Mental causation in a physical world

Author: Marcus Eric

Source: Philosophical Studies, Volume 122, Number 1, January 2005 , pp. 27-50(24)

Publisher: Springer

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Abstract:

It is generally accepted that the most serious threat to the possibility of mental causation is posed by the causal self-sufficiency of physical causal processes. I argue, however, that this feature of the world, which I articulate in principle I call Completeness, in fact poses no genuine threat to mental causation. Some find Completeness threatening to mental causation because they confuse it with a stronger principle, which I call Closure. Others do not simply conflate Completeness and Closure, but hold that Completeness, together with certain plausible assumptions, entails Closure. I refute the most fully worked-out version of such an argument. Finally, some find Completeness all by itself threatening to mental causation. I argue that one will only find Completeness threatening if one operates with a philosophically distorted conception of mental causation. I thereby defend what I call naïve realism about mental causation.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11098-005-2204-x

Affiliations: 1: Department of Philosophy, Auburn University, 6090 Haley Center, 36849, Auburn, AL, USA, Email: eric_marcus@yahoo.com

Publication date: 2005-01-01