Part-Whole Physicalism and Mental Causation

Author: Ehring D.

Source: Synthese, Volume 136, Number 3, September 2003 , pp. 359-388(30)

Publisher: Springer

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Abstract:

A well-known ``overdetermination'' argument aims to show that the possibility of mental causes of physical events in a causally closed physical world and the possibility of causally relevant mental properties are both problematic. In the first part of this paper, I extend an identity reply that has been given to the first problem to a property-instance account of causal relata. In the second, I argue that mental types are composed of physical types and, as a consequence, both mental and physical types may be causally relevant with respect to the same physical effect, contrary to the overdetermination argument. In further sections, I argue that mental types have causal powers, consider some objections and reject an alternative version of part-whole physicalism. Throughout I assume that causal relata are tropes and property types are classes of tropes.

Language: English

Document Type: Research article

Affiliations: 1: Philosophy Department Southern Methodist University Dallas, TX 75275 U.S.A.

Publication date: 2003-09-01