There is on esubstance, person, who is both l iving, and sentient, and rat ional.There s not one substance nstantiating hree distinct substantial orms-life, sentience, nd rationality-because they are all constituents of oneset of powers. What gives the person ife is precisely what makes thepersonsentient, and what makes him s entient is just what makes himrational, erren hough canine sentience,by contrast, does not give r iseto canine rationality. The reverse also holds: for ins tance, what makesthe person ational is also what makes him o rp;anic,since the sort ofrationality persons have essentially nvolves the use of sensation, andsensation equires ife. There may be-indeed are-kinds of rationalitythat do not require sensation,but they are irrelevant to considerationof the human person.The person, hen, ike any substantialkind of thing, is an essentialunitymanifesting a multiplicity of operations:one nature, many manifes tationsof that nature. The nature is called by hylemorphists the soul, the termhaving been raditionally used for all living things, even plants, but nowrestricted o human beings. n what sen se, hen, is hylemorphism a kindof dualism?

V. Sour-AND KNowLEDGEThe hylemorphic theory is dualistic with respect o the analy sis of a//

material substanceswithout exception, since it h olds that they are allcompositesof primordial matter and substantial orm. When it comes opersons,however, he theory has a specialaccount. The soul of Fido, forinstance, s wholly material-all of Fido's organic and mental operationsare material, nasmuchas heyhavean analysis n wholly material erms.The soul of a person, on the other hand, is wholly immaterial, the argu-ment for this being that a person has at least some mental operations hatare not wholly explicable n material erms-and we can deducewhat athing's nature is from the way it necessarilyacts or behave s. f, however,some such operations are not wholly materially explicable, he soul itselfcannot be anything other than wholly immaterial because here is no

HYLEMORPHIC DUALISM

sense n postulat inS; soul that is a mixture of the material ancl theimmatcr ia l . r lTo takethe astpoint first, if the soul were a mixture of the material andimmaterial it would be subject to contrary properties: qua material itwould have spatiotemporal characteristics, ua immaterial it would not;quamaterial t would have parts,qua mmaterial t would not; qua mate-rial it would bc divisible,qua immaterial t would not.34 lthough verymuch mpcrfcct, he analogywith abstract bjects s useful: he color red,for instance, hough r.r,hollydependent on material tokenings or its cxis-tence, s in its own nature an immaterial, abstractoblect,not a mixture ofthe material and the immaterial. Its very immateriality is what allows itto be wholly instantiated n more than one plac e at one time, which is notpossible or material objects.But if it is true of immaterial objectswhollydependent on material instantiation that they are not a mixture of thematerialand the mmater ial, how much more rt'ill it be true of immaterialobjectshat arenot wholly rnaterial lydependent?We wil l see his ack ofdependenceater.)Note also hat this point doesnot exclude he fol low-ing. (i) The Ttcrsttrt,eing a conryound f matter and form, is a compoundof the material and the immaterial. In this senseone can speak oosely ofthe person's being a "mixture" of the material and the immaterial. The

33A word of explanation s n order. Lest t be thought that hylemorphic dualism commrtsitself to an absurd position concerniug thc immortality of purely material objects such astablesand chairs, or dogs and cats, t must be emphasized hat the theory is not one aboutuniversalsbut about particulars.As abstractobjects, niversalssuch ascluirness ndfelinity,and even hunnnity, are immaterial. Nevertheless, ust what that means or a universal is adifficult and complex issue hat cannot be explored here. f, as t scems, t is correct to saythat universals are wholly present wherever and whenever they are instantiated, we arecompelled o assign o univirsals a kind of spatiotemporaI ocation that must still be com-patible with their essential mmateriality. But their immateriality does not entail that theycan exist without their instances: n the Aristotelian view of universals, he ceasing o exrstof, say,all the green things means the ceasing to exist of the universal 3.reenness,ven thoughgreenness,ua abstractobiect, s irnmaterial. Of course,greennessontinues to exist even ifthis particular tree s destroyed,as ong as here are othergreen hings; but the total absenceof green hings tntails the absence f greenrtess.ence,n,e cannot deduce rom the facts hata universal F is an immaterial entity ind that F is instantiated n some particular object, hatFcansurvive the destruction of that object for it might be h e only instince of F). Even moreimportantly for present purposes, however, is the point that every particular instance of auniversal s distinct from the universal itself: the hunger of Felix, for example, s a propertynsllnrc ("trope," as t is now called; "mode," as t is traditionally called), o be distinguishedtrom the unil'ersal ftrngcr. property instancesare concrcte ntities, not abstractones, and assucharenot essr-ntiallymmaterial. Thus, one cannot readoff from hylemorphic dualism thevleu'that an individual instance of some universal is immaterial because he universal isimmaterial, and he nce the absurd conclusion that even, substance s immortal simolvbecause- o rever t to tht 'Aristolel i .rn l t ,rminolotV-i t nt ,sses'cs substant ial trrm. Aspossessed y a substance, he substantial ft>rm s'1i7rticutar,ot universal, and concrctc, olabstract. f it is immatcrial, it will not be because t instantiates n immaterial universal, e.g.,nu,nntlnlturc or ftlinity, but rathcr bt'cause here is something about he instances of the.relevantuniversal such that they themselvcsare propcrly to be regardcd as mmaterial. Inthe human case, his is the idea that the human inteliect is immaterial in its esscntialoperations.Y Aristotlc, Dt, Aninn, 1il.4, 429a25.

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88 DAVID S. ODIrl tRlrR(lsoul, however,d()esnot have Parts and t lrtrs s not i tsclf a compollndobject(this I assurnc ather than argue for irr thc presr.ntessav): o itwould reallypossess ontradictory ropcrt ie'sverc t kr Lre oth rnaterialand mmaterial. i i)Thesoul,although mmaterial n itsclf , atrbe describedas having a certainessentialelat iorr o matter, n that its completcoper-at ion requires mbodiment.Again,hor.t ,evcr,his does n()t mean hat thesoul has contradictorvpropert ies.

Now, if the sor.rls mmatcrial, t iol lows that htrmannature s mmate-rial, sinct- he soul of .r1.rg15611ust s that persoll 'snatlrre.We can see hisby understandinghe concel)t i a hierarclry f capacit ies. l though somcmay balkat the deaof sucha hierarchl, ,n fact he dea s easilyexplainedby saying hat F-typre apacities resttf'rerior o C-t1'pccapacitiesust n casethe former entail he latterbut not vice versa. t fol lows that sentiencessuperior o nutrit ionbecause entient perationsequirenutrit ive ones utnot viceversa-we havealrundantexamples f such.Hence, he natureofan object lrat has sentience nd nutrit ion as capacit iess sentient, nd byimplicat ionnutrit ive,but not merelynutrit ive. n other words, he natr.treof a thing s defined n terrnsof its highestcapacit ies. urnan rationalityis superior o both human sentience nd human nutrit ion according o thedefinitiorr given,so human nature s defined n terms of the rational capac-ity. I f the rat ionalcapacity s immaterial,however, t fol lows that humannature, hat s, he substantial orm of thehuman person, s mmaterial. Thisdoesnot mply that nutrition, say, s an mmaterial process, nly that humannature, being essentially mmaterial, containsa porLterf nutrition that canexist apart rom anv embodiment.But in the absence f the requisite mate-rial conditions-embodiment and objectsupon which to act-that powercannot be exercised.)There are various ways of establishing the immateriality of humanreason,or the human intellect, and one of the se does indeed appeal toconsciousness. ut as have claimed,an excessive ocuson consciousnessis deleteriousboth to the debate about personal dentity (and the mind-body problem) and to our \rery conception of human nature. Instead,hylemorphists take their primary cue from Aristotle, who asse rts hat theintellect has no bodily organ.3s n other words, intellectual activity-theforming of ideas or concepts, the making of judgments, and logicalreasoning-is an essentially mmaterial process,a process hat is intrin-sically ndependentof matter,however much it may be extrinsicalht epcn-dent on matter or its normaloperationsn the human being.r"Aristot le's

15A r is to t le , Dt 'Ct t t cm l iL t t r t 'A t t in t , r l iu t r r , l l ,736b2 t l : fo r bod i ly ac t iv i t v hns no sh , r r t ' n th t 'ac t i v i t y of reason lno t r s | " ; s t ' t ' n lso no t t '3 '1 abov t ' , . ind Dr ' ,4 r r t r r a i ,11 .1 , 13a6 .rn Extr insic depr 'ndtnce is a kint l of norresscnt ial dcpcrrclt 'ncc. For cxarrrplt ' , ct 'r t , r i t r kir tr lro f p lan ts depend ex t r ins ic . r l l v l r cncc nonessen t ia l l y , on thc p resence o f so i l fo r th t ' i r n r r t r it ion , s ince they can be g ro rvn hydropon ica l l v ; bu t they c l t - pcnc l n t r ins ic i l l l v h t 'nc t ' t ' ssen-t ial ly, on thc prt 'sence ol ccrtain nutr icnts that the) ntrrnral l t , r r 'ceivt f rom stt i l but caltr t 'ceive via othcr routt 's.

HYLIMOIIPIjICUALISM 89

oosit i t l l r,t nrustbe cmprhasized,s not tlrat hy|emtrrphism i lfsc| entai lsln" i.-.1t...iatity of the intel lect,but that within the hylemorphic con-."o, i". , ct,rrsideiing,he sltccif icttrrct iL.tnf the human Person' he nterl lect. irf U" imnrateriai. he central hcses f hylcmorphism n general he niel l us in what mannerand to what exterrt he human persoll s imnratc-rial, as wil l be explained rr due course--'The rcasorr or the proposit ion hat thc intel lect s immaterial is thatthere s an e'sscntial ntological mismatch l]etr.t'cen

l'reproper objectsofir-rtette.trat ct ivity ir-rstmentionedand any kind of potentialphysicalembodimentof them:we might call this theanfuttdinrentroblcnt, ut lookedat in a slightly narro\,verway', n cognit ir 'e-scientificernrs, t miglrt becalled he iocation or storageproblem. Cttrtcepts, rclpositio.s, arld argu-ments are abstract;potentill inaterial loci ior these tems are cottcrete'37The former are unc,xtended; he latter are extended.38The former areuniversals;he atterarepart icular.Nothing that is abstract, nextended,andun i r , e rsa l -a r rd i t i sperhapshard tc l seehowanyth ingabst rac tcou lbe othcr than unextencled r.rd'univcrsal-ct luld e embodied, ocated, rstored n anything concrete, xtended, nd particular.Therefore, he properoUi".t , of intel leciualact ivitycanhaveno materialembodimentor locus'To complicate he probleni evenmore for the materialist, consider hoseconcepts hut o.o not only Lrniversal, nex.tended,

nd abstract' but alsosemantically simple. suppose, pcr itrrltttssilti/c,hat the materialist couldovercorne ne proUt"m of ne fiist tl-rree eaturesof concePts, dding thatthosethataresemant i ca l l ycomplex,SuchaStheconcepto fab lackdoghad their locus in the brain tpuiiutly distributed in a way that mirroredtheir cornplexity: hus, the conceptblack had location A' the coucePtdoghad location B, and some kind itf structural relation between A and Bconstituted he reiation between theseconceptsas elementsof the unifiedconcept of a black dog. (Whether it is even riSht to analyze complex.orr."pt, in this way iI another matter that cannot be discussed here.)NowwhataboutsimpleconcePtssucl rast l reconceptofuni ty,orofbeing,or of identity?such cbnceptso not admit of analysis nto semanticParts,though it is possible o explicate he notions contextually, llustrate them,and io or't. h"y are, nevertheless, emanticallv simple'

So there is not:r7The point here s not one about nstnntiatitttt, ince ht- nstantiation of the abstractby thcconcrete s a comrnonpl"."i*r-rlan is not to say tl.rat t is casily underskrod) th.-rt evealsnotrrinf sp"tinl abtlut tirc hum'rn nrind Human iteings atrd human minclsdo not instantiatt'.o.l"pir,'al,"y possess nd storc thenr' Thc orrtoltrgicalprol'lern' ',\"i1 :[1t'-,T.rbstractobiect suclr as a conccpt, with all its sui Uellc'risprtlpi'rtit's' tould cver be st(rred in orpossr '-s. ' .1r\ . l ( i ) l l ( c le "bi t 'c t t l l l ' l \ ' l br ' t i r lr8 The thr iughtht ' r t ' s that concr .pts rc l()teven nf,trrttrt/ / l / a;nlr/t 'ol ,cml-trdinrctrtut lto a ackot crtorrsion,h(. ackbcingnot mcrev a Privati trtt ,LrLh swhelr a conctPt l ' lpPensn() t t( l h, l \ r ' (r l ), ,s\( 'ss()r. ,, i '. tn i ' , t t ln- ' . i rtr,r l ' 'r [ ' i l i tv,irr 11rs.t1sl irrrr,l l t . l l t : , \ ' '1st ' [ 'rnrr*b". ', . ,rt [ . l , i .g r t 'c1.-utkc.].rt his u,. l \ ', t i i arguablV fr.t ight n.lrsent:,t l ' 't l -1inl ht ' "conlcpt is either e.iiontlcd or unt.rtt'ndct1;6ut this iuppt'rt' "tY t]t.ill:1:-"lll.*.:]; ttttt'"does make scnse (and i, irr.'; tt' sav tirat a brain is extr'nded' and so thc ()nk)logicalmismatch is prt,scrvt.tl. Thanks ttt Fri.d sontmers fttr t-rrph.tsizing this poilrt to mt')


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92 DAVID S. ODERBL,RC;I f researchersnto functional nraging r.rve hon,r.r nything, hen, t ismerely hat category-specif icbject ecognit iorrs corrclatedwith activityin certaindist inct, f highly dif fuscand non-discrctc, egions n the brain.But thissortof research, s nteresting nclas potential lyuseful or brain-damaged patients as it might be, goes no way to even beginning toprovide a theoreticalor enrpirical foundation for the idea tl'ratconcepts,judgmerrts, nd inferenceshcmselves ave a physical ocation.Thereare, of cotrrse,many kinds of challengeshat might be leveled

against he defcnse f the mmaterial i tyof the ntellcct have given. Onemight ier.e'la Rylc'an-stylecharge'of illegitimate reification against thevery idea of concepts as things.a2One might object that an appeal toimrnateriality o solve he embodiment proble'ms a classic ase f obscuruntTtcr bscurius. ne might deny that thereareconcepts n any meaningfulsense at all, and claim that there are only distinct, particular acts ofrepresentation.There is no space here to canvass hes e and othe r objec-t ions.But as a general eply n'e slrould emphasize hat a refusal o reifyconceptsmeansan inabilitv to explain funclamentalsemantic and logicalphenomena: not merely the fact tl-rat he concept of a black dog is afunction of the conceptof black and t ire concept of dog, but that theconcept-Ttossessornderstands his, n'hich is more than saying he can rec-ognize black dog only if he can recognizeblack things and dogs. Rather,it means hat if he has those concepts,he can see ow one is derived fromthe others.Mutatis mutandis for judgments and for inferences.And if aperson graspsa certain concept, and if that concept is an object (paceGottlob Frege'sworries about the concepihorse),43hen the persongraspsan object.Since his is a mental act, his mind must take hold of something,and if it takeshold of a thing then that thing must make a kind of contactwith it-which means, since there is no other plausibie way of under-standing it, that the concept must somehow be in its possessor'smind.But if the concept s not the sort of thing that can be physically inside thepossessor's rain, his mind cannotbe his brain, and moreover must beimmaterial sinceonly an immaterial thing can be suited to laying hold ofthe concept.

a2SecGilbert Ryle,Tlrr'Concept fMind (London: Hutchinson, 1949), or a sustainedattackon what he san,as the illegitimate practiceof taking thc nrind to be an entity or substanceof some kind, rather than as a conceptdenoting variorts kinds of behavior. n attacking thesupposed conceptual mistake of making a thing out of n'hat is not a thing, Ryle was, ofcourse, he.avily nfluenced by Ludrvig Wittgenstein.{r Due to the distinctivc fcatures of Frcgc's semanticarrd syntactic heory,, n crprtssionsuch as "the concept horse" ouglrt to refer to an object-namely, the conccpt of a horse.Butsincc he radic ally distinguishes between concept and object (obiects,such as the horscDobbin, safisn/ oncepts, uch as ht'concept ". . . s fast"),how cotrld one anc.lhe sarnc hingbe hoth a conceptand an object?Sr't'Ci.Frt'gt', On Concept anclObjcct," in P Ceach anelM.Black, eds., Translatiorts.fronthr [>ltilostt1thitnl rililgs ol GttttlobFn'.gc Oxford: Blackw,ell,1952). suspcct hat this paradox in Frcge s genuine, and I take t to count against his rigirldistinction betwccn concept and object.

HYI-I]MOIII 'FIICDUAI-ISM 93Vl . Sour - , o l rur l r v , aruo M,qrERle l DsrrNosnce

What, then, of the complex relat iol rshipr ghr..^ the soul , the person,arrcl hc matter the soul informs to produce the person? The first thing tcrnote is that the soul is not the person.aa The person is the human being,the substantial compound of matter and form. A person is an individualsubstanceof a rat ional naturr ., but the soul is not suclr a substance-for itis the rational nature, not a substance wit l t a rat ional nature. Hence, th cfundamental flaw irr the cartesian conception of the person is the i l legi t-imate identi f ication of the person with the soul, takinp; hem to be one an dthe same substance. I t might u' i th good reason be said that Descartes,having 1;ivenup on the notion of sut.rstantial orm, 15yet eager to preservcpersonal inrmortal i ty, had non'here else to go. Yet the mistake is b.rsic,and leads to so many of the.problems that hat,e dogged Cartesian dual-ism ever since.

Nexi , given the unicity of substanti . t l form, orr t 'cannot take there tr>beseparate, ower orders of soul or nature in the human person. Growth,ar St.ThomasAquinas,Slnmn T|h:ol()qir.hl ' reaf t ( ' r / ' ) , l , q. 75,a. 5, rans.Fathersi f theEnglishDominican Province,2de.d. London:Burnt 'sC)atcs nd Washbour t rc, 922), ol .4:13-16. For a contrary vieu,, hough rrot couchecl n tcrms of souls, see E. J. I_()r,1.,,Formwithout Mattcr," in Odcrberg, ed., Lontt ontl Mnttu, 1-21, at t],9, whert- Lowe iclcntifits tht,

individual concretesubstancewith its ou'n srrlrst.rnti.rlorm, suggesting ater that pcrhapspersons reex:rmples f mattcrless ubstanccs,.e. , orms withoui mattar 21) .But i t i s notclear rom his discussionwhy the two must be clentified.For f, using his exantple, he formof a statue s the property (although it is dangerous to ust this tcrm for rcas,.,rs ppo...,from the above discussion)of its particular bcinqn stntut'ofsuch-anrl-suchslrope, nd if thcindividual statue tself is an instance of the substantial kind stntrie J such nd suthn slntTta,then he form as property and the statueas concrete ubstance re not one and the same.Thestatue s a compound of matter and form (hon'tr,'er one wishes to construe matter, and itshould be noted that Lon'e eschewsprime mattl'r in favor of proxinrate matter such as rrrn;rof bronze), nd it is this that is the instanceof thr. kind. Thr. form remains onlv a part of thaicompound, ts very individuality being given b_y he mattcr with which it is inited (thoughaga_in, owe reiccts he idea of matter as the principlc of individuation).asDescartes ays his about substantial orms:For they {'ere not introduced by philosophcrs for any other reason han that by theman explanat ionmight be given for the proper act ions f natur.rl hings,.rf nhich th cform is to be the principlc and root, as rvas said in an earlier thesis.But clearly n6explanation can be given by thesesubstantial orms for any natural action, sincc hcirdefenders admit that they are occult and that they do not understand them themselvcs.For if they say hat some action proceecls rom a substantial orm, it is as f thtysaicl hat it proct'eds rom something they clo not understand; n,hich explains nothing.

He also says that "thc prophets and apostles,and rrthers who composed the sacrr-dscriPturcsat the dictation of the Holy Ghost, nevt.r considercd hcsephilosophical entities,clearly unknon,n outsidt the Schooli," and that substantial orms ar.i ,,n6wlier.,,wt think,clearly r.nenti trtcd n Holy ScriPturt.. . . ." Descar tes'sct t t ' r to Regius, fanrrary 6.12,nCharlesAdam and I'aul Tanncry, cds., LJculrt's /c )r's.drfu 'sll: Corrt:sltottLioncrljaris: Ct'rf,1899) ,502,506.l though Dcscar tcss here csponding irectlykr t l .re harge v tht Calvinisttheologian Vtrctius hat the former's clcnial of subst:rntial oinrs is irrconiistent with Scrip-ture, hL'.conttxt uggcsts h .rt ht. s nrort'th.tr.rr.rppv o strund triurnphant a[rout hcre ot'urgno clcarbibl icalntent ionof thr.m, s hough his cnt ; r1rsi1i1guppor t o his denial .Contraryto.popular pamdv, howevt-r,scholasticmethod hardly takes rcfcrence n Hol1, Writ to bc.crttcrion for tht' acceptabilitv of a philosophic.rl c()nccpt


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96 I)NVII) S. ODERBEITC]\ . \ ,hosc' ,hat is, u 'hich pt ' rsorr 's, oul it is.a 'r n shrrr t , hc; rr i r rcip leofirrcl ividr-rat ionor Pt'rsorrsmust be'crtrss-fclr; \ trl l't 'As Icla imt 'r1 ar l icr ,hc orn. ts he bearerof he derrt i ty i . r st rLrstancc,irr he sense lrat t is the primarl, part of the substanct esl 'rorrsiblt .or th esubstance's eing the substancet is over t ime. The soul, as form of thebody, s thcrefore lso he Lre'arerf pcrsonal dentity.From t lre subjt 'ct ivepoint of view, r, lren re.f l t 'ct rpon 1yown identitv as t pcrsorl t is nrysoul that cxercise'shat inte'l lectual peration, ecognizing tscl i irs tlrebearerof nrv clcrrt i ty sa pcrson.This docs n()tmean h.rt hc f irst-persorrLrronollns ambiguous,orl ly that t refers o me as a personbv rtreans freferring o that person's hic'fpart, which is the soul, ust as,wherr sa y"l anr n pain" after stutrmv toe, l" refers o me as a personby meansof one of my parts, n this casemy toe: am in pain becauscmy toe s inpain. take he primary refererrce'ofhe irst-person ronoun,as usedbymc, to be myself as a person;but I propose entat ively lrat he referenceto my soul (in the caseof thought)or my toe (n,herr stub t) is a kind ofsecondary r i t tstunrorfnl eference.ln the disembodied tate, continue'toexist-that is, he person hat sme persists es;ritemy physicaldcnflr, hich is the separation f my formfrom my matter-even though one of my constituerrts, amely my body,does not. What this means, hen, s that my death results n the personthat I am cctrrt i truirtso cxisl t tsuu1 licf parl, nan'relyhe part in virtue ofwhich l am sprecif ical lyif ferent, r dif ferent n kind, from any other kirrdof animal. When the body my soul informs cease'so exist,as sr-rrelytdoes ai some time, then the person I am dies but does not thereb y ceaseto exist;hence,death and cessation f existence,or entities ike us, arenotthc'sameevent.sl persistboth nso pcrsoil nd as he form that once vasthe forrn of the body that n'asa part of tlrat person.My s oul is the bearerof my identity as a person, but I am not, and r4/as evet strictly numer-

a'Hon'ard I lobinson ums up this posi t ionsuccinctly,n ansn,er o the Aristotel ian uLrs-t ion of "u,hy and hon'a soul should be in this i fe at lcast-tred to a par t icularbotlv as asubstantial nitv": " the soul s he orm of the body, or the ndividual ized denti ty of a f t r rnrdepends ntcessarily on the mattcr in u,hich it is individualized, so there can be no n,orryabout how it comes to belong to this hot-iy."Set Howard Robinsorr, Form and thc. mma-teriality of the lntollt'ct from Aristotlt' to Aquinas," in Henry lllumenthal ancl fku,ardliobinson, eds.,Aristotlcntrd hc ttcrTraditittn (Orford Studicsn Ancit,tttPltilosoplrtl),-c1..fliaArrnas (Oxford: Clarendon Press,1991), 07-26,at 225 26.50Hcncc, t shouH be clear hat al thorrghhuman n; r turcpcr sc is universal,a hunr . rnpcrson,bt ' ingan indiv idual izedhuman n. r ture, s par t icular .'r f trst s ht 'soul ,h. rv ing nt r insic 'x istcncendcpendcnt f nr.rtter, ot-s ot cr.aso() \ istvia sr.p.ir.rtion rorr nl..ltt('r, o bv prritt, trf re.rsoning t u,oultl st't'nr lrat tlrtt sorrl cannrrlcontc nto t.xistrrtct by the verv fact lf the coming into t ristt'rtcr. f tltc pt'rso n as crrnrpounclof soul anclbodr'. n otht'r n,orcls, eithcr ht soul's generation nrrr ts corruptiorr r'lt'pt,ntl trmattrr. As Aristotlt' puts it in On tltt Grtk'rlti(utof Aninnls 736b21-28, ht' rational soLrl suniquc in having o corrc "from outsit lc." t rccluiresur therargument ,b( ' t phi losophicalor t l reoJogicai,o tlcterminewhetht ' r f rom outsidc" ntai ls pre-cxistenccPlak))or inrrrt 't l iate creation Christ iarri tv).

HYI,EMORPHICDUALISMical ly identical rvith my soul. '52 nctther imperfect i rnalogy helps to maketl re point. Supposc it werc technically possible to reduce' n"r1, rganiccxistcnce to that of a head.53Then I would existd-s htacl , btrt I rvor-rldno tbe numerical ly identical arll/r a head any more tharr I would have bccrrnumerically identical with my whole body-there being no rcason t( .)aff i rm one and deny the otlrer, transitivity of identi ty would be 'n' iolated.And yet in solrc seltsc I am a hc'ad: pcrhaps, to use a much-cliscusscdconcept, we can say that i am coirsf i fr rtcr / y a hcatl , as I was or-rce on -sti tuted b1,6 1a,11,,1"ody (lct us l( 'a\/e.rside hc soul ior the. rrome-rrt-tlrepoint shoulcl be graspable by nrater ial ists as u,ell). Al though tl te corrccptof consti tut ion is not wel l unclc-rstood, t i r ink that the best way of inter-preting i t in this cor l text s to say that my exist ing as a hc.ird ust r .r reansnvbeing reduced to one of my parts, my exist ing in a radically muti latcclstate.

Finally, the const-quences or personal re'sponsibi l i tv must be' st.rnrc-thing l ike the fol lowing. If pep5o1lr e wherr their sorr s eave heir Lroclewhich is no more than a special case of the gelrcral tnr th that sl lbstancescease o exist when their form and matter are no longer uni ted-thcrr ca nany sensebe made of a soul 's bear ing any responsibil ity for thc .rctsof th ewhole person of which it once was a constituent? To pursue the goryanalogy of the bodi less head, there cloesnot appear to be anything repug-nant to reason in the idea that a persorl exist ing solely as a heaci shouldbe punishecl for crimes committed while the head was corlrlected to abody. Yet perhaps intui t ions di ffer strongly on this question. I think necan accommodate any divergence by considering generally whether scnsecan be made of the idea that a part of an F can be held responsible for the

s2Although heoverw,helmingextual videncerom Aquinass that hjs s exactJy ,hathe believes, hcre s also a particularlv tricky sentencc'fronr is Ctlttttrt'rttarq n I Coriitltinns,referred o by John Finnis n " 'The Th ng I Am': Pcrson.rldr'rr irl in Aqu n,rs rnd Slr.r t..pt,.re(elsewhere n this volume), to which .rttentionshould be drarryn. n his commentarv it 15.2on chapter 15, verses13ff. ("lf there be no resurrcction oi the Jead, ther.r hrist it rit.r nsenagain. . . []f the dead risc. ot again, your faith is in vain," t-tc.),Aquinas says: My soul isnot me [animamca non estego] ;and so c'vcn f my soul shorrldat tainsalvai ion n .rnothtrl i le,st i l l ne' i ther nor any m.rn v, ruldhare attrinci i t ." This ooksas hough rc. s cicnvurgthat the person survives death and asscrting hat only tho soul tJoe.s o. Read in c()nrc\r,hou'ever-both the contextat hand and that of.r l l his 6thcr ronr.rrksxr thc subioct incluri-ing those ref t ' r red o in this cssav)- l d. not think th .rt thi : i : nhat he ha: irr mrnu.l mmedi a te l y r i o r o t l t t , . l uo ted i sc r t i on , t , po i n f s )u t l l . ) t he sou l s a | ; 1p1rt l r t ,m , r r r .and not the whole man (iotus homo). So by going on to sily that thc man cloc,s ot achit-r,csalvationafter doath, he irnplicitly rneans hii of the rry'ro/t,mtrn,nd this is corroct,since ht,Prson.aftr'r eath is dcprivcd of his brxlv. More.over, inct l.rt s commenting on St. pall'sclaim hat rvit l rtrut h ' resurrect ion f thc dcad, ai th is in r ' ; r in, nd sincche explains ha tman hasa natural c i t 's i roor his salvat ion n.rtural i tcr tsidt 'r. l t s. r lutenrui ipsius) , r rnustbe aken tt bc';rointint trut tlrat rr'lrata prrrs()nlcsires s the s.tlr'.rtion f his wholc scif, rt>tivandsoul-n()t of tr imself n sonte cr luccd r impovt'r islrcel 'a\ , , sa nrorep.rrt,narl t lv, t l rr,soul. Hence, hc sor t of salvat ionult inl . l tcly cl i .sirc. l , ,hich prcvorts fai ih 1r,rnr erng urvatn, s that reprcst'nlr'd by Christ's rt:surrt'ction, ) n,it that tri the entire pers6rr,brrclv rlrlsoul, n his ful lnt 'ss. s3Gruesomt-as jt mlv souncl,patcnts h.rvt, rlreatlt' btcn t.rken )ut on iust sucl'r r pnrce-dure (set-U.S. Parentno. +OOO.1Z5).

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Oderberg - Hylemorphic Dualism

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