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In exploring the issue of whether I side with Descartes or Dickinson, intuitively I wish to side with Descartes.  I believe much of my sentiment in his support stems from my training to study 'harder' sciences that seem to give way to a 'proven' truth through repeated testing and examination.

In trying to justify my decision, I've thought that perhaps my conclusion is only appealing to me because Descartes opens up neural studies to a more intelligible understanding by others wishing to explore studies of the brain and behavior.  I define intelligibility here as the ability of information to be communicated clearly from one person to another.  Inherent in my definition is a subjective determination of what is 'intelligible' for one may not be the same as another.  In that case, I further define intelligibility as the communicability of information for all reasonable people, those wishing to employ reason and rational thought in their pursuit of knowledge.  In other words, I think Descartes understanding of the nervous system makes the system most easily understood by the most number of people (assuming they are all rational), and because of this fact, it therefore seems 'more true' or 'less wrong' as Dr. Grobstein would probably prefer me to say.  For instance, by separating psyche into a physical (brain) and abstract (behavior) portions, Descartes transforms the murky object of psyche into something more open to analysis. 

Dickinson's understand, albeit elegant, I would argue is less accessible to rational inquiry.  Dickinson says, and I think I quote Dr. Grobstein here, "brain=behavior."  When one views the psyche this way,  I think it becomes a spaghetti mess of abstract and physical concepts.  If one wants to 'dissect' the psyche, given this assumption, it soon becomes very difficult, given a 'cultural' foundation to use physics and math to then understand this mess.  It seems that one would inevitably break this mind-body mess into distinct parts, and study those individually, to understand it as a whole.  Right?

Does this mean that all analysis of the psyche using Descartes' assumption is therefore more accurate than using Dickinson's?  Of course not.  I believe, on faith and feeling alone, that many artists and poets (Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, etc.) have 'figured out' how the brain-behavior combination works better than modern science has, or maybe ever will.  However, if one makes a living by pursuing rational inquiry (as a scientists), then he or she would probably favor an assumption about the psyche that allows the most number of observations and tests possible.  Yes?

Moreover, what does it say about us, as a culture, or perhaps innately as human beings, that we 'need' to break things down into smaller pieces to come to any 'certain' or 'less wrong' understanding of anything?  Does this mean science must be inherently conservative rather than ambitious in its claims?  I would argue, from my experience, yes.