A term used to conceptualize the relationship of mental and physical properties within a physicalist perspective, without necessarily reducing mental properties to physical ones. Typically, a supervenience relation is understood to hold if one set of properties (the mental) are understood to depend on another set of properties (the physical), and any change of property at one level entails a change at the other level. An extensive philosophical literature surrounds supervenience, with considerable debate over whether supervenience relations allow for mental causation and whether they support non-reductionist interpretations of mind-brain relations.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsAuthor information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this entry
Cite this entry
Peterson, G. (2013). Supervenience. In: Runehov, A.L.C., Oviedo, L. (eds) Encyclopedia of Sciences and Religions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8265-8_200179
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8265-8_200179
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-8264-1
Online ISBN: 978-1-4020-8265-8
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law