On Arguments for Immateriality of the Soul by Avicenna and Mullā Ṣadrā

Homazadeh  Abyaneh, Mahdi

doi:10.30497/ap.2019.75322

On Arguments for Immateriality of the Soul by Avicenna and Mullā Ṣadrā

Author

Mahdi Homazadeh Abyaneh

PhD, Philosophy of Mind Director of Philosophy of Cognitive Science Program Science Studies Department Iranian Institute of Philosophy: IRIP Neufel-le-chateau St. Tehran, Iran.

10.30497/ap.2019.75322

Abstract

I seek to explicate the ways in which the soul is deemed immaterial in two main strands of Islamic philosophy and then consider with the physicalistic approach some arguments for the immateriality of the soul. To do so, I first overview Avicenna's theory of the spiritual incipience (al-ḥudūth al-rūḥānī) of the soul and his version of substance dualism. I will then discuss Mullā Ṣadrā's view of the physical incipience (al-ḥudūth al-jismānī) of the soul and how the soul emerges and develops towards immateriality on his account. I then overview and discuss five of the most important arguments presented by these two great Muslim philosophers in favor of the immateriality of the soul. To do so, I will also point out some of the main contemporary physicalistic views of the nature of mind and mental states. I will then argue that arguments for the immateriality of the soul – dealt with here – do not indeed target or challenge any significant versions of contemporary physicalism. I conclude that the most important narrow physicalistic views – such as identity theory – have a very different formation than what Avicenna and Mullā -Sadrā are refuting. Also, the most important wide physicalistic theories – such as the externalist representationalism - are inconsistent with assumptions and readings of materialism in the Islamic philosophy framework and propose other types of physicalism about the mind were not fundamentally considered by the Avicenna and Mullā -Sadrā arguments. Moreover, some of these arguments, in my opinion, involve conflations of epistemological or ontological issues.

Keywords

20.1001.1.25385275.1398.23.61.7.8

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