Descartes Believes That There Exists Both 'mind' And 'matter' (or 'body' - Same Thing). Smart Believes That There Is Only 'matter', Or The Material/physical World, And Everything Else, Including Thoughts, Sensations And Other Apparently 'mental' Processe

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Philosophy of Descartes

I would start the argument, that there exists both Mind and Body/Matter, and that both are exclusively distinct from each other, because of the functions. The argument can be established through inspecting both mind and matter through their properties. First, “Matter” by the virtue of its existence always requires physical qualities to exist, whereas “Mind” is intangible.

Mind and Matter are two distinct entities, which have existence in and of them self and that both are mutually exclusive of each other ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"OkSgStiW","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Ariew)","plainCitation":"(Ariew)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":337,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/smYQhi21/items/GWMTUZ9M"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/smYQhi21/items/GWMTUZ9M"],"itemData":{"id":337,"type":"book","title":"Descartes and the last scholastics","publisher":"Cornell University Press","ISBN":"1-5017-3324-9","author":[{"family":"Ariew","given":"Roger"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2019"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Ariew). He further posits that Mind by its own virtue has distinct and separate entity with proper functions and properties, whereas body has its own. One can also question his notion on several instances?

For probing his argument, take a look at non-living bodies, which lack the thinking capacity at all like mountains, and mineral deposits on the plane and they do not possess the same properties as humans. There remains no room for doubt that, it is possible for bodies to exist without thinking ability. Taking his argument other way round i.e. is it possible for thinking to exist without or outside substance/matter? or making it simple is it possible to think without the help of brain? Thus, the answer which I am getting while writing this academic piece of paper is No, if it would be known than by proxy it also posits that it is not possible for body to exist without mind. As we do not have any observations and instances in human history of mind without bodies as in the case of bodies which are everywhere without having thinking capacities or minds ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"Um0oRwDo","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Gibson)","plainCitation":"(Gibson)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":331,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/smYQhi21/items/JFVJANFW"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/smYQhi21/items/JFVJANFW"],"itemData":{"id":331,"type":"book","title":"The philosophy of Descartes","publisher":"Routledge","ISBN":"1-315-46808-5","author":[{"family":"Gibson","given":"A. Boyce"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Gibson). As a matter of fact, that Mind being intangible or without any physical properties we cannot know its existence as human senses operate on only those bodies which have matter.

Works Cited

ADDIN ZOTERO_BIBL {"uncited":[],"omitted":[],"custom":[]} CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY Ariew, Roger. Descartes and the Last Scholastics. Cornell University Press, 2019.

Gibson, A. Boyce. The Philosophy of Descartes. Routledge, 2016.