Mental properties
American Philosophical Quarterly 40 (3):175-196 (2003)
| Abstract | It is becoming increasingly clear that the deepest problems currently exercising philosophers of mind arise from an ill-begotten ontology, in particular, a mistaken ontology of properties. After going through some preliminaries, we identify three doctrines at the heart of this mistaken ontology: (P) For each distinct predicate, “F”, there exists one, and only one, property, F, such that, if “F” is applicable to an object a, then “F” is applicable in virtue of a’s being F. (U) Properties are universals, not particulars. (D) Every property is either categorical or dispositional, but not both. We show how these doctrines influence current philosophical thinking about the mind, suggest and defend an alternative conception of properties, and indicate how this conception provides answers to two puzzles besetting contemporary philosophy of mind: the problem of mental causation and the problem of qualia. | |||||||||
| Keywords | Mental Property Metaphysics Ontology Qualia | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,709 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesJames John (2010). Against Qualia Theory. Philosophical Studies 147 (3).
Danilo Suster (2001). Semifactuals and Epiphenomenalism. Acta Analytica 16 (26):23-43.
Robert Francescotti (2001). Property Dualism Without Substance Dualism? Philosophical Papers 30 (2):93-116.
Sophie Gibb (2006). Why Davidson is Not a Property Epiphenomenalist. International Journal of Philosophical Studies 14 (3):407 – 422.
S. C. Gibb (2004). The Problem of Mental Causation and the Nature of Properties. Australasian Journal of Philosophy 82 (3):464-75.
Paul Noordhof (1997). Making the Change: The Functionalist's Way. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 48 (2):233-50.
David Robb (1997). The Properties of Mental Causation. Philosophical Quarterly 47 (187):178-94.
Anthony B. Dardis (2002). A No Causal Rivalry Solution to the Problem of Mental Causation. Acta Analytica 17 (28):69-77.
David Robb & John Heil, Mental Causation. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
David Robb (forthcoming). The Identity Theory as a Solution to the Exclusion Problem. In S. C. Gibb, E. J. Lowe & Valdi Ingthorsson (eds.), Mental Causation and Ontology. Oxford University Press.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads120 ( #4,237 of 549,662 )Recent downloads (6 months)3 ( #25,807 of 549,662 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
