A conceptualist argument for a spiritual substantial soul

Religious Studies 49 (1):35-43 (2013)
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Abstract

I advance a type of conceptualist argument for substance dualism – minimally, the view that we are spiritual substances that have bodies – based on the understandability of what it would be for something to be a spirit, e.g. what it would be for God to be a spirit. After presenting the argument formally, I clarify and defend its various premises with a special focus on what I take to be the most controversial one, namely, if thinking matter is metaphysically possible, it is not the case that we have a distinct positive concept of God's being a divine spirit.

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10.1017/s0034412512000133

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Citations of this work

Generic Animalism.Andrew M. Bailey & Peter van Elswyk - 2021 - Journal of Philosophy 118 (8):405-429.
Our animal interests.Andrew M. Bailey - 2017 - Philosophical Studies 174 (9):2315-2328.
Magical Thinking.Andrew M. Bailey - 2020 - Faith and Philosophy 37 (2):181-201.
On the concept of a spirit.Andrew M. Bailey - 2017 - Religious Studies 53 (4):449-457.

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References found in this work

The Character of Mind.Thomas G. Arner & Colin McGinn - 1984 - Philosophical Review 93 (4):630.
Introduction.Robert C. Koons & George Bealer - 2010 - In Robert C. Koons & George Bealer (eds.), The Waning of Materialism: New Essays. Oxford University Press.

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