Double-aspect theory
In the philosophy of mind, double-aspect theory is the view that the mental and the physical are two aspects of, or perspectives on, the same substance. It is also called dual-aspect monism, not to be confused with mind–body dualism. The theory's relationship to neutral monism is ill-defined,
According to Harald Atmanspacher, "dual-aspect approaches consider the mental and physical domains of reality as aspects, or manifestations, of an underlying undivided reality in which the mental and the physical do not exist as separate domains. In such a framework, the distinction between mind and matter results from an epistemic split that separates the aspects of the underlying reality. Consequently, the status of the psychophysically neutral domain is considered as ontic relative to the mind–matter distinction".
Theories
Possible double-aspect theorists include:- Baruch Spinoza, who believed that Nature or God has infinite aspects, but that Extension and Mind are the only aspects of which we have knowledge.
- Arthur Schopenhauer, who considered the fundamental aspects of reality to be Will and Representation.
- David Bohm, who used implicate and explicate order as a means of displaying dual-aspects.
- Gustav Fechner
- Mark Solms, neuropsychoanalyst, for whom dual-aspect monism represents a matrix of ontological juxtaposition of psychoanalytical and neuroscientific knowledge from two distinct perspectives: looking from the inside and looking from the outside.
- George Henry Lewes
- Thomas Jay Oord - calls his version "Material-Mental Monism"
- John Polkinghorne
- Brian [O'Shaughnessy (philosopher)|Brian O'Shaughnessy] on the dual aspect theory of the Will
- Thomas Nagel
- David Chalmers, who explores a double-aspect view of information, with similarities to Kenneth Sayre's information-based neutral monism
- J. A. Scott Kelso, The Complementary Nature attempts to reconcile what it calls "the philosophy of complementary pairs" with the science of coordination dynamics.
Pauli-Jung conjecture
Atmanspacher further refers to Paul Bernays' views on complementarity in physics and in philosophy when he states that "Two descriptions are complementary if they mutually exclude each other, yet are both necessary to describe a situation exhaustively."