Cartesian dualism and disabled phenomenology. Issue 2 (2nd April 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Abrams, Thomas
• Is Part Of: Scandinavian journal of disability research. Volume 18:Issue 2(2016)
• Page Start: 118
• Page End: 128
• Publication Date: 2016-04-02
• Subjects: Cartesian dualism -- Heidegger -- phenomenology -- subjectivity; People with disabilities -- Research -- Periodicals; Disabled Persons -- periodicals; Rehabilitation -- periodicals; Prostheses and Implants -- periodicals; 362.4
• DOI: 10.1080/15017419.2014.995219
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1501-7419

Abstract

ABSTRACT: In this paper, I critically examine phenomenological disability studies' critique of so-called 'Cartesian Dualism'. I argue that it is not a metaphysical divide between mental and extended substance that disability studies must overcome, but rather a more fundamental understanding of world understood only in terms of substance, what Martin Heidegger calls the 'ontology of objective presence'. This view of 'the world' passes over being-in-the-world and the problem of meaning. After outlining phenomenological disability studies' objection to Descartes' legacy, I critically contrast the mind–body problem with the substance problem, suggesting the latter is crucial, and the former derivative. I conclude by discussing the contours of a disabled phenomenology: one that takes physical and mental difference as the basis for a theoretical project, rather than another site for phenomenological investigation.