Q1: What is Gilbert Ryle’s concept of the body?

Gilbert Ryle is one of the greatest philosophers of all time who published a book in 1949 that is
called as “the concept of mind”. He was concerned with ordinary language philosophy. He was a
modern philosopher who greatly had influence in the 20th century. According to him, mind was
nothing except a philosophical illusion. It was followed by the western philosophy of Rene
Descartes. He said that mind has been used to of categorical mistakes which then become
habitual in human body. Ryle believed that other philosophical theories were too limited to
explain his concept. He majorly argued to the ghost in the machine and Cartesian theory.
According to his concept, the idea of perceiving, remembering and memorizing things arises
from the mind. Self-made concept was introduced.
A: Ryle basically argues about the philosophical ideas of Rene Descartes which states that the
mind is a separate entity from the human body. Descartes idea was dualism that human mind is
present separately and is not physical. The term “ghost in a machine” was firstly used by Gilbert
Ryle in his book “the concept of mind”. According to gilbert’s idea the consciousness is present
in the mind of the human body. This term explains that the human consciousness depends on
mainly the brain present in the body. Some theories of today also claim that the consciousness is
actually the ghost in the machine. Ghost in the machine has been used in a criticizing way as the
actions of human’s are independent of the mind present in the human body.
B: The term categorical mistake was probably used in the very first chapter of the book called as
“the concept of the mind”. In simple words it means relating a thing to one category while it
belongs to the other one. Ryle believed and argued that it was not right to call the mind as an
object that is made up of immaterial things. Basically his argument stated that Descartes ideas
were not applicable logically as he called the mind a “nonphysical” thing. He was against the
idea of mind body dualism. He believed that mind does not exist separately and is a physical
thing and the Descartes theory was unable to make it fall in the right category. A general
example of categorical mistake is the phrase used which is “the time has crawled”. However,
when we look on the literal meaning it is practically not possible.
C: Bifurcation theory says that in a system sudden qualitative changes occur and sometimes
small alterations are also made to the other parameters present. The theory is a derivative of
philosophical ideas. There are types of bifurcation one is local and the other is the global one.
Local bifurcations result in equilibrium whereas the global one disturbs the stability of a static
system. In general the term bifurcation means the distribution of something in categories or
branches.
Q2: What is form/essence dualism argument?
Matter mind or mind body dualism is the base of Cartesian duality. This theory says that there
are two realities of every subject either physical or spiritual. When the philosophy of mind is
concerned they are present in same categorical way but separated from each other. The free will
and moral arguments stands against dualism. It is also said that dualism is directly related to free
will.
A: When the mind’s philosophy is concerned there are two types of dualism. One is substance
dualism and the other is property dualism. Substance dualism says that there are two kind of
subjects either mental or physical. Whereas the property dualism states that mental and physical
are two different entities and they exist independently. Substance dualism says that there are two
different properties that are mental and physical properties.
1. Substance dualism is in the favor that there are two kinds of ideas whereas on the other
hand property dualism says that there is only one kind of substance but two properties
that adhere them which are mental and physical
2. Substance dualism says that the material can be present outside the body and mental are
physical are two separate categories whereas property dualism states that there is only
one substance but with distinct properties.
3. Two properties of same substance form the basis of property dualism whereas substance
dualism is in the favor of two properties.
B: