A mechanism that realizes strong emergence

The causal efficacy of a material system is usually thought to be produced by the law-like actions and interactions of its constituents. Here, a specific system is constructed and explained that produces a cause that cannot be understood in this way, but instead has novel and autonomous efficacy. The construction establishes a proof-of-feasibility of strong emergence. The system works by utilizing randomness in a targeted and cyclical way, and by relying on sustained evolution by natural selection. It is not vulnerable to standard arguments against strong emergence, in particular ones that assume that the physical realm is causally closed. Moreover, it does not suffer from epiphenomenalism or causal overdetermination. The system uses only standard material components and processes, and is fully consistent with naturalism. It is discussed whether the emergent cause can still be viewed as ‘material’ in the way that term is commonly understood.

Principles and Persons

This book is a collection of essays, most of which appear here for the first time, that were written in honour of the legendary moral philosopher, Derek Parfit. The essays are mainly concerned with issues that Parfit addressed in his book, Reasons and Persons. They include the relevance of personal identity to ethics, the rationality of different attitudes to time, the nature of well-being, the varieties of consequentialism, reasons for action, aggregation in ethics, causal overdetermination, egalitarianism, prioritarianism, and supererogation.

Two schemas for metaphysical emergence

Wilson presents the problem of higher-level causation (Kim 1989, 1993, 1998), according to which metaphysical emergence gives rise to problematic causal overdetermination. She argues that there are two and only two strategies of response to this problem of making sense of metaphysical emergence. One strategy provides a schematic basis for ‘Weak’ (physically acceptable) emergence; core and crucial here is that a macro-entity or feature has a proper subset of the powers of its base-level configuration. The other strategy provides a schematic basis for ‘Strong’ (physically unacceptable) emergence; core and crucial here is that a macro-entity or feature has a new power as compared to its base-level configuration. Wilson shows that a range of seemingly diverse accounts of metaphysical emergence are plausibly seen as satisfying the conditions in one or the other schema, and thus are more unified than they appear.

The Proportionality Argument and the Problem of Widespread Causal Overdetermination

The consensus is that repeatable artworks cannot be identified with particular material individuals. A perennial temptation is to identify them with types, broadly construed. Such identification, however, faces the so-called “Creation Problem.” This problem stems from the fact that, on the one hand, it seems reasonable to accept the claims that (1) repeatable artworks are types, (2) types cannot be created, and (3) repeatable artworks are created, but, on the other hand, these claims are mutually inconsistent. A possible solution to the Creation Problem is to argue that claim (2) can be rejected because (a) the only motivation for it is that a type, being abstract, cannot stand in causal relations, but (b) this motivation is ungrounded, since types can, in fact, stand in such relations. Clearly, in order for this solution to be successful, it is necessary to substantiate the possibility of types to be causally efficacious. In this essay, I examine an attempt to do this with the help of Yablo’s principle of proportionality, which has been undertaken by Walters (2013) and, more recently, Juvshik (2018). Although the argument they advance may seem to provide strong support for the causal efficacy of types, I think it actually fails to do this. To explain why this is so, I first show that this argument commits us to the existence of widespread causal overdetermination involving types and then argue that this commitment is both epistemically and ontologically problematic.

Alternative Possibilities and Causal Overdetermination

This paper argues against dismissing the Principle of Alternative Possibilities merely on the ground of so-called Frankfurt-style cases. Its main claims are that the interpretation of such cases depends on which substantive theory of responsibility one endorses and that Frankfurt-style cases all involve some form of causal overdetermination which can be interpreted either as being compatible with the potentially manipulated agent’s ability to act otherwise or as a responsibility undermining constraint. The paper also argues that the possibility of such scenarios can support the truth of classical compatibilism as much as the truth of semicompatibilism.