Reviving Psychophysical Supervenience Essay -- Argumentative Persuasiv

Reviving Psychophysical Supervenience ABSTRACT: Many philosophers have lost their enthusiasm for the concept of supervenience in the philosophy of mind. This is largely due to the fact that, as Jaegwon Kim has shown, familiar versions of supervenience describe relations of mere property covariation without capturing the idea of dependence. Since the dependence of the mental on the physical is a necessary requirement for even the weakest version of physicalism, it would seem that existing forms of supervenience cannot achieve that for which they were designed. My aim is to revive the concept of supervenience. I argue that if we construe supervenience along Davidsonian lines — as a relation connecting predicates rather than properties — then it avoids the shortcomings of the more familiar varieties. When it first appeared on the scene in the philosophy of mind, the concept of supervenience was warmly embraced. Supervenience was thought to capture the idea of dependence without reduction and thus promised to provide a useful framework for discussions of mental causation, phenomenal experience, and, more generally, the relation between the mental and the physical. Since then a great deal has changed. Much careful work has been done to show that philosophical applications of supervenience do not, in fact, achieve what they were thought to. For example, Jaegwon Kim, whose name is closely associated with the concept, has shown convincingly that the standard formulations of supervenience in the philosophy of mind (weak, strong, and global) do not capture the idea of psychophysical dependence. (1) Many philosophers believed that supervenience could express a form of physicalism, but since the concept of dependence is a minimal req... ...dson, ‘Thinking Causes’, in Mental Causation, ed. John Heil and Alfred Mele (Oxford, Clarendon Press: 1993) p. 13. (4) Donald Davidson, "Mental Events," in Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980) p. 214 (emphasis added). (5) Davidson, "Radical Interpretation," in Davidson, Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984) p. 137. (6) Donald Davidson, ‘Mental Events’, op. cit., p. 214. (7) For example, see Simon Evnine, Donald Davidson (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991) pp. 69-70. (8) Davidson, "Mental Events," op. cit., p. 214. (9) For example see, Terence Horgan, "From Supervenience to Superdupervenience: Meeting the Demands of a Material World," Mind 102 (1993) pp. 554-586; Thomas Grimes, "Supervenience, Determination, and Dependency," Philosophical Studies 62 (1991) pp. 81-92. Reviving Psychophysical Supervenience Essay -- Argumentative Persuasiv Reviving Psychophysical Supervenience ABSTRACT: Many philosophers have lost their enthusiasm for the concept of supervenience in the philosophy of mind. This is largely due to the fact that, as Jaegwon Kim has shown, familiar versions of supervenience describe relations of mere property covariation without capturing the idea of dependence. Since the dependence of the mental on the physical is a necessary requirement for even the weakest version of physicalism, it would seem that existing forms of supervenience cannot achieve that for which they were designed. My aim is to revive the concept of supervenience. I argue that if we construe supervenience along Davidsonian lines — as a relation connecting predicates rather than properties — then it avoids the shortcomings of the more familiar varieties. When it first appeared on the scene in the philosophy of mind, the concept of supervenience was warmly embraced. Supervenience was thought to capture the idea of dependence without reduction and thus promised to provide a useful framework for discussions of mental causation, phenomenal experience, and, more generally, the relation between the mental and the physical. Since then a great deal has changed. Much careful work has been done to show that philosophical applications of supervenience do not, in fact, achieve what they were thought to. For example, Jaegwon Kim, whose name is closely associated with the concept, has shown convincingly that the standard formulations of supervenience in the philosophy of mind (weak, strong, and global) do not capture the idea of psychophysical dependence. (1) Many philosophers believed that supervenience could express a form of physicalism, but since the concept of dependence is a minimal req... ...dson, ‘Thinking Causes’, in Mental Causation, ed. John Heil and Alfred Mele (Oxford, Clarendon Press: 1993) p. 13. (4) Donald Davidson, "Mental Events," in Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980) p. 214 (emphasis added). (5) Davidson, "Radical Interpretation," in Davidson, Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984) p. 137. (6) Donald Davidson, ‘Mental Events’, op. cit., p. 214. (7) For example, see Simon Evnine, Donald Davidson (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991) pp. 69-70. (8) Davidson, "Mental Events," op. cit., p. 214. (9) For example see, Terence Horgan, "From Supervenience to Superdupervenience: Meeting the Demands of a Material World," Mind 102 (1993) pp. 554-586; Thomas Grimes, "Supervenience, Determination, and Dependency," Philosophical Studies 62 (1991) pp. 81-92.