The Mind-Body Problem and Sexuality

For thousands of years no one has come up with a cohesive explanation for the interaction between the physical person and their mind. In philosophy this conundrum is called the mind-body problem.

Though some have said the mind-body problem is a pseudo dilemma, the way one answers it can have significant implications regarding morality and ethics. This is because each proposed idea makes slightly different claims as to what consciousness is. In return, the definition of a person gets altered, which changes the obligations and responsibilities we have to one another. Extrapolating this out, moral conclusions will vastly differ if followed with a cohesive logic.

I don't bring this up to get into the weeds of each philosophical solution, but to point out that, if the mind-body problem exists, a subject-object problem does too. And it's around sexuality that the subject-object problem seems to show itself with the most intensity.

Just like the highest mountain peaks owe their formation to tectonic shifts, sexuality cannot be unhinged from addressing the most fundamental questions about consciousness. And without coming up with explanations to the mind-body problem that align with the subject-object problem (and vice versa), the morality and ideas we propose regarding sexuality will ultimately be unintelligible.

Despite the complexity and impossibility of knowing all this completely, trying to grasp it seems crucial.