What is the Relationship Between and Meaning of 'Mind' and 'Body'?

[JackDaydream]

I have just read your essay and found it interesting because the issue of mind and body has often been seen as connected to the issue of 'God' although that has become less prominent.

Although arguments for the existence of God provoked the essay, the real thrust is the difficulties with predicating infinite attributes, to God or anything else.

It is true that attributing 'infinite attributes to God' or anything is complex. I was extremely surprised that an essay related to God ended up in the thread and I just took it as an unusual aspect to the thread discussion and I see the idea of God as more complicated than mind or body, in trying to grasp and understand the nature of reality metaphysically, especially in relation to scientific perspectives of the nature of reality.

[JackDaydream]

This what we call the body is formed by substance in a gravitational state. This substance is arranged by the intelligence/plan of DNA. The origin of life is the origin of the body and of DNA. The existence of virtual particles is accepted as true. If there are virtual particles it must be possible that there is a virtual substance. This substance is then categorized as metaphysical by many and interdimensional by others or both. If a picture is in the mind it must be a hologram made of virtual particles. The reality of this image exist within the reality of the body and therefore in a Universal x-dimensional coordinates sharing the x, y, z. Whether two systems share one point is mathematically possible. A difference of opinion is a formation of virtual particles. This arrangement might be shared or not. However, there is a cascade or a virtual recursive procedure that is dependent of the Universal substance and this explains why there are birds and why there are humans. It is this of a virtual image of a butterfly and of wings.
IMO. The origin of life is in a property of energy to arrange the fields and gate the virtual particles. Life on Earth is the recursive record since. This we call human virtue might be properties of the virtual particles or the realization of the ongoing human thought.

The basis of life in the code of DNA is extremely interesting as the basis for memory in all the structures of the body. One aspect which I have also read about is the idea of junk DNA. For a long time, it had been believed that the 2 active strands were the important ones and that the others were junk. I understand that is now disputed. What was seen as junk is now considered to represent aspects of the person, especially the nature of emotions and other parts of potential for the development of each person as a unique being.

[JackDaydream]

An infinitely extended body is as incoherent, as self-contradictory, as an unextended one. We are justified in denoting some X as a body only when we can discern, and specify, its limits. An infinitely extended elephant would be indistinguishable from a non-existent one.

Interesting. This seems to make sense ... until we consider that there is no rational/reasonable/logical reason to distinguish "some X" as being distinct within the universe. We have assumed, axiomatically, that the things we believe to be distinct and independent are, in actuality, distinct, independently-existing things.

Two things are distinct if we can distinguish between them, and, conversely, any two things we can distinguish are distinct, by definition. The world we perceive is the only world of which we can usefully speak. Any "actuality" which may exist beyond that is beyond our knowledge and therefore any speculation regarding its properties is vacuous and pointless.

Distinct adjective - clearly separate and different (from something else).

I don't speak of Objectivism/Objective Reality here, as your words seem to say. I only observe that there is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate, distinct or independent (of the rest of the universe).

It is interesting to consider where the objective and subjective aspects exist, starting and ending with the mind and body. Bodies are born from bodies and it could be asked where mind comes in here. It is believed that an important aspect in childhood development is the distinction which the child makes in realising separates from the mother. It is also important how people are socialised to see individual identity. This may be very different in a culture which values individualism. Even the sense of body may be viewed in different ways. Most people in Western society sees the body as belonging to oneself, with a freedom to make choices about it, whereas it may be that in some cultures the idea of one's own body is seen in a less individualistic sense, and the body is seen less in terms of personal expression of self and autonomous identity and freedom.

[Consul]

My quoted statement above is only true in context, i.e., with regard to what is required for a "being" to exist. There are many non-spatiotemporal existents (but they are not "beings").

I also think a definition of "existence," or "to exist," in order to be useful, must imply a criterion for existence. If there is no means of determining whether a claimed X exists, then the claim is vacuous. All terms, BTW, contrary to Kim, can be defined. If they could not then we could never learn to use them, or use them properly (meaning to communicate actionable information).

If we cannot find out whether X exists (because there is no possible way of getting evidence for, or gathering information about its existence), then the assertion or belief that X exists is unjustifiable; but the sentence "X exists" isn't thereby rendered meaningless.

Do you have an informative definition of "to exist"?

The concept of existence is used to select a subset of the set of my/our objects of thought, namely, the one whose members are something in and for themselves, and not just something in and for my/our thoughts. What doesn't exist is nothing more than something thought or imagined, whereas what exists is something more than something thought or imagined.

Foonote: Existing thoughts and mental images are themselves something in and for themselves, and something more than something thought or imagined, in the sense that they are what they are, no matter whether or not they are themselves objects of higher-order thoughts or imaginations.

As I said above, I agree. There are many non-spatiotemporal existents, e.g., universals. If were asked for a definition of "to exist," it would be something like, "Has some communicative utility." In other words, what exists is whatever we say exists, as long as what we say enables or facilitates some communicable experience. The real challenge is not defining "existence," but in classifying existents, so that one sort of existent is not equated or confused with another.

Sorts of existents are not to be confused with sorts of existence!

It's obviously circular to define "what exists" as "whatever we say exists."
Anyway, existence isn't determined by existence-beliefs/-claims: What is believed/claimed to exist needn't exist.

First of all, there is a distinction between multitudinal infinities, i.e. infinite numbers of things (including infinite sets/classes with infinitely many members), and magnitudinal infinities, i.e. infinite (extensive or intensive) quantities (physical or geometrical ones).

I'm not sure that distinction is meaningful. If the members of the multitude are separated by finite distances, then a magnitudinal infinity is automatically created. E.g., since we know stars are separated by finite distances, if the universe consists of infinitely many stars, then it has infinite extent (magnitude).

Yes, but the distinction between multitudes and magnitudes, and correspondingly between multitudinal infinities and magnitudinal ones is still meaningful.
Extent is a magnitude or quantity (quantitative property); but note that by "magnitude" I don't only mean "greatness of size or extent" in the geometrical sense, but all kinds of quantitative, i.e. measurable and numerically representable, properties such as density, heat, or mass.

[SteveKlinko]

The Physicalist view will prevent the understanding that there could be a Conscious Mind in Conscious Space, separate from, a Physical Mind (Brain) in Physical Space. This is simply because the Physicalist must always insist that the Conscious Mind IS the Physical Mind. To a Physicalist there could never be a Conscious Mind if there was no Physical Universe. The Physicalist view has been researched and studied for a Hundred years, but Science has Zero Explanation for how Conscious Experiences ARE the Brain. Emphasis on the Zero. Conscious Experiences do not even Seem like they could BE the Brain. It's the Neural Correlates of Conscious Experience that have fooled almost everyone, including the best Minds on the planet, into pursuing the Physicalist point of view. We need to start designing Modern Models for the old Dualism. Like it or not Dualism seems to be the most Coherent approach, given the absolute Categorical Differences between any Conscious Experience and any kind of Neural Activity. Conscious Experience refuses to be pushed back into the Neurons. The Experiences just seem to sort of float there in some unknown place outside of what the Neurons are doing. I call this unknown place Conscious Space.

Your approach to mind leads me to think about the systems understanding of mind, especially Gregory Bateson' s idea of the 'ecology of mind'. This idea was summarised by Mary Catherine Bateson. She says,
'Bateson argued that the ecology of mind is an ecology of pattern, information, and ideas that happen to be embodied in material things...Mind is not separate from its material base, and tradition dualisms separating mind from body or mind from matter are erroneous.'
In addition, the 'emphasis on mental systems as including more than single organisms leads Gregory to the insistence that the unit of survival is always organism and environment'.

Even though beings develop unique individual consciousness there are aspects of group mind. Also, the history of dualism resulted in the idea of 'the ghost in the machine' which was too simplistic in the way it saw the mind and body relationship because it almost views the body as a container. Mind permeates the body, and body itself may be the expression of mind. It may be about going beyond idealism and materialism, and the conflict between the two perspectives may be that both are too concrete and do not give enough scope for the subtle intricacies of material form and consciousness.

From my point of view the Physical Mind (Brain) is a Tool that is separate from the Conscious Mind which uses the Tool. This is close to the Ghost in the Machine concept on the surface, but in reality when you think a little Deeper about this, it is a very different concept. The Conscious Mind is Connected (Connectism) to the Physical Mind. The Physical Mind does not Embody the Conscious Mind. These two Minds are separate and different Phenomena. I think this is intuitively clear. All Physicalist efforts to push the Conscious Mind back into the Physical Mind ring Hollow to me and are really quite Incoherent. The fact that we don't know how the two Minds are Connected does not invalidate the point of view. At least it is more satisfying to me to think about these two Minds as separate and different than to try to squash them together into one thing. It is the duty of Science to pursue the Connectist approach in their study of the Conscious Mind.

I am interested by your approach. Most people seem to see the brain and mind as connected. The mind is a far wider reality than may be seen as the brain. Some see the nature of mind as almost solved by neuroscience. But, that may be simply about the wiring of the nervous system and the nervous system. So, I am interested by how you see mind and consciousness. Is it as something which is a far larger reality than can ever be pinpointed to the brain itself, as posited in reductive understanding of consciousness?

Yes, Science is only studying the Neural Correlates (Nervous System) of Conscious Experience. Science has no idea what Conscious Experience itself is. As far as Consciousness being a larger reality than the Brain, I think it could be, but I have no direct Experience that it is a larger reality. I deal with the Brain and Mind from a Systems Engineering and Signal Processing point of view. I see Neurons Firing and I see Conscious Experience happening, so I ask the obvious question: How does the Neural Activity produce the Conscious Experience? Since Science cannot show how the Neural Activity produces the Conscious Experience, I justifiably assume that the Neural Activity is not directly Producing the Conscious Experience. So from a Systems Engineering point of view, I necessarily must introduce a conversion stage of processing between the Neural Activity and the Conscious Experience which I call the Inter Mind. The Inter Mind, through some mechanism or process, Monitors what the Physical Mind (Brain) is doing and produces the Conscious Experience for the Conscious Mind. With this configuration, the Brain does not even know anything about what Conscious Experience is. The Brain is just an unconscious Mechanistic Processor in the Physical World. The Brain is not Conscious. The Conscious Mind connects to the Brain through processes in the Inter Mind to enable the Conscious Mind to Play inside the Physical Universe.

[JackDaydream]

Your approach to mind leads me to think about the systems understanding of mind, especially Gregory Bateson' s idea of the 'ecology of mind'. This idea was summarised by Mary Catherine Bateson. She says,
'Bateson argued that the ecology of mind is an ecology of pattern, information, and ideas that happen to be embodied in material things...Mind is not separate from its material base, and tradition dualisms separating mind from body or mind from matter are erroneous.'
In addition, the 'emphasis on mental systems as including more than single organisms leads Gregory to the insistence that the unit of survival is always organism and environment'.

Even though beings develop unique individual consciousness there are aspects of group mind. Also, the history of dualism resulted in the idea of 'the ghost in the machine' which was too simplistic in the way it saw the mind and body relationship because it almost views the body as a container. Mind permeates the body, and body itself may be the expression of mind. It may be about going beyond idealism and materialism, and the conflict between the two perspectives may be that both are too concrete and do not give enough scope for the subtle intricacies of material form and consciousness.

From my point of view the Physical Mind (Brain) is a Tool that is separate from the Conscious Mind which uses the Tool. This is close to the Ghost in the Machine concept on the surface, but in reality when you think a little Deeper about this, it is a very different concept. The Conscious Mind is Connected (Connectism) to the Physical Mind. The Physical Mind does not Embody the Conscious Mind. These two Minds are separate and different Phenomena. I think this is intuitively clear. All Physicalist efforts to push the Conscious Mind back into the Physical Mind ring Hollow to me and are really quite Incoherent. The fact that we don't know how the two Minds are Connected does not invalidate the point of view. At least it is more satisfying to me to think about these two Minds as separate and different than to try to squash them together into one thing. It is the duty of Science to pursue the Connectist approach in their study of the Conscious Mind.

I am interested by your approach. Most people seem to see the brain and mind as connected. The mind is a far wider reality than may be seen as the brain. Some see the nature of mind as almost solved by neuroscience. But, that may be simply about the wiring of the nervous system and the nervous system. So, I am interested by how you see mind and consciousness. Is it as something which is a far larger reality than can ever be pinpointed to the brain itself, as posited in reductive understanding of consciousness?

Yes, Science is only studying the Neural Correlates (Nervous System) of Conscious Experience. Science has no idea what Conscious Experience itself is. As far as Consciousness being a larger reality than the Brain, I think it could be, but I have no direct Experience that it is a larger reality. I deal with the Brain and Mind from a Systems Engineering and Signal Processing point of view. I see Neurons Firing and I see Conscious Experience happening, so I ask the obvious question: How does the Neural Activity produce the Conscious Experience? Since Science cannot show how the Neural Activity produces the Conscious Experience, I justifiably assume that the Neural Activity is not directly Producing the Conscious Experience. So from a Systems Engineering point of view, I necessarily must introduce a conversion stage of processing between the Neural Activity and the Conscious Experience which I call the Inter Mind. The Inter Mind, through some mechanism or process, Monitors what the Physical Mind (Brain) is doing and produces the Conscious Experience for the Conscious Mind. With this configuration, the Brain does not even know anything about what Conscious Experience is. The Brain is just an unconscious Mechanistic Processor in the Physical World. The Brain is not Conscious. The Conscious Mind connects to the Brain through processes in the Inter Mind to enable the Conscious Mind to Play inside the Physical Universe.

In some ways your idea of the intermind is similar to the idea of the subconscious, more in the way in which Carl Jung uses the term and how this was developed into the tradition of depth psychology. Part of the issue is about deep the mind goes because many psychologists and philosophers seem to see it as shallow, especially in relation to experience. It is as if people are like robots in the flat perspective of the mind and the full depths of subjective personhood gets glossed over or dismissed, especially in the deterministic way of seeing human beings.

The unique aspects of each person's conscious is experience is cast aside and, the potential for development of consciousness is not seen, especially when the material aspects of consciousness are ignored. I realise that you come from an engineering perspective in your critical analysis of science, but it may be that the arts have a lot to offer on metaphysics and consciousness as imagination and creativity may be an essential aspect of consciousness.

[Pattern-chaser]

I don't speak of Objectivism/Objective Reality here, as your words seem to say. I only observe that there is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate, distinct or independent (of the rest of the universe).

My comment addressed the necessary and sufficient conditions for two or more things being distinct. It didn't address whether they are independent, which is a different claim and not implied by the things being distinct.

No, we're not debating the meaning of "distinct". We started here:

An infinitely extended body is as incoherent, as self-contradictory, as an unextended one. We are justified in denoting some X as a body only when we can discern, and specify, its limits. An infinitely extended elephant would be indistinguishable from a non-existent one.

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

[Pattern-chaser]

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

N.B. The 'extension' I describe here owes nothing to hippy mysticism, fairies or magic. As an example, every 'body' attracts every other body, gravitationally, regardless of their physical locations within the body of the universe. These are real-world physics connections, although there may be other, more metaphysical, connections too.

[SteveKlinko]

From my point of view the Physical Mind (Brain) is a Tool that is separate from the Conscious Mind which uses the Tool. This is close to the Ghost in the Machine concept on the surface, but in reality when you think a little Deeper about this, it is a very different concept. The Conscious Mind is Connected (Connectism) to the Physical Mind. The Physical Mind does not Embody the Conscious Mind. These two Minds are separate and different Phenomena. I think this is intuitively clear. All Physicalist efforts to push the Conscious Mind back into the Physical Mind ring Hollow to me and are really quite Incoherent. The fact that we don't know how the two Minds are Connected does not invalidate the point of view. At least it is more satisfying to me to think about these two Minds as separate and different than to try to squash them together into one thing. It is the duty of Science to pursue the Connectist approach in their study of the Conscious Mind.

I am interested by your approach. Most people seem to see the brain and mind as connected. The mind is a far wider reality than may be seen as the brain. Some see the nature of mind as almost solved by neuroscience. But, that may be simply about the wiring of the nervous system and the nervous system. So, I am interested by how you see mind and consciousness. Is it as something which is a far larger reality than can ever be pinpointed to the brain itself, as posited in reductive understanding of consciousness?

Yes, Science is only studying the Neural Correlates (Nervous System) of Conscious Experience. Science has no idea what Conscious Experience itself is. As far as Consciousness being a larger reality than the Brain, I think it could be, but I have no direct Experience that it is a larger reality. I deal with the Brain and Mind from a Systems Engineering and Signal Processing point of view. I see Neurons Firing and I see Conscious Experience happening, so I ask the obvious question: How does the Neural Activity produce the Conscious Experience? Since Science cannot show how the Neural Activity produces the Conscious Experience, I justifiably assume that the Neural Activity is not directly Producing the Conscious Experience. So from a Systems Engineering point of view, I necessarily must introduce a conversion stage of processing between the Neural Activity and the Conscious Experience which I call the Inter Mind. The Inter Mind, through some mechanism or process, Monitors what the Physical Mind (Brain) is doing and produces the Conscious Experience for the Conscious Mind. With this configuration, the Brain does not even know anything about what Conscious Experience is. The Brain is just an unconscious Mechanistic Processor in the Physical World. The Brain is not Conscious. The Conscious Mind connects to the Brain through processes in the Inter Mind to enable the Conscious Mind to Play inside the Physical Universe.

In some ways your idea of the intermind is similar to the idea of the subconscious, more in the way in which Carl Jung uses the term and how this was developed into the tradition of depth psychology. Part of the issue is about deep the mind goes because many psychologists and philosophers seem to see it as shallow, especially in relation to experience. It is as if people are like robots in the flat perspective of the mind and the full depths of subjective personhood gets glossed over or dismissed, especially in the deterministic way of seeing human beings.

The unique aspects of each person's conscious is experience is cast aside and, the potential for development of consciousness is not seen, especially when the material aspects of consciousness are ignored. I realise that you come from an engineering perspective in your critical analysis of science, but it may be that the arts have a lot to offer on metaphysics and consciousness as imagination and creativity may be an essential aspect of consciousness.

I look at the Physical Mind (Brain) as the Sub Conscious Mind. Since I think the Brain is a Chemically and Electronically Mechanistic non Conscious entity, it makes sense that it is the Sub Conscious part of the Inter Mind Model.

[GE Morton]

I don't speak of Objectivism/Objective Reality here, as your words seem to say. I only observe that there is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate, distinct or independent (of the rest of the universe).

My comment addressed the necessary and sufficient conditions for two or more things being distinct. It didn't address whether they are independent, which is a different claim and not implied by the things being distinct.

No, we're not debating the meaning of "distinct". We started here:

An infinitely extended body is as incoherent, as self-contradictory, as an unextended one. We are justified in denoting some X as a body only when we can discern, and specify, its limits. An infinitely extended elephant would be indistinguishable from a non-existent one.

Yes, we started there. But then you said, "Interesting. This seems to make sense ... until we consider that there is no rational/reasonable/logical reason to distinguish 'some X' as being distinct within the universe. We have assumed, axiomatically, that the things we believe to be distinct and independent are, in actuality, distinct, independently-existing things."

So my response re: "distinct" was to that statement.

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

Really? Perhaps we have different notions of what constitutes a "body." I take the following to be paradigm bodies: My cat; the coffee cup in front of me; the Moon; the Eiffel Tower; a brick; Vladimir Putin. Clearly none of those are "extended to the boundaries of the universe," and if they were, we could not recognize them as my cat, the Moon, a brick, etc., and therefore not as "bodies." Perhaps you could set forth the conception you hold of what constitutes a "body" that would make your surprising claim true.

I don't speak of Objectivism/Objective Reality here, as your words seem to say. I only observe that there is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate, distinct or independent (of the rest of the universe)."

Well, those are three different properties, and the truth conditions for them are all different. I.e., things that are distinct need not be separate, and things that are separate need not be independent.

[GE Morton]

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

N.B. The 'extension' I describe here owes nothing to hippy mysticism, fairies or magic. As an example, every 'body' attracts every other body, gravitationally, regardless of their physical locations within the body of the universe. These are real-world physics connections, although there may be other, more metaphysical, connections too.

The connections one thing may have with another have nothing to do with the extensions of the two things.

[Pattern-chaser]

I don't speak of Objectivism/Objective Reality here, as your words seem to say. I only observe that there is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate, distinct or independent (of the rest of the universe).

Well, those are three different properties, and the truth conditions for them are all different. I.e., things that are distinct need not be separate, and things that are separate need not be independent.

Again, you choose to quibble about word-choice, rather than addressing the point. Your intended meanings here are quite clear, and so are mine.

My point is clear, and this is it:

There is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate/distinct/isolated/independent/un-extended.

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

Really? Perhaps we have different notions of what constitutes a "body." I take the following to be paradigm bodies: My cat; the coffee cup in front of me; the Moon; the Eiffel Tower; a brick; Vladimir Putin. Clearly none of those are "extended to the boundaries of the universe," and if they were, we could not recognize them as my cat, the Moon, a brick, etc., and therefore not as "bodies." Perhaps you could set forth the conception you hold of what constitutes a "body" that would make your surprising claim true.

The localised concentration of matter that you label "Vladimir Putin" is known to me. For what reason do you think that a localised concentration of matter is not connected ("extended") to the rest of the universe? I think if you examine your own assumptions - and they are the same as everyone else's; this is not a personal accusation - you will find that we assume the independence (or select your own favourite word) of things entirely without justification.

It is an empirically-verifiable fact that the internals of the universe are not homogenous. But what reason do we have for going further, and assuming that, because the universe is heterogeneous, it can be divided into 'parts' that are somehow separate [again, please choose your preferred word]?

You give as an example of a body the localised concentration of matter that we label "Vladimir Putin", and you appear to claim that it is bounded; not by the limits of the universe, but something much smaller. What is your justification for this assumption? After all, there is a continuous flow of matter and energy in both directions through the boundaries you place around this 'body'. This body exists within many electromagnetic fields which are not in any way disturbed or restricted by your boundaries. And so on.

You refer to my claim as "surprising", but I suggest it is your perspective that is surprising. I can see no evidence, and no chain of logical reasoning, that justifies your insistence that "Vladimir Putin" is in some sense bounded. Clearly you see some justification. Please tell me what it is. I.e. please justify your statement that

Clearly none of those are "extended to the boundaries of the universe,"

What is "clear" about this?

[Consul]

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

Really? Perhaps we have different notions of what constitutes a "body." I take the following to be paradigm bodies: My cat; the coffee cup in front of me; the Moon; the Eiffel Tower; a brick; Vladimir Putin. Clearly none of those are "extended to the boundaries of the universe," and if they were, we could not recognize them as my cat, the Moon, a brick, etc., and therefore not as "bodies." Perhaps you could set forth the conception you hold of what constitutes a "body" that would make your surprising claim true.

What a body is, and how many bodies there (really) are are two different questions.
Regarding fundamental ontology, one can be substance monist claiming that there (really) is only one body (extended material substance), viz. the physical world (cosmos/universe) as a whole. If this is true, then all other apparent bodies such as cats, coffee cups, bricks, statues, and planets, which are part of ordinary ("manifest-image") ontology, aren't really material substances at all, but nonsubstantial complexes of locally/regionally compresent material attributes inhering in the one world-substance as their (only) possessor and substratum.

Materialist substance monism holds an antisubstantialist "bundle theory" of all material substances (bodies) except for the one Weltkörper (world-body), whose spatial/spatiotemporal extension is either finite or infinite. Then cats, coffee cups, bricks, statues, and planets are nothing but bundles or clusters of physical properties inhering in certain spatial/spatiotemporal regions of the universal substance. And, for example, if such a property-bundle constitutes a cat, then the region or volume of space/spacetime in which it is present has the contour or shape of a cat.

[SteveKlinko]

People have been talking about Infinitely extended bodies on this thread. I don't think there are or can be Infinite things of any kind. You cannot even have infinite points on a line segment, which is something most people believe has got to be true. As soon as you would have Infinite points, then the distance between the points would have to be Zero and all the points on the line would collapse onto a single point. Infinite points on a line are actually an absurdity that cannot exist. All other concepts of the number of points approaching Infinity and the distance being differentially small never produce an actual Infinity of points on a line. This only approaches Infinity. Extending this we can say: An Infinite anything is an Absurdity.

[Pattern-chaser]

While it seems that an "infinitely" extended body is not a useful concept, it is the case, in practice, in the real world, that there is no reason at all, apart from offhand assumptions, to consider any 'body' as anything other than extensible, and actually extended out to the very boundaries of the universe itself. So I suggest that a 'universally-extended' (if we may call it that) body is not incoherent, but the actual truth, applying to any and all bodies.

Really? Perhaps we have different notions of what constitutes a "body." I take the following to be paradigm bodies: My cat; the coffee cup in front of me; the Moon; the Eiffel Tower; a brick; Vladimir Putin. Clearly none of those are "extended to the boundaries of the universe," and if they were, we could not recognize them as my cat, the Moon, a brick, etc., and therefore not as "bodies." Perhaps you could set forth the conception you hold of what constitutes a "body" that would make your surprising claim true.

Regarding fundamental ontology, one can be substance monist claiming that there (really) is only one body (extended material substance), viz. the physical world (cosmos/universe) as a whole. If this is true, then all other apparent bodies such as cats, coffee cups, bricks, statues, and planets, which are part of ordinary ("manifest-image") ontology, aren't really material substances at all, but nonsubstantial complexes of locally/regionally compresent material attributes inhering in the one world-substance as their (only) possessor and substratum.

Wow, that's a complicated collection of words. I seems that I am asking for a justification for anything that is not "substance monism":

My point is clear, and this is it:

There is no clear, rational and logical reason to assume that any subsidiary part of the universe is separate/distinct/isolated/independent/un-extended.