Aristotle initiated the systematic investigation of perception, the emotions, memory, desire, and action, developing his own account of these phenomena and their interconnection. My aim is to gain a philosophical understanding of his views and to examine how far they withstand critical scrutiny. Aristotle’s approach calls into question the way in which our, post-Cartesian, mind–body problem is set up. He was guided throughout by a conception of both the psychological and the material that was rejected by those who originally formulated and subsequently sought to address our problem. His views challenge basic aspects of today’s conventional thinking about psycho-physical phenomena and their place in a material world. They offer the resources to dissolve, rather than solve, the mind–body problem we have inherited.