Descartes claims that God is a substance, and that mind and body are two different and separable substances. This paper provides some background that renders these claims intelligible. For Descartes, that something is real means it can exist in separation, and something is a substance if it does not depend on other substances for its existence. Further, separable objects are correlates of distinct ideas, for an idea is distinct (in an objective sense) if its object may be easily (...) and clearly separated from everything that is not its object. It follows that if our idea of God is our most distinct idea, as Descartes claims, then God must be a substance in the Cartesian sense of the term. Also, if we can have an idea of a thinking subject which does not in any sense refer to bodily things, and if bodily things are substances, then mind and body must be two different substances. (shrink)

Among the various approaches to the question of the nature of the mind , Augustine’s philosophical arguments for the existence of an incorporeal and spiritual substance in man and against materialism are here thoroughly examined on their merits as a source of insight for contemporary discussion. This book, originally published in 1986, employs Augustine’s method of introspection, and argues that, as a philosopher, Augustine can teach the modern mind how to detect the reality of such a spiritual subject (...) in and through basic human acts and faculties, such as imagination, memory, knowledge, free-will and self-knowledge. It presents a critical dialogue with various materialistic anthropologies directly addressed by Augustine himself, or those which have arisen at later periods, including epiphenomenalism, mind-brain identity theory, Marxism and others. (shrink)

Among the various approaches to the question of the nature of the mind, Augustine’s philosophical arguments for the existence of an incorporeal and spiritual substance in man and against materialism are here thoroughly examined on their merits as a source of insight for contemporary discussion. This book, originally published in 1986, employs Augustine’s method of introspection, and argues that, as a philosopher, Augustine can teach the modern mind how to detect the reality of such a spiritual subject in (...) and through basic human acts and faculties, such as imagination, memory, knowledge, free-will and self-knowledge. It presents a critical dialogue with various materialistic anthropologies directly addressed by Augustine himself, or those which have arisen at later periods, including epiphenomenalism, mind-brain identity theory, Marxism and others. (shrink)

In the summer of 1893, following the first publication of F.H. Bradley’s Appearance and Reality, Edward Caird and Sir Henry Jones exchanged letters, with Caird bringing criticism to bear on Bradley’s work analogous to one of Hegel’s objections to Spinoza’s theory of the attributes of substance. Spinoza’s attributes of his one reality, or substance — i.e., extension and thought and infinitely many other attributes not directly known to us — each contain this reality, and they (...) are each a way for us to know it. Hegel objected that they each failed in this owing to the abstractness of Spinoza’s ideas of the attributes. Caird held that Bradley’s metaphysics also makes the idea of reality in this way opposed to its object. The idea fails to contain reality as concrete experience. (shrink)

What we experience is somewhat of a melange, something at once perceptual, mediated by the sense organs; scientific, reflecting our use of mathematical and other formal devices to make clear and systematic the causes of what is now taking place, and pointing us towards what might be expected; eventful, stretches of vital movement in which beginning and ending are, though separate, inescapably interlocked; and important, reflecting both our sense of value and the presence of an objective standard outside us and (...) unaffected by our interests. Initially these strands are inchoately together, constituting commonsense objects, artifactual or natural, the occupants of the world of which we unreflectively take account. On some occasions one of these facets may be to the fore, on other occasions it may be so recessive that its presence is overlooked. (shrink)

A doctoral dissertation seeking to establish the Thomist theory of substance by means of a refutation of the epistemologies of Descartes, Locke, Hume and Kant. --R. T.

This is a study of the attributes problem in the metaphysics of Spinoza, using the recent literature ascribing an absolute idealism to Spinoza as a point of departure.

Substance has long been one of the key categories in metaphysics. This Element focuses on contemporary work on substance, and in particular on contemporary substance ontologies, metaphysical systems in which substance is one of the fundamental categories and individual substances are among the basic building blocks of reality. The topics discussed include the different metaphysical roles which substances have been tasked with playing; different critieria of substancehood (accounts of what is it to be a (...) class='Hi'>substance); arguments for and against the existence of substances; and different accounts of which entities, if any, count as substances1. (shrink)

In this double-volume work, a great modern philosopher propounds a system of thought in which Einstein's theory of relativity represents only the latest (albeit the most radical) fulfillment of the motives inherent to mathematics and the physical sciences. In the course of its exposition, it touches upon such topics as the concept of number, space and time, geometry, and energy; Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometry; traditional logic and scientific method; mechanism and motion; Mayer's methodology of natural science; Richter's definite proportions; relational (...) concepts and the activity of the ego; Einstein's relativity and "reality"; and the philosophical concept of truth and its role in relativity theory. 1923 edition. (shrink)

Virtual Reality Therapy has been shown to be effective in treating anxiety disorders and phobias, but has not yet been widely tested for Substance Use Disorders and it is not known whether health care practitioners working with SUDs would use VRT if it were available. We report the results of an interview study exploring practitioners’ and researchers’ views on the utility of VRT for SUD treatment. Practitioners and researchers with at least two years’ experience delivering or researching and (...) designing SUD treatments were recruited. Interviews were thematically analyzed, resulting in themes relating to the safety and realism of VRT, and the opportunity for the additional insight it could offer to during SUD treatment. Participants were positive about employing VRT as an additional treatment for SUD. VRT was thought suitable for treating adults and people with mental health issues or trauma, provided that risks were appropriately managed. Subsequent relapse, trauma and over-confidence in the success of treatment were identified as risks. The opportunity VRT offered to include other actors in therapy, and observe reactions, were benefits that could not currently be achieved with other forms of therapy. Overall, VRT was thought to offer the potential for safe, realistic, personalized and insightful exposure to diverse triggering scenarios, and to be acceptable for integration into a wide range of SUD treatments. (shrink)

Philosophers today have largely given up on the project of categorizing being. Aristotle’s ten categories now strike us as quaint, and no attempt to improve on that effort meets with much interest. Still, no one supposes that reality is smoothly distributed over space. The world at large comes in chunks, and there remains a widespread intuition, even among philosophers, that some of these chunks have a special sort of unity and persistence. These, we tend to suppose, are most truly (...) agents and subjects, and are what exist in the most proper sense of the term. We believe, in other words, in substances. (shrink)

The essay constructs an ontological theory designed to capture the categories instantiated in those portions or levels of reality which are captured in our common sense conceptual scheme. It takes as its starting point an Aristotelian ontology of “substances” and “accidents”, which are treated via the instruments of mereology and topology. The theory recognizes not only individual parts of substances and accidents, including the internal and external boundaries of these, but also universal parts, such as the “humanity” which is (...) an essential part of both Tom and Dick, and also “individual relations”, such as Tom’s promise to Dick, or their current handshake. (shrink)

‘Substance’ (substantia, zelfstandigheid) is a key term of Spinoza’s philosophy. Like almost all of Spinoza’s philosophical vocabulary, Spinoza did not invent this term, which has a long history that can be traced back at least to Aristotle. Yet, Spinoza radicalized the traditional notion of substance and made a very powerful use of it by demonstrating – or at least attempting to demonstrate -- that there is only one, unique substance -- God (or Nature) -- and that all (...) other things are merely modes or states of God. Some of Spinoza’s readers understood these claims as committing him to the view that only God truly exists, and while this interpretation is not groundless, we will later see that this enticing and bold reading of Spinoza as an ‘acosmist’ comes at the expense of another audacious claim Spinoza advances, i.e., that God/Nature is absolutely and actually infinite. But before we reach this last conclusion, we have a long way to go. So, let me first provide an overview of our plan. In the first section of this paper we will examine Spinoza’s definitions of ‘substance’ and ‘God’ at the opening of his magnum opus, the Ethics. Following a preliminary clarification of these two terms and their relations to the other key terms defined at the beginning of the Ethics, we will briefly address the Aristotelian and Cartesian background of Spinoza’s discussion of substance. In the second section, we will study the properties of the fundamental binary relations pertaining to Spinoza’s substance: inherence, conception, and causation. The third section will be dedicated to a clarification of Spinoza’s claim that God, the unique substance, is absolutely infinite. This essential feature of Spinoza’s substance has been largely neglected in recent Anglo-American scholarship, a neglect which has brought about an unfortunate tendency to domesticate Spinoza’s metaphysics to more contemporary views. The fourth section will study the nature of Spinoza’s monism. It will discuss and criticize the interesting yet controversial views of the eminent Spinoza scholar, Martial Gueroult, about the plurality of substances in the beginning of the Ethics; address Spinoza’s claim in Letter 50 that, strictly speaking, it is improper to describe God as “one”; and, finally, evaluate Spinoza’s kind of monism against the distinction between existence and priority monism recently introduced into the contemporary philosophical literature. The fifth and final section will explain the nature, reality, and manner of existence of modes. We therefore have an ambitious plan; let’s get down to business. (shrink)

Resumo No segundo capítulo das Categorias, Aristóteles introduz um esquema conceptual de acordo com o qual, recorrendo a dois únicos critérios, “estar num sujeito” e “dizer-se de um sujeito”, é possível distribuir a realidade por quatro tipos de entes: as substâncias individuais, que nem estão num sujeito nem se dizem de um sujeito; as substâncias universais, que se dizem de um sujeito, mas não estão num sujeito; os acidentes individuais, que estão num sujeito, mas não se dizem de um sujeito; (...) e os acidentes universais, que estão num sujeito e se dizem de um sujeito. O problema coloca-se ao nível do terceiro tipo de entes, os acidentes individuais, em virtude, em particular, do modo como são definidos no texto, a saber, como algo que “não pode ser separadamente daquilo em que está”. Ora a importância desta cláusula, e, portanto, da sua correcta interpretação, vai muito para além de uma simples decisão em matéria textual ou mesmo doutrinária, se a restringirmos ao passo e à questão em apreço. Nela, joga-se todo o sentido que Aristóteles deseja atribuir à individualidade das inerências e, através dela, o modo como é por ele concebida a distinção ontológica entre substâncias e acidentes individuais, enquanto tipos diversos de itens individuais. Este, pois, o objecto do presente estudo: apreender o sentido e o fundamento da distinção entre substâncias e acidentes individuais em Aristóteles, a partir de uma análise do estatuto das inerências no segundo capítulo das Categorias. Palavras-chave : acidente, Aristóteles, Categorias, individual, inerências, substânciaIn the second chapter of Categories, Aristotle introduces a conceptual scheme in accordance to which, using only two criteria, “being in a subject” and “said of a subject”, it is possible to distribute reality over four types of beings: individual substances, which are neither in a subject nor are said of a subject; universal substances, which are said of a subject but are not in a subject; individual accidents, which are in a subject, but are not said of a subject; and universal accidents, which are in a subject and are said of a subject. The problem arises with the third type of entity, individual accidents, due to the way they are defined in the text, namely as something which “cannot exist separately from what it is in”. The importance of this clause, and therefore of its correct interpretation, goes far beyond the mere decision on textual or even doctrinal matters, if restricted to the passage and to the question under consideration. What is at stake here is the significance that Aristotle wishes to attribute to the individuality of inherences and, through that, the way in which the ontological distinction between individual substances and individual accidents – that is to say, between primary substances and their accidents as diverse types of individual items – is conceived by him. Here, then, is the scope of this paper: to grasp the meaning and the rationale of the distinction between individual substances and individual accidents in Aristotle, based on the analysis of the statute of inherences in the second chapter of the Categories. Keywords: accident, Aristotle, categories, individual, inherences, substance. (shrink)

Michael Wedin argues against the prevailing notion that Aristotle's views on the nature of reality are fundamentally inconsistent. According to Wedin's new interpretation, the difference between the early theory of the Categories and the later theory of the Metaphysics reflects the fact that Aristotle is engaged in quite different projects in the two works--the earlier focusing on ontology, and the later on explanation.

In his groundbreaking work of 1969, Spinoza's Metaphysics: An Essay in Interpretation, Edwin Curley attacked the traditional understanding of the substance-mode relation in Spinoza, which makes modes inhere in the substance. Curley argued that such an interpretation generates insurmountable problems, as had been already claimed by Pierre Bayle in his famous entry on Spinoza. Instead of having the modes inhere in the substance Curley suggested that the modes’ dependence upon the substance should be interpreted in terms (...) of (efficient) causation, i.e., as committing Spinoza to nothing over and above the claim that the substance is the (efficient) cause of the modes. These bold and fascinating claims generated one of the most important scholarly controversies in Spinoza scholarship of the past thirty-five years. In this chapter I argue against Curley’s interpretation and attempt to reestablish the traditional understanding of Spinozistic modes as inhering in God and as predicated of God. I also criticize Curley’s philosophical motivation for suggesting this interpretation. I do believe, however, that Curley is right about the existence of an intimate connection between the substance-mode relation and causation in Spinoza. In the next chapter I will study the notion of ‘immanent cause’, which merges efficient causality and inherence. I will clarify the relation between immanent, efficient and material causation, and show where precisely Spinoza diverged from the traditional Aristotelian taxonomy of causes. In the second chapter I also discuss the German Idealists’ view of Spinoza as an ‘acosmist’. Under this interpretation Spinoza was a modern reviver of Eleatic monism, who allegedly asserts the mere existence of God, and denies the reality of the world of particular things. Spinozistic modes - according to this reading - are nothing but passing and unreal phenomena. Though this view of Spinoza as an ‘acosmist’ can be supported by some lines in Spinoza’s thought, I believe it should be rejected since it is not consistent with some of the most central doctrines of the Ethics. In the final part of the second chapter I discuss the relation between modes and the attributes under which they fall, and suggest a terminological distinction between a ‘mode of God’ (i.e., a mode under all attributes) and a ‘mode of an attribute’ (i.e., a mode under a specific attribute), a distinction which can help us avoid some common confusions in the treatment of the issue. (shrink)

This monograph is divided into four parts: 1. AMERICAN PHILOSOPHY: Unlike the philosophies of other countries today, it does not pivot about a particular authoritative university or school. Most positions, though, agree in acknowledging a plurality of irreducible ultimate principles and realities. 2. PROCESS PHILOSOPHY: This has been of primary interest to theologians, and is occupied mainly with pointing up differences with Thomism. The strength and weaknesses of both these positions is outlined, and alternative views indicated. 3. THE MODAL PHILOSOPHY: (...) A summary account is given, justifying and describing five irreducible, conditioning realities which govern individual substances, severally and together. 4. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS: These have mainly to do with the problem of the One and the Many, raised by the audience. Each finality, it is held, is a One for the Many actualities; each actuality is a One for the Many finalities. (shrink)

If spacetime does not exist, it does so in a very unusual way. It curves in response to massive objects. It warps in response to high velocities. The Substance of Spacetime treats spacetime, not merely as a geometric abstraction, but as a real physical substance, opening a window onto reality that would otherwise be impossible to even contemplate.

‘Substance’ (substantia, zelfstandigheid) is a key term of Spinoza’s philosophy. Like almost all of Spinoza’s philosophical vocabulary, Spinoza did not invent this term, which has a long history that can be traced back at least to Aristotle. Yet, Spinoza radicalized the traditional notion of substance and made a very powerful use of it by demonstrating – or at least attempting to demonstrate -- that there is only one, unique substance -- God (or Nature) -- and that all (...) other things are merely modes or states of God. Some of Spinoza’s readers understood these claims as committing him to the view that only God truly exists, and while this interpretation is not groundless, we will later see that this enticing and bold reading of Spinoza as an ‘acosmist’ comes at the expense of another audacious claim Spinoza advances, i.e., that God/Nature is absolutely and actually infinite. But before we reach this last conclusion, we have a long way to go. So, let me first provide an overview of our plan. In the first section of this paper we will examine Spinoza’s definitions of ‘substance’ and ‘God’ at the opening of his magnum opus, the Ethics. Following a preliminary clarification of these two terms and their relations to the other key terms defined at the beginning of the Ethics, we will briefly address the Aristotelian and Cartesian background of Spinoza’s discussion of substance. In the second section, we will study the properties of the fundamental binary relations pertaining to Spinoza’s substance: inherence, conception, and causation. The third section will be dedicated to a clarification of Spinoza’s claim that God, the unique substance, is absolutely infinite. This essential feature of Spinoza’s substance has been largely neglected in recent Anglo-American scholarship, a neglect which has brought about an unfortunate tendency to domesticate Spinoza’s metaphysics to more contemporary views. The fourth section will study the nature of Spinoza’s monism. It will discuss and criticize the interesting yet controversial views of the eminent Spinoza scholar, Martial Gueroult, about the plurality of substances in the beginning of the Ethics; address Spinoza’s claim in Letter 50 that, strictly speaking, it is improper to describe God as “one”; and, finally, evaluate Spinoza’s kind of monism against the distinction between existence and priority monism recently introduced into the contemporary philosophical literature. The fifth and final section will explain the nature, reality, and manner of existence of modes. We therefore have an ambitious plan; let’s get down to business. (shrink)

G.W.F. Hegel focuses his treatment of Sophocles' drama, Antigone , in the Phenomenology of Spirit, on the ideal of mutual recognition. Antigone was punished with death for performing the burial ritual honoring her brother, Polyneices, to whose irreplaceability she attests in her well-known speech of defiance. Hegel argues that Antigone's loss of Polyneices was the irreparable loss of reciprocal recognition. Only in the brother sister relation, Hegel thought, could there be equality in mutual recognition. I argue that this equality cannot (...) be found in a marriage union with a husband or in the public sphere of civil society. Situating Hegel's account of marriage in the Philosophy of Right within the history of marriage and historical literature on the emerging market economy of Hegel's time, I demonstrate that Hegel's perception of equality in the reciprocal recognition of the brother sister relation was a function of both economic realities and his relationship with his sister, Christiane. I show desire in the Phenomenology to be the desire for dominance, and I show the brother sister relation to be free of desire. (shrink)

Russell’s critique of substance monism is an ideal starting point from which to understand some main concepts in Spinoza’s difficult metaphysics. This paper provides an in-depth examination of Spinoza’s proof that only one substance exists. On this basis, it rejects Russell’s interpretation of Spinoza’s theory of reality as founded upon the logical doctrine that all propositions consist of a predicate and a subject. An alternative interpretation is offered: Spinoza’s substance is not a bearer of properties, as (...) Russell implied, but an eternally active, self-actualizing creative power. Eventually, Spinoza the Monist and Russell the Pluralist are at one in holding that process and activity rather than enduring things are the most fundamental realities. (shrink)

This article analyzes the treatment of vegetative powers in Nicolaus Taurellus’s critical response to Andrea Cesalpino. Taurellus’s interest in this topic derives from larger metaphysical and theological concerns. His concern is that Cesalpino’s view that vegetative powers are due to a divine principle of activity inherent in natural particulars leads to a version of substance monism that is incompatible with the Christian doctrine of creation. Taurellus’s critique can best be understood within the context of his defense of an immaterialist (...) account of the basic constituents of reality, which is connected with an emergentist account of the origin of vegetative powers. (shrink)

Aristotle's views on the fundamental nature of reality are usually taken to be inconsistent. The two main sources for these views are the Categories and the central books of the Metaphysics, particularly book Zeta. In the early theory of the Categories the basic entities of the world are concrete objects such as Socrates: Aristotle calls them 'primary substances'. But the later theory awards this title to the forms of concrete objects. Michael Wedin proposes a compatibilist solution to this long-standing (...) puzzle, arguing that Aristotle is engaged in quite different projects in the two works. The theory of Metaphysics Zeta is meant to explain central features of the standing doctrine of the Categories, and so presupposes the essential truth of the early theory. The Categories offers a theory of underlying ontological configurations, while book Zeta gives form the status of primary substance because it is primarily the form of a concrete object that explains its nature, and this form is the substance of the object. So when the late theory identifies primary substance with form, it appeals to an explanatory primacy that is quite distinct from the ontological primacy that dominates the Categories. Wedin's new interpretation thus allows us to see the two treatises as complementing each other: they are parts of a unified history of substance. (shrink)

These substances have been considered in recent times, as in traditional interpretation, to be identical with the immobile Movers of the Physics. Both Physics and Metaphysics refer to the same separate substances. On the other hand, the immobile Movers of the Physics have been identified with the immanent souls of the Heavens, and so sharply distinguished from the separate substances of the Metaphysics. Then in the opposite extreme, the Movers of the Metaphysics have been completely identified with the celestial souls. (...) Or again, the first only of the Movers has been declared separate, and the others identified with the different sphere-souls, among which is the first Mover of the Physics. In still another interpretation the first Mover alone is separate, but the other immobile Movers are held to be the divine thoughts, identical with the first Mover. Even the first Mover has been interpreted as a thought in the mind of some other Being, as merely an ideal or standard of goodness which does not imply--though it need not exclude--any corresponding existent reality in the Aristotelian universe. (shrink)

The paper offers a new account of Spinoza's conception of “substance”, the fundamental building block of reality. It shows that it can be demonstrated apriori within Spinoza's metaphysical framework that (i) contrary to Idealist readings, for Spinoza there can be no substance that is not determined or modified by some other entity produced by substance; and that (ii) there can be no substance (and hence no being) that is not a thinking substance.

Aristotle's views on the fundamental nature of reality are usually taken to be inconsistent. The two main sources for these views are the Categories and the central books of the Metaphysics, particularly book Zeta. In the early theory of the Categories the basic entities of the world are concrete objects such as Socrates: Aristotle calls them 'primary substances'. But the later theory awards this title to the forms of concrete objects. Michael Wedin proposes a compatibilist solution to this long-standing (...) puzzle, arguing that Aristotle is engaged in quite different projects in the two works. The theory of Metaphysics Zeta is meant to explain central features of the standing doctrine of the Categories, and so presupposes the essential truth of the early theory. The Categories offers a theory of underlying ontological configurations, while book Zeta gives form the status of primary substance because it is primarily the form of a concrete object that explains its nature, and this form is the substance of the object. So when the late theory identifies primary substance with form, it appeals to an explanatory primacy that is quite distinct from the ontological primacy that dominates the Categories. Wedin's new interpretation thus allows us to see the two treatises as complementing each other: they are parts of a unified history of substance. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the basic meaning of ousia in Plato’s philosophical use of the term. “Basic” is not intended as “the strongest”, let alone “exclusive”, insofar as the semantics of ousia encompasses a variety of philosophical meanings. On the contrary, the basic meaning is proposed to be the elementary semantic component of ousia, which is present in the background of Plato’s quasi‑technical use of the term and marks the difference from its ordinary meaning. In view (...) of this, a “genetic” aspect is firstly considered, that is, the connection with the Socratic question “What is X?”. Thereafter, a brief mention to Plato’s conception of language and its relation to reality is made, focusing on the notion of eponymy. This because Plato’s coinage of the philosophical semantics of ousia gives this term the role of an eponym, in the sense that its prominent value is the reference to the Forms, but this does not exclude that it may refer to other types of entities. In the last two sections of the paper, a number of passages from Plato’s works are examined to show that the basic meaning of ousia ultimately is “determined existence”, inasmuch as it designates any thing existing with its own peculiar feature. For ousiai can be empirical things as well as Forms, which implies that the meaning of Plato’s ousia should not be understood in the light of an substance/accident relation. (shrink)

In an effort to refute Avicenna’s real distinction between essence and existence, Averroes argues for an Instantiation Analysis of existence which thinks of existence not as an accidental addition to an essence, but rather as the recognition that there is an instance in extramental reality which matches a concept in the mind of a knower. In this study, I argue that Averroes’s Instantiation Analysis fails to refute Avicenna’s real distinction by showing that Avicenna himself endorses the Instantiation Analysis and, (...) in fact, makes use of it to motivate his real distinction. To show this, I review several texts where Avicenna makes the puzzling claim that substances are found to be in subjects. These texts reveal how Avicenna discovers the real distinction with Aristotle’s help—not, as Averroes relates, against the view of Aristotle. (shrink)

The Upanishadic thinkers arrived at the conception of the Atman—the self—through psychological reflection. By an analysis of consciousness, they concluded that the self was the primary reality. Further, they discovered that it was the same primary reality—the same principle—that formed the basis of the Universe. In this capacity the self was called the Brahman This psychological approach to the problem of ultimate reality is characteristic of the Upanishadic philosophy. It is interesting to note that the writers of (...) the Upanishads have also offered cosmological speculations which led them independently to the positing of absolute existence. (shrink)

Psychotherapy with the use of psychedelic substances, including psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), ketamine, and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), has demonstrated promise in treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety, addiction, and treatment-resistant depression. Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy (PP) represents a unique psychopharmacological model that leverages the profound effects of the psychedelic experience. That experience is characterized by strong dependency on two key factors: participant mindset and the therapeutic environment. As such, therapeutic models that utilize psychedelics reflect the need for careful design that promotes (...) an open, flexible, trusting mindset and a supportive setting. To meet this need, the PP model is increasingly supplemented by auxiliary methods, including meditation, relaxation, visualization or spiritual practices. We suggest virtual reality (VR) as a full-spectrum tool able to capitalize on and catalyze the innately therapeutic aspects of the psychedelic experience, such as detachment from familiar reality, alteration of self-experience, augmentation of sensory perception and induction of mystical-type experiences. This is facilitated by VR’s evidenced capacity to: aid relaxation and reduce anxiety; buffer from external stimuli; promote a mindful presence; train the mind to achieve altered states of consciousness (ASC); evoke mystical states; enhance therapeutic alliance and encourage self-efficacy. While these unique VR features appear promising, VR’s potential role in PP remains speculative due to lack of empirical evidence on the combined use of VR and PP. Given the increased commercial interest in this synergy there is an urgent need to evaluate this approach. We suggest specific VR models and their role within PP protocols to inspire future direction in scientific research, and provide a list of potential disadvantages, side effects and limitations that need to be carefully considered. These include sensory overstimulation, cyber-sickness, triggering memories of past traumatic events as well as distracting from the inner experience or strongly influencing its contents. A balanced, evidence-based approach may provide continuity across all phases of treatment, support transition into and out of an ASC, deepen acute ASC experiences including mystical states and enrich the psychotherapeutic process of integration. We conclude that the potential application of VR in modulating psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy demands further exploration and an evidence-based approach to both design and implementation. (shrink)

As far as classical physics is concerned, it is possible to trace causal relations between physical objects back to intrinsic properties of these objects. On this view, causal relations turn out to be internal instead of external relations, supervening on intrinsic properties of the relata. However, one can raise doubts about this view already in Newtonian mechanics. The decisive blow to this view comes from quantum physics, with Bell’s theorem proving that no dynamics based on local, intrinsic properties of quantum (...) objects can yield the empirical predictions of quantum mechanics. Nonetheless, quantum entanglement by no means implies that we have to abandon an ontology of objects in favour of an ontology of structures. Any of the known proposals for a quantum ontology of matter in space-time is committed to objects. However, on any of these proposals, what determines the dynamics of these objects are not local, intrinsic properties, but a global or holistic property instantiated by all the objects together – that is, a structure that takes all the objects in the universe as its relata. The view set out in this paper thus amounts to combining ontic structural realism with an ontology of objects that can be conceived as substances. This suggestion is illustrated by drawing on the ontology of quantum physics worked out by Bohm and Bell. (shrink)