scholarly journals Multiple Realizability from a Causal Perspective

2020 ◽  
Vol 87 (4) ◽  
pp. 640-662 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren N. Ross
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability

Criticism of D.B Volkov’s Teleofunctional Solution to the Problem of Mental Causation

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 116-135
Author(s):  
Anton V. Kuznetsov
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Mental Causation ◽  
Physical Factors ◽  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Causal Relevance ◽  
Relational Properties ◽  
Local Properties ◽  
Non Local ◽  
Mental Properties ◽  
First Editions

The articles examines the teleofunctional solution to the problem of mental causation, presented by Dmitry Volkov in his recently published book Free Will. An Illusion or an Opportunity. D.B. Volkov proposes solutions to three big metaphysical problems – mental causation, personal identity, and free will. Solving the first problem, Volkov creatively combines the advantages of Dennett’s teleofunctional model and Vasilyev’s local interactionism. Volkov’s teleofunctional model of mental causation seeks to prove the causal relevance of mental properties as non-local higher order properties. In my view, its substantiation is based on three points: (a) critics of the exclusion problem and Kim’s model of mental causation, (b) “Library of first editions” argument, (c) reduction of the causal trajectories argument (CTA 1) by Vasilyev to the counterpart argument (CTA 2) by Volkov. Each of these points faces objections. Kim’s criticism is based on an implicit confusion of two types of reduction – reduction from supervenience and from multiple realizability. The latter type does not threaten Kim’s ideas, but Volkov uses this very type in his criticism. The “Library of first editions” argument does not achieve its goal due to compositional features and because non-local relational properties are a type of external properties that cannot be causally relevant. The reduction of CTA 1 to CTA 2 is unsuccessful since, in the case of this reduction, important features of CTA 1 are lost – these are local mental properties, due to which the influence of non-local physical factors occurs. My main objection is that the concept of causally relevant non-local properties is incompatible with the very concept of cause. The set of causally relevant properties of cause can only be local.

Ungrounded Dispositions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer McKitrick
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Scientific Explanations ◽  
Mechanistic Explanations

Some dispositions have causal bases or grounding properties. However, ungrounded dispositions do not have causal bases. Ungrounded dispositions are also known as powers, baseless dispositions, and bare dispositions. Ungrounded dispositions are not supplanted by mechanistic explanations, for even mechanistic explanations ultimately reference dispositions. While some argue that citing dispositions does not really explain anything, dispositions can in fact figure in adequate explanations. Furthermore, scientific explanations reference dispositions with no known grounds. This lends some support for the view that ungrounded dispositions are metaphysically possible. Philosophical arguments based on multiple realizability or the demand for truth-makers fail to show that ungrounded dispositions are impossible.

A Liberal Conception of Multiple Realizability

2006 ◽  
Vol 132 (3) ◽  
pp. 467-494 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Funkhouser
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Liberal Conception

Mechanistic Functionalism

2020 ◽  
pp. 89-106
Author(s):  
Gualtiero Piccinini
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Special Sciences ◽  
Functional Mechanisms ◽  
Relevant Level

The first three chapters introduced mechanisms, including functional mechanisms—that is, mechanisms that have teleological functions. This chapter introduces a mechanistic version of functionalism. Functionalism is the view that the nature of something is functional. Mechanistic functionalism embeds this claim in the functions of mechanisms and their components. Mechanistic functions are inseparable from the structures that perform them at the relevant level of organization. Weak (mechanistic) functionalism entails multiple realizability; strong (mechanistic) functionalism entails medium independence. Thus, even if medium independence is closely related to computation, (mechanistic) functionalism about cognition does not entail that cognition is computational. In addition, (mechanistic) functionalism entails neither traditional anti-reductionism nor the autonomy of the special sciences.

The Metaphysics of Mind and the Multiple Sources of Multiple Realizability

2014 ◽  
pp. 125-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gualtiero Piccinini ◽  
Corey J. Maley
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Multiple Sources ◽  
Metaphysics Of Mind

The Multiple Realizability of Biological Individuals

2013 ◽  
Vol 110 (8) ◽  
pp. 413-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Clarke ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability

Multiple Realizability as Compatible with the Mental Constraint Thesis

2011 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-127
Author(s):  
Mark Bauer ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Realizability

scholarly journals Is Multiple Realizability a Valid Argument against Methodological Individualism?

2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Branko Mitrović
Keyword(s):  
Methodological Individualism ◽  
Valid Argument ◽  
Multiple Realizability ◽  
Social Entities ◽  
Number Of Authors

In recent decades, a number of authors have relied on the multiple realizability argument to reject methodological individualism. In this article, I argue that this strategy results in serious difficulties and makes it impossible to identify social entities and phenomena.

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