Pairing Problems: Causal and Christological

• Main Author: Wong Kevin W.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Sciendo 2021-06-01
• Series: Perichoresis: The Theological Journal of Emanuel University
• Subjects: christological anthropology; christology; embodiment; mind-body dualism; physicalism
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.2478/perc-2021-0013

Trenton Merricks has objected to dualist conceptions of the Incarnation in a similar way to Jaegwon Kim’s pairing problem. On the original pairing problem, so argues Kim, we lack a pairing relationship between bodies and souls such that body A is causally paired with soul A and not soul B. Merricks, on the other hand, argues that whatever relations dualists propose that do pair bodies and souls together (e.g. causal relations) are relations that God the Son has with all bodies whatsoever via his divine attributes (e.g. God the Son could cause motion in any and all bodies via his omnipotence). So if we count these relations as sufficient for embodiment, then dualism implies that God the Son is embodied in all bodies whatsoever. I shall argue that while the original pairing problem might be easily answerable, the Christological pairing problem is not and that dualists must shift some of their focus from the defense of the soul’s existence to explicating the nature of the mind-body relationship.