Pairing Problems: Causal and Christological

Perichoresis 19 (2):99-118 (2021)
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Abstract

Trenton Merricks has objected to dualist conceptions of the Incarnation in a similar way to Jaegwon Kim’s pairing problem. On the original pairing problem, so argues Kim, we lack a pairing relationship between bodies and souls such that body A is causally paired with soul A and not soul B. Merricks, on the other hand, argues that whatever relations dualists propose that do pair bodies and souls together (e.g. causal relations) are relations that God the Son has with all bodies whatsoever via his divine attributes (e.g. God the Son could cause motion in any and all bodies via his omnipotence). So if we count these relations as sufficient for embodiment, then dualism implies that God the Son is embodied in all bodies whatsoever. I shall argue that while the original pairing problem might be easily answerable, the Christological pairing problem is not and that dualists must shift some of their focus from the defense of the soul’s existence to explicating the nature of the mind-body relationship.

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References found in this work

The extended mind.Andy Clark & David J. Chalmers - 1998 - Analysis 58 (1):7-19.
Physicalism, or Something Near Enough.Jaegwon Kim - 2005 - Princeton University Press.
The existence of God.Richard Swinburne - 1979 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Physicalism, or Something near Enough.Jaegwon Kim - 2006 - Philosophical Quarterly 56 (223):306-310.
The Coherence of Theism (revised edition).Richard Swinburne - 1977 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.

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