more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
Maybe physical effects of mental causes are always overdetermined by distinct causes (the 'belt and braces' view). Defenders say the two are still counterfactually dependent - but that would raise the question of why, if they are ontologically distinct.
Gist of Idea
Maybe mind and body do overdetermine acts, but are linked (for some reason)
Source
David Papineau (Thinking about Consciousness [2002], 1.5)
Book Ref
Papineau,David: 'Thinking about Consciousness' [OUP 2004], p.27
A Reaction
[He cites D.H. Mellor as defending 'belt and braces'] This strikes me as the sort of theory that arises from desperation: traditional dualism won't work, but we MUST keep mind separate, so that we can have free will, and save morality. All very confused!
| 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] |