Beyond Descartes: Why the Mind-Body Problem is a Category Error
We are stuck in a 400-year-old rut regarding consciousness, but our fundamental definitions of cause and effect may be the real illusion.
Thomas O. Scarborough argues that we have not actually moved past René Descartes’ famous “I think, therefore I am.” Despite discarding the idea of an immaterial soul, we still cling to the dualistic trap of “A causes B”—where a mental state drives a physical reaction. Scarborough, author of Everything, Briefly, suggests this is a fundamental misunderstanding of reality. Just as Descartes made a “category mistake” by mixing different types of causes, modern philosophy faces an “ontological mistake.” We attempt to isolate the mind as a distinct thing, but in a universe of infinite regress, no singular cause or effect exists in isolation.
This realization shifts the burden of accountability. Since we perceive the world through our mental models, we create the very “things” and “relations” we observe. We don’t just react to reality; we launch it from ourselves. In this light, while our physical actions may be determined, the arrangement of our internal world remains uniquely our responsibility. We are the architects of our perception, and acknowledging that freedom is the first step out of the philosophical rut.
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