Minds, Causes and Mechanisms A Case Against Physicalism

by Corbí; , Josep E.; Prades, Josep L.

• ISBN13: 9780631218012
• ISBN10: 0631218017
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-02-21
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Summary

Minds, Causes, and Mechanisms questions the internal consistency of causal physicalism, and vindicates a novel approach to mental causation.Through a series of original and detailed arguments, it is made clear that many difficulties in the physicalist picture derive from an implausible view about causality. An alternative approach is defended which shows how mental contents, as opposed to functional properties, may be causally efficacious without having an implementing mechanism.This volume includes a lucid discussion of recent developments by philosophers such as Block, Davidson, Fodor, Kim, Lewis, Mellor, Putnam, Schiffer, Shoemaker, and Yablo. No one who wants to deal with the issue of mental causation, or causation in general, will be able to ignore the strong case against physicalism that this book makes.

Author Biography

Josep E. Corbi was born in Monover, Spain in 1957. He has been a lecturer at the University of Valencia since 1980, and has published several papers on the philosophy of mind and epistemology.

Josep L. Prades was born in Valencia, Spain in 1954. He taught philosophy at the University of Murcia and is presently a lecturer at the University of Girona. He has published several studies of Wittgenstein's philosophy and papers on the philosophy of mind and epistemology.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	ix
Introduction	xi
Physicalism and the Mental: The Dominant View	1	(38)
The Dominant View in the Debate on Mental Causation	4	(12)
The Causal Closure of the Physical World and Explanatory Exclusion	16	(5)
Strong Supervenience	21	(3)
Narrowness and Minimality	24	(11)
Narrowness and Mental Causation	35	(4)
An Initial Tension: Narrowness and Multiple Realization	39	(19)
Multiple Realization	40	(5)
A Critique of Fodor's Notion of Narrow Content	45	(6)
Functional Properties and Narrowness: Some Initial Remarks	51	(7)
Dispositions, Minimality, and Intrinsic Causal Powers	58	(51)
Twin-Substitutivity and Narrow Correlates	59	(2)
Multiple Realization and Minimality	61	(6)
Realizing Contexts and Sets of Circumstances	67	(6)
Dispositions and Meta-Dispositions	73	(5)
Basic Causal Functions: Conditional vs. Unconditional Dispositions	78	(10)
Normality Conditions and Causal Dispositions	88	(4)
Dispositions and Intrinsic Bases	92	(8)
Supervenience Constraints	100	(9)
Ceteris Paribus Laws and the Autonomy of Nonbasic Properties	109	(26)
The Dominant View: A First Approach to Ceteris Paribus Laws	111	(3)
A Preliminary Doubt	114	(6)
The Fork Problem	120	(8)
An Alternative Approach to Ceteris Paribus Laws	128	(7)
Strict Laws, Causes, and Background Conditions	135	(58)
Causal Relata: Davidson's Theory of Causation	137	(7)
Complete Causes and Causal Explanation	144	(7)
Strict Laws and Causal Counterfactuals	151	(8)
Overdetermination and the Individuation of Causes	159	(8)
An Overall Antireductionist Argument	167	(11)
Background Conditions, Normality, and Interference	178	(7)
The Objectivity of Causal Facts and the Absolute Conception of Reality	185	(8)
Mental Causation	193	(40)
Physical Closure, Overdetermination, and Mental Causation	195	(7)
Implementing Mechanisms and Mental Causation	202	(10)
Tracking the World	212	(15)
The Externalism of the Mental	227	(6)
Notes	233	(19)
References	252	(8)
Index	260