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Property Dualism does not imply the unintuitive theory of Epiphenomenalism

So, another term paper.. This was for the 'Philosophy of Mind' (PHIL 132) with Prof J. Searle. I Don't remember many details, but do remember arguing with him for over an hour against the requirement that I submit this paper to turnitin.com. He finally got tired and said to just email him the paper. Probably many things wrong, but this is part of me, I guess (6/13/22)


Property Dualism is one of the most prominent theories on philosophy of mind, which tries to reconcile some of the problems that substance dualism faces without the reductionist approach materialists have taken. While it is successful in preserving qualia of the mind, it has come under strong criticism especially in terms of the problem of interaction. One answer for this dilemma is epiphenomenalism which denies any causal relation from mind to the physical world. Epiphenomenalism itself is seen troublesome as it is counterintuitive to say that one’s thoughts have no causal relation to what they do as a conscious being. This however, is not the only solution in terms of interaction; some property dualists have argued for theories that allow causation from mind to body. Hence, while property dualism does not imply epiphenomenalism, it is seen by some as a more plausible explanation, yet with significant opposition.

Property dualism is a way to explain consciousness in accordance with the modern notion that the universe is made up explicitly from physical substance, matter and energy, while preserving the subjective nature of the mind. It differs from substance dualism in that property dualists deny the existence of a separate substance that is distinct from the material substance. However, they maintain that the consciousness is not reducible to physical substance due to its first person ontology, and thus oppose most materialist theories of mind. Consciousness is regarded as a property of the brain, which in turn is made up of purely physical substance. Hence, property dualists argue, that mind is caused entirely by the physics of the brain and neurobiology. 

One of the main problems with this theory, and dualism in general, is the causation of one from the other, or the interaction. When property dualism proposes that the mind is caused by the brain, inevitably, the next question would be “how or whether the mind dictates what the body does?” If the answer is that minds do not cause physical events, the mental becomes an epiphenomenon and is consequently named epiphenomenalism. This however does not imply that the only answer to the mind body problem (in terms of prperty dualism) is epiphenomenalism. One can look the other way, claiming that the mental properties do cause bodily behaviour. This, however, leads to the problem of over determination: a single bodily movement would have two distinct causes, a neurobiological cause, which is determined by physical brain processes, and a mental cause. However, some have taken the position of denying that over determination is a problem, pointing that there are other properties that subject to the same criteria. (A famous argument is the causation of baseball breaking the window as formulated by Mills. He argued that the fact the it was the third such window breaking that yeah simply has multiple causes, one relating to the ball hitting window and the physical phenomenon, and the other the fact that there have been two other similar incidents. Mills, 1996.)  The other problem with this view is that it is at odds with the idea that physical world is causally closed, hence inviting epiphenomenalism. Thus, if a property dualist needs to preserve non-overdetermination and accept that the physical world is causally closed, he or she will have to fall back to declaring mental events are causally inefficacious. Yet, this does not imply that property dualism inevitably leads to epiphenomenalism. 

When property dualism tries to preserve causal closure of the material world and take on the view of epiphenomenalism, it faces another fundamental problem: it is starkly different from common intuition. This view denies the common notion that my thinking to raise my arm had nothing to do with my hand going up that exact moment. As Ellen Langer theorized in her 1975 thesis, minds give us an “Illusion of Control”.  While this is the most troublesome fact about epiphenomenalism, at least a couple of other arguments also have questioned this view. One is that if nothing is caused by mental states, why would it have evolved naturally, or what is the reason of existence. In addition, epiphenomenalism is unsatisfactory in the sense that while it claims to preserve causal closure of the physical world, it contradictorily maintains that mental events are caused by brain events. These problems call for revisions for the theory, and will become trivial if one were to distance from the traditional nomenclature of mind versus body. 

Thus, even though property dualism seem to invite epiphenomenalism trying to adhere to the fact that physical world is causally closed, epiphenomenalism seems to bring about an “absurd” solution to the mind body problem with the claim that mental events are causally inert. In addition, it struggles to maintain the necessity of the mental states (evolutionally,) and fails to properly account for the causal closure of the physical world. However, these problems could be avoided if one were to approve causation of physical events through mental events. While this brings another set of problems, it nevertheless provides a variation of property dualism that does not inherently imply epiphenomenalism.


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