Abstract
Epiphenomenalism has had a long historical tradition. It is the view that mental properties are causally inert with respect to the physical world. In this paper, I argue that this tradition faces enormous challenges and needs better arguments to defend its position, and to demonstrate this, I interrogate the (mostly contemporary) strands including computationalism, the idea of the illusion of conscious will, and causal exclusionism.
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Notes
Descartes (1989), p. 4.
Ibid, p. 12.
Huxley 2015 (1874), 215–216.
From “responses” You can substitute with a quotation from fifth meditation.
Descartes, Passions of the Soul, Ch 1.1, 350–360.
Huxley 2015 (1874), 220.
Ibid, 222.
Ibid, 223.
Ibid, 228–9.
Ibid.
Ibid, 241.
Ibid, 244.
Jackson (1990), p. 469.
Ibid, 474.
Jackson (1990), p. 474.
Jackson (1990), p. 474.
Campbell (1984), pp. 48, 135.
Ibid, p. 48.
Ibid, pp. 48–9.
Preston and Astbury (1937): 77.
Ibid, p. 475.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Jackson (1996), p. 391.
Ibid, p. 390.
Ibid, pp. 391–2.
Block (1990).
Ibid, p. 140.
Ibid, p. 138.
Ibid, p. 145.
Ibid.
Ibid, p. 146.
Ibid, p. 153.
Ibid.
Ibid, p. 154.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid, p. 155.
Ibid, pp. 155–6.
Yablo (1992), p. 246.
Kim (1998), p. 38.
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Ani, E.I. Interrogating the Epiphenomenalist Tradition. J. Indian Counc. Philos. Res. 33, 481–501 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40961-016-0065-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40961-016-0065-7