AG: I describe myself as a commonsensible naturalist because I am committed, to borrow the words of William Hasker, to “a naturalism that makes a serious effort to accommodate, or at least make sense of, our ordinary confictions about the mind and its operations—things we think we all ‘know’ about the mind, when we are not doing philosophy.” So I cordially invite the reader to read my A Metaphysical Naturalist Manifesto, my inaugural blog of 21 July 2007 on the Securlar Outpost for a general statement of my philosophy.
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VR: OK, I am linking to it here. So being very commonsensible about the mind, I thoroughly reject epiphenomenalism and the physical closure principle, according to which mental states or events are not causally efficacious. I adhere to the idea of interactionist property dualism, understood to disallow substance dualism, and thus hold that there are mental states of (some) living organisms (such as humans) and that these entities are irreducibly distinct from any accompanying physiological states.
Oddly, Edward Feser (approvingly quoted by Victor Reppert) appears to hold that beliefs, and other intentional states (e.g., intentions, purposings, etc.), are not mental states. He boldly and erroneously refers to them as physical states of the brain. In my opinion, beliefs and other intentional states have par excellence a better claim to be irreducibly mental than simple qualia.
VR: Actually, in these passages Feser is talking about types of property dualism which attempt to hold on to the causal closure of the physical. These are common in the literature (Chalmers, McGinn, etc). So the title of my post was misleading. Property dualism without causal closure is a different kettle of fish.
AG: Victor Reppert, in his reply to stunney’s excellent comment, rather lamely claims that “[o]ne of the main reasons for being a property dualist and not a substance dualist is that this will permit you to hold on to the causal closure of the physical.” However, being the commonsensible naturalist that I am, interactionist property dualism (which appears to be the belief of stunney) rightly rejects the dogma of the causal closure of the physical. No—the reason that I am an interactionist property dualist is: (1) interactionism (including the causal efficacy of mental states or events) is so evidently true and is a fundamental properly basic belief; and (2) the evidence overwhelmingly shows it as more probable than not that mental activity cannot exist without the substratum of an appropriately configured brain. Reppert is reduced to alleging that rejection of the causal closure principle means that “you are in effect a substance dualist.” This can be justly labeled as Reppert’s ipse dixit, or (if you prefer) his idée fixé. He owes us an explanation and justification of this implausible contention.
VR: Substance dualists need not deny the fact that mental states need brain states. There are types of substance dualism other that Cartesian dualism. In my presentations of the argument from reason I argue first for an explanatory dualism and then try to figure out what makes the best sense of explanatory dualism. In other words, my first goal is to argue that in order for reason to be possible, reasons-explanations have to be basic explanations. Then we go from there.
I think Hasker would not only accept, but insist upon, the cliam that mental activity cannot exist without the substratum of an appropriately configured brain.
The reason I think that once you deny causal closure you have “gone over” to substance dualism is that you are admitting non-physical causes, and that means there have to be non-physical substances that have those causal powers. Something is “breaking in” to the physical realm.
AG: Now, although I am an interactionist property dualist, I am quite willing to agree that a substance dualist has an equal claim to consider himself as a commonsensible naturalist provided that he maintains that the posited spiritual substance depends for its existence upon the appropriately configured physical organism. Accordingly, William Hasker’s emergent self is a kind of substance dualism which a naturalist could plausibly embrace were it purged of its theistic aspects, i.e., the doctrine that the emergent self survives the death of its parent organism due to miraculous intervention.
VR: Hasker himself, as a Christian, thinks that God can, and will, preserve us into eternity. I wouldn’t call that part of this theory of mind, however.
Of course you can avoid theism and accept Hasker’s position in the philosophy of mind. There are other “mentalistic” world-views other than theism. A good example comes from C. S. Lewis. Lewis accepted the anti-naturalism arguments of Owen Barfield and became, not a theist, but an Absolute Idealist.
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A RESPONSE TO REPPERT’S REPLY CONCERNING PROPERTY DUALISM
Victor Reppert commendably acknowledges that “[p]roperty dualism without causal closure is a different kettle of fish” compared with “types of property dualism which attempt to hold on to the causal closure of the physical”—and thus he clarifies his initial blog "Against property dualism" (21 August 2007) in which he fails to distinguish the two radically different kinds of property dualism. But a fair reading of "Against property dualism" is that Reppert appears to be talking about property dualism in general instead of explicitly targeting a specific school of property dualism—a practice similar to someone explicitly criticizing traditionally conservative Christian theology in general when he is actually targeting directing, say, Calvinism, for criticism.
Reppert rightly observes that “[s]ubstance dualists need not deny the fact that mental states need brain states.” He tellingly makes this point in response to the second prong of my explanation of why I am an interactionist property dualist; in which I say: “the evidence overwhelmingly shows it as more probable than not that mental activity cannot exist without the substratum of an appropriately configured brain.” Of course, what I should have done was to have immediately added something like: “and that such activity can and does exist in the ordinary course of nature in the absence of a spiritual substance associated with the organism in question.” So I am grateful to Reppert for calling attention to my slip. I now turn to other matters.
In commenting on a follow-up blog by Reppert, I referred to his contention “that rejection of the causal closure principle means that ‘you are in effect a substance dualist.’” I noted that Reppert “owes us an explanation and justification of this implausible contention.” In his reply blog, Reppert provides his explanation as follows: “The reason I think that once you deny causal closure you have ‘gone over’ to substance dualism is that you are admitting non-physical causes, and that means there have to be non-physical substances that have those causal powers. Something is ‘breaking in’ to the physical realm.” Reppert contends in substance that the denial of the physical causal closure principle entails the existence of non-physical causes. But what does “non-physical causes” mean? The interactionist property dualist is simply referring to non-physical states of appropriately configured physical substances—it being understood that the physical substances in question are causal agents. But what Reppert appears to hold is that it is metaphysically impossible for any physical substance to have non-physical (i.e., mental) phenomenal and intentional states. Reppert’s contention appears to be rooted in some unstated notion that non-physical causes means non-physical (causal) agents. Well, although sometimes one can be vaguely right and thus not precisely wrong, it is another thing to be ambiguously imprecise in one’s terminology.
But if Reppert is content with holding that the denial of the physical causal closure principle entails the existence of non-physical substances (i.e., spiritual beings) with the requisite causal powers, then I do not see why he fails to also insist that both the physical causal closure principle and that of the irreducibility of mental states (whether phenomenal or intentional) entail the existence of non-physical substances. Because, per hypothesis, non-reductive, non-interactionist property dualism means that (to paraphrase Reppert) “admitting non-physical [effects] … means there have to be non-physical substances that have these causal [liabilities].”
Reppert evidently thinks that interactionist property dualism is crypto-substance dualism since “[s]omething is ‘breaking in’ to the physical realm” given that the physical causal closure principle is false. Here again ambiguity serves as Reppert’s ally for what does something mean? The term may, in some contexts, simply refer to a mental state or event, such as having an intention to act in a particular way. "Something" also could mean a substance or substantive entity. And the latter is surely Reppert’s meaning.
In his blog "A Clarifying Passage from Feser" (25 August 2007), Reppert provides us with a quotation from Edward Fesser’s Philosophy of Mind, a Beginner’s Guide (One World, 2006), p. 16, in which the author declares: “[P]roperty dualism raises a puzzle of its own, namely that of explaining exactly how non-physical properties an [sic!] inhere in a physical substance.” This demand is quite challenging; and it suggests a complementary demand that the substance dualist explain exactly how a human organism (qua physical substance) is united with a spiritual substance such as to constitute on human person—or, in the alternative how the human soul animates the human organism. In any event, the challenge need not be particularly troubling for an interactionist property dualist (whether naturalist or theist). The human organism essentially has physical properties in order to be pro tanto a physical substance. But in order for the human organism to essentially have a human mind all that is required is that the human organism (qua physical substance) also have mental properties.
It is not all that difficult. Suppose John accidently touches a flame. He is burned and experiences pain. The phenomenal content of pain is irreducibly mental. The interactionist property dualist would say that the particular pain is a mental state of the relevant part of the man qua physical substance. However, the substance dualist must engage in “explaining exactly” how it is that what happens to the John’s human body (a physical substance) when he touches the flame causes John’s human soul (a spiritual substance) to have the particular mental state of experiencing pain.
Similar considerations apply to the case where John, experiencing strong hunger pains, decides to eat a meal as soon as he returns home from an errand.
A more extended discussion is called for in talking about the power to understand propositional speech and to reason (or the power to acquire the power to reason). Very briefly, it is clearly the case that the human brain must be configured in a particular way in order for a human to have even the power to acquire the power to reason or to understand propositional speech. However, for Reppert and company, having a brain characteristic of the normal, thriving adult human so very different from that of the normal, thriving adult parrot is insufficient to adequately explain why the adult unlike the parrot understands propositional speech which he hears or utters.
Of course, talking about these matters brings us to Reppert’s Dangerous Idea. But I have said enough to show that interactionist property dualism does not entail substance dualism, whether overt or occult. And, prescinding for the time being from issues pertaining to the rational powers of humans, the principle of parsimony serves to establish that the fact that humans and other animals have mental properties is best explained by affirming that such properties are those of the organism qua physical substance.
Fortunately, as a commonsensible naturalist, I am spared the need to affirm the existence of spiritual beings as being necessary to explain the causal efficacy or liability of mental states of physical substances. However, I acknowledge that a commonsensible naturalist could coherently hold (what I think is the less probable opinion) that at least some mental properties cannot be instantiated in the absence of a spiritual substratum which, however, can exist only during the time that the associated organism is appropriately configured. On the other hand,might not a commonsensible supernaturalist hold that God’s omnipotence encompasses the power to create a world in which the existence of some physical substances (sans associated spiritual substance)with causally efficacious mental states obtains in the ordinary course of nature? If so, the causal efficacy of mental states of certain physical substances fails to provide the ground for a special argument for God’s existence. Nevertheless, a Christian theist might quite plausibly maintain, assuming for argument's sake his theological presuppositions, that it is supernaturally revealed that every human person is a spiritual substance or, alternatively that his personhood obtains by virtue of the integral union of a physical and spiritual substance.
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