Events, Causation, and Parallelism

Dissertation, The University of Iowa (1986)
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Abstract

The problem to be addressed in this dissertation concerns the coherence of a view in the philosophy of mind called psychophysical parallelism. There is much to commend this view as, among its competitors, closest to being true. In fact, in this essay little or nothing will be said to defend the claim that parallelism has the greatest likelihood of being the true view; that it surpasses its competition will be a starting point rather than a conclusion. This is not to say that as currently articulated the theory is without fault. The purpose of the first chapter is to discuss some of these problems. By doing so I shall establish the pattern for the rest of the work, in which an attempt will be made to rearticulate the view taking into consideration the existing difficulties. ;In subsequent chapters, I shall attempt to repair the deficiences of psychophysical parallelism as presently formulated. Chapter II addresses the concept of event and offers reasons for reifying events. Chapter III considers two current theories of events, the Particularist Theory of Myles Brand and the Property Theory of Jaegwon Kim. Exegesis of the main themes of both theories if followed by criticism of each. Terence Horgan's views on events are offered in addition as a way of introducing a theory of events that more closely than the others seems to accommodate the truth. Chapters IV, V, and VI constitute the body of this dissertation. Chapter IV is a short discourse on causation. In this chapter I defend a notion of physical causal necessity. In Chapter V, I articulate a version of a Property Theory of Events that harmonizes with this view of causation. The last chapter answers objections to the idea of a strict psychophysical coexistence law. Beyond this the concept of a person is introduced as a way of meeting commonsense demands for mental efficacy in the physical world.

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