Physical Determinability

• Main Author: Sophie C. Gibb
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Associazione Culturale Humana.Mente 2015-12-01
• Series: Humana.Mente: Journal of Philosophical Studies
• Subjects: the causal completeness principle; conservation laws; the powers theory of causation
• Online Access: http://www.humanamente.eu/index.php/HM/article/view/68

I defend a dualist model of psychophysical causal relevance, according to which mental events are not causes in the physical domain, but are causally relevant in this domain because they enable — or, in other words, provide the appropriate structure for — physical events to be caused. More specifically, I defend the claim that mental events are ‘double preventers’ within the physical domain, where double preventers are a type of enabling event. The distinction that I make between causes and enabling events and the dualist model of psychophysical causal relevance that I defend has emerged from my acceptance of the powers theory of causation. In this paper, I explore how this dualist model of psychophysical causal relevance offers a response to Papineau’s defence of the causal completeness principle via the conservation laws.