The Metaphysics of Constitutive Mechanistic Phenomena

ABSTRACT The central aim of this article is to specify the ontological nature of constitutive mechanistic phenomena. After identifying three criteria of adequacy that any plausible approach to constitutive mechanistic phenomena must satisfy, we present four different suggestions, found in the mechanistic literature, of what mechanistic phenomena might be. We argue that none of these suggestions meets the criteria of adequacy. According to our analysis, constitutive mechanistic phenomena are best understood as what we will call ‘object-involving occurrents’. Furthermore, on the basis of this notion, we will clarify what distinguishes constitutive mechanistic explanations from etiological ones. _1_ Introduction _2_ Criteria of Adequacy _2.1_ Descriptive adequacy _2.2_ Constitutive–etiological distinction _2.3_ Constitution _3_ The Ontological Nature of Constitutive Mechanistic Phenomena _3.1_ Phenomena as input–output relations _3.2_ Phenomena as end states _3.3_ Phenomena as dispositions _3.4_ Phenomena as behaviours _4_ Phenomena as Object-Involving Occurrents _4.1_ What object-involving occurrents are and why we need them _4.2_ The object in the phenomenon _4.3_ The adequacy of option _5_ Conclusion