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Hello, at the start of René Descartes 6 meditation he writes, there is a great difference

between mind and body inasmuch as body is by nature always divisible and mind is entirely indivisible for when I consider the mind or myself

insofar as I am merely a thinking thing I am unable to distinguish many parts within myself

I understand myself to be something quite single and complete.

Although the whole mind seems to be united to the whole body, I recognize that if a foot or an

arm or any other part of the body is cut off,

nothing has thereby been taken away from the mind.

This thinking is the basis of what's known as Cartesian dualism.

Descartes' attempt to address one of the central questions in philosophy, the mind body problem.

Is the mind part of the body or the body part of the mind?

If they are distinct, then how do they interact?

And which of the two is in charge.

We'd me to discuss the mind-body problem is Anthony Graling,

reader in philosophy at Burke Becklone in University,

Julian Bhajini, editor of the Philosophersors magazine, and Sue James, professor of philosophy

at Birkbeck, London University.

Anthony Graling, as with so many questions in philosophy, we go back to the Greeks.

So could you tell us what Plato had to say about this first?

Well Plato is committed to the view that the soul is immortal and that it is composed of three

parts, reason, spirit and appetite.

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