Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-22dnz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T11:46:05.826Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Correlation Argument for Reductionism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Christopher Clarke
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Reductionists say things like all mental properties are physical properties; all normative properties are natural properties. I argue that the only way to resist reductionism is to deny that causation is difference making (thus making the epistemology of causation a mystery) or to deny that properties are individuated by their causal powers (thus making properties a mystery); that is to say, unless one is happy to deny supervenience or to trivialize the debate over reductionism. To show this, I argue that if properties are individuated by their causal powers, then, surprisingly, properties are individuated by necessary coexemplification.

Type
Articles
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 86 , Issue 1 , January 2019 , pp. 76 - 97
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

Thank you Adrian Boutel, Christopher Cowie, Hugh Mellor, and Mark Pindar for your comments on an ancestor of this manuscript; and also to several anonymous referees for your generous and constructive suggestions. This work has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreement 715530).

References

Antony, Louise M. 1999. “Multiple Realizability, Projectability, and the Reality of Mental Properties.” Philosophical Topics 26:1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Antony, Louise M. 2008. “Multiple-Realization: Keeping It Real.” In Being Reduced: New Essays on Reduction, Explanation and Causation, ed. Hohwy, Jakob and Kallestrup, Jesper, 164–75. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Armstrong, David M. 1978. A Theory of Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Audi, Paul. 2013. “How to Rule Out Disjunctive Properties.” Noûs 47:748–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bacon, John. 1986. “Supervenience, Necessary Coextensions, and Reducibility.” Philosophical Studies 49:163–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baker, Lynne Rudder. 1993. “Metaphysics and Mental Causation.” In Mental Causation, ed. Heil, John and Mele, Alfred R., 75–96. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Baker, Lynne Rudder. 2007. The Metaphysics of Everyday Life: An Essay in Practical Realism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, Karen. 2003. “Why the Exclusion Problem Seems Intractable and How, Just Maybe, to Tract It.” Noûs 37:471–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Block, Ned. 1997. “Anti-reductionism Slaps Back.” Philosophical Perspectives 11:107–32.Google Scholar
Chalmers, David J. 1996. The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Clapp, Lenny. 2001. “Disjunctive Properties: Multiple Realizations.” Journal of Philosophy 98:111–36.Google Scholar
Clarke, Christopher. 2016. “The Explanatory Virtue of Abstracting Away from Idiosyncratic and Messy Detail.” Philosophical Studies 173:1429–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clarke, Christopher. 2017. “How to Define Levels of Explanation and Evaluate Their Indispensability.” Synthese 194:2211–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collins, John, Hall, Ned, and Paul, L. A., eds. 2004. Causation and Counterfactuals. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crane, Tim, and Mellor, D. H. 1990. “There Is No Question of Physicalism.” Mind 99:185–206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fine, Kit. 1994. “Essence and Modality.” Philosophical Perspectives 8:1–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fodor, Jerry. 1974. “Special Sciences (or the Disunity of Science as a Working Hypothesis).” Synthese 28:97–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fodor, Jerry. 1987. Psychosemantics: The Problem of Meaning in the Philosophy of Mind. Cambridge, MA: Bradford/MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fodor, Jerry. 1997. “Special Sciences: Still Autonomous after All These Years.” Philosophical Perspectives 11:149–63.Google Scholar
Galles, D., and Pearl, Judea. 1998. “An Axiomatic Characterization of Causal Counterfactuals.” Foundations of Science 3:151–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halpern, Joseph Y., and Hitchcock, Christopher. 2015. “Graded Causation and Defaults.” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 66:413–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halpern, Joseph Y., and Pearl, Judea. 2005. “Causes and Explanations: A Structural-Model Approach. Part I: Causes.” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 56:843–87.Google Scholar
Haug, Matthew C. 2011a. “Abstraction and Explanatory Relevance; or, Why Do the Special Sciences Exist?” Philosophy of Science 78:1143–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haug, Matthew C. 2011b. “Natural Properties and the Special Sciences.” Monist 94:244–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heil, John. 2003. “Levels of Reality.” Ratio 16:205–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heil, John, and Robb, David. 2003. “Mental Properties.” American Philosophical Quarterly 40:175–96.Google Scholar
Horgan, Terence E. 1989. “Mental Quausation.” Philosophical Perspectives 3:47–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horgan, Terence E. 1997. “Kim on Mental Causation and Causal Exclusion.” Philosophical Perspectives 11:165–84.Google Scholar
Hüttemann, Andreas. 2004. What’s Wrong with Microphysicalism? London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, Frank. 2002. “Review: From Reduction to Type-Type Identity.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 65:644–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jaworski, William. 2002. “Multiple-Realizability, Explanation and the Disjunctive Move.” Philosophical Studies 108:289–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jenkins, C. S., and Nolan, Daniel. 2012. “Disposition Impossible.” Noûs 46 (4): 732–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jaegwon. 1984. “Concepts of Supervenience.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 45:153–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jaegwon. 1992. “Multiple Realization and the Metaphysics of Reduction.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 52:1–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jaegwon. 1993. “Supervenience as a Philosophical Concept.” In Supervenience and Mind, 131–60. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jaegwon. 1998. Mind in a Physical World. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Le Pore, Ernest, and Loewer, Barry. 1987. “Mind Matters.” Journal of Philosophy 84:630–42.Google Scholar
Lewis, David K. 1966. “An Argument for the Identity Theory.” Journal of Philosophy 63:17–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, David K. 1983. “New Work for a Theory of Universals.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 61:343–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, David K. 1986. “Causal Explanation.” In Philosophical Papers, vol. 2, 214–40. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, David K. 1994. “Reduction of Mind.” In A Companion to Philosophy of Mind, ed. Guttenplan, Samuel, 412–31. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
List, Christian, and Menzies, Peter. 2009. “Non-reductive Physicalism and the Limits of the Exclusion Principle.” Journal of Philosophy 106:475–502.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Macdonald, Cynthia, and Macdonald, Graham. 2006. “The Metaphysics of Mental Causation.” Journal of Philosophy 103:539–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Macdonald, Graham. 1992. “Reduction and Evolutionary Biology.” In Reduction, Explanation and Realism, ed. Charles, David and Lennon, Kathleen, 69–96. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Marras, Ausonio. 1993. “Psychophysical Supervenience and Nonreductive Materialism.” Synthese 95:275–304.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McLaughlin, Brian P. 2007. “Type Materialism for Phenomenal Consciousness.” In The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness, ed. Velmans, M. and Schneider, S., 431–44. London: Blackwell.Google Scholar
McLaughlin, Brian P. 2009. Review of Physical Realization, by Sydney Shoemaker. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2009 (7).Google Scholar
Mellor, D. H. 1982. “The Reduction of Society.” Philosophy 57:51–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mellor, D. H. 2008. “Micro-Composition.” Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement 83:65–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ney, Alyssa. 2008. “Defining Physicalism.” Philosophy Compass 3:1033–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nolan, Daniel. 2014. “Hyperintensional Metaphysics.” Philosophical Studies 171:149–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nute, Donald. 1980. Topics in Conditional Logic. Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nute, Donald, and Cross, C. B. 2002. “Conditional Logic.” In Handbook of Philosophical Logic, Vol. 4, rev. 2nd ed., ed. Don M. Gabbay and F. Guenthner, 1–98. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Papineau, David. 2001. “The Rise of Physicalism.” In Physicalism and Its Discontents, ed. Gillett, Carl and Loewer, Barry, 3–36. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pereboom, Derk, and Kornblith, Hilary. 1991. “The Metaphysics of Irreducibility.” Philosophical Studies 63:125–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pettit, Philip. 1993. The Common Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Polger, Thomas. 2008. “Two Confusions Concerning Multiple Realization.” Philosophy of Science 75:537–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenberg, Alex. 2006. Darwinian Reductionism. Chicago: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruben, David-Hillel. 1984. “Social Properties and Their Basis.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 85:23–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sawyer, R. Keith. 2002. “Nonreductive Individualism: Part I—Supervenience and Wild Disjunction.” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 32:537–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shapiro, Lawrence A. 2000. “Multiple Realizations.” Journal of Philosophy 97:635–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shoemaker, Sydney. 1980. “Causality and Properties.” In Time and Cause: Essays Presented to Richard Taylor, ed. Inwagen, P. van, 109–35. Dordrecht: Reidel.Google Scholar
Shoemaker, Sydney. 2001. “Realization and Mental Causation.” In Physicalism and Its Discontents, ed. Gillett, Carl and Loewer, Barry, 74–98. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shoemaker, Sydney. 2007. Physical Realization. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smart, J. J. C. 1959. “Sensations and Brain Processes.” Philosophical Review 68:141–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Streumer, Bart. 2008. “Are There Irreducibly Normative Properties?” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 86 (4): 537–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Swoyer, Chris. 1982. “The Nature of Natural Laws.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 60:203–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williamson, Timothy. 2007. The Philosophy of Philosophy. Oxford: Blackwell.CrossRefGoogle Scholar