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Full Idea
If a mental property is realised by a material property, then it looks as though its material realiser pre-empts any causal contribution on the part of the realised mental property.
Gist of Idea
If minds are realised materially, it looks as if the material laws will pre-empt any causal role for mind
Source
John Heil (Philosophy of Mind [1998], Ch.6)
Book Ref
Heil,John: 'Philosophy of Mind' [Routledge 1998], p.198
A Reaction
This has a beautiful simplicity about it. I can see how some very odd phenomena might suddenly appear out of a physical combination, but not how entirely new causal laws can be created.
| 4862 | Can the pineal gland be moved more slowly or quickly by the mind than by animal spirits? [Spinoza on Descartes] |
| 5606 | Freedom and natural necessity do not contradict, as they relate to different conditions [Kant] |
| 2622 | Can one movement have a mental and physical cause? [Ryle] |
| 2318 | Agency, knowledge, reason, memory, psychology all need mental causes [Kim, by PG] |
| 3392 | Mind is only interesting if it has causal powers [Kim] |
| 3396 | Experiment requires mental causation [Kim] |
| 3397 | Beliefs cause other beliefs [Kim] |
| 4887 | We try to cause other things to occur by causing mental events to occur [Perry] |
| 7864 | Maybe mind and body do overdetermine acts, but are linked (for some reason) [Papineau] |
| 6120 | Causation depends on intrinsic properties [Mellor/Crane] |
| 5346 | In the 17th century a collisionlike view of causation made mental causation implausible [Flanagan] |
| 4618 | If minds are realised materially, it looks as if the material laws will pre-empt any causal role for mind [Heil] |