Descartes: two senses

A. Substance - A thing whose existence is dependent on no other thing.

B. Created Substance- A thing whose existence is dependent on nothing other than God.
Strictly speaking, for Descartes there is only one Substance (as opposed to Created Substance), since
there is only one thing whose existence is independent of all other things: God. However, within the
universe that God has created there are entities the existence of which depends only on God. These
lesser substances are the ultimate constituents of the created world.
The definition of substance that Descartes offers in the Second Replies (and elsewhere), ignores the
distinction between God and creation and defines substance in a much more traditional way,
claiming that a substance is a subject that has or bears modes, but is not itself a mode of anything
else.
The infinite substance, that is, God, is the most real thing because only he requires nothing else in
order to exist; created, finite substances are next most real, because they require only Gods creative
and conservative activity in order to exist; and finally, modes are the least real, because they require
a created substance and an infinite substance in order to exist. So, on this principle, a mode cannot
cause the existence of a substance since modes are less real than finite substances. Similarly, a
created, finite substance cannot cause the existence of an infinite substance. But a finite substance
can cause the existence of another finite substance or a mode (since modes are less real than
substances). Hence, Descartes point could be that the completely diverse natures of mind and body
do not violate this causal principle, since both are finite substances causing modes to exist in some
other finite substance.
Descartes specifies two attributes (principle properties): thought and extension.
Consequently, there are at least two kinds of created substance
A. Extended substances - having length, breadth, and depth, take up space or to have volume
B. Thinking substances. mind.
Consider an extended substance, say, a particular rock. Among this rocks properties are shape and
size; but having these properties presupposes the property of extension. Put otherwise, something
cannot have a shape or a size without also being extended. Furthermore, the properties that the rock
may have are limited to modifications of extensiona rock cannot have the property of experiencing
pain for example, since the property of experiencing pain is not a way of being extended. In general,
we can say that for Descartes i) the attribute of a substance is its most general property, and that ii)
every other property of a substance is merely a specification of, way of being, or mode of that
attribute. . Furthermore Descartes treats bodies, including the objects of our everyday experience
(chairs, trees, spoons, etc.) as extended substances. Descartes thinks that matter is infinitely
divisiblethat each part of matter is itself extended all the way downit follows that there are an
infinite number of extended substances.
Descartes: It makes no sense to ascribe such modes to entirely extended, non-thinking things like
stones, and therefore, only minds can have these kinds of modes. Conversely, it makes no sense to
ascribe modes of size, shape, quantity and motion to non-extended, thinking things. For example,
the concept of an unextended shape is unintelligible. Therefore, a mind cannot be understood to be
shaped or in motion, nor can a body understand or sense anything. Human beings, however, are
supposed to be combinations of mind and body such that the minds choices can cause modes of
motion in the body, and motions in certain bodily organs, such as the eye, cause modes of sensation
in the mind.
Mind-Body
Human minds and bodies are really distinctthat is, that they are each substances. Indeed, every
individual consciousness or mind is a thinking substance.
How can these two substances with completely different natures causally interact so as to give rise to
a human being capable of having voluntary bodily motions and sensations?
The arm moving upward is the effect while the choice to raise it is the cause. But willing is a mode of
the non-extended mind alone, whereas the arms motion is a mode of the extended body alone: how
can the non-extended mind bring about this extended effect? It is this problem of voluntary bodily
motion or the so-called problem of mind to body causation The crux of their concern was that in
order for one thing to cause motion in another, they must come into contact with one another.
Descartes claims that the question itself stems from the false presupposition that two substances
with completely different natures cannot act on each other.
A. External motions affect the peripheral ends of the nerve fibrils, which in turn displace the
central ends. As the central ends are displaced, the pattern of interfibrillar space is
rearranged and the flow of animal spirits is thereby directed into the appropriate nerves. It
was Descartes' articulation of this mechanism for automatic, differentiated reaction that led
to his generally being credited with the founding of reflex theory.
B. Descartes' most extensive account of causal mind/body interactionism and of the localization
of the soul's contact with the body in the pineal gland(which is between the two hemispheres
of the brain). As is well known, Descartes chose the pineal gland because it appeared to him
to be the only organ in the brain that was not bilaterally duplicated and because he believed,
erroneously, that it was uniquely human.