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Alin C. Cucu [10]Alin Christoph Cucu [2]
  1. How Dualists Should (Not) Respond to the Objection from Energy Conservation.Alin C. Cucu & J. Brian Pitts - 2019 - Mind and Matter 17 (1):95-121.
    The principle of energy conservation is widely taken to be a se- rious difficulty for interactionist dualism (whether property or sub- stance). Interactionists often have therefore tried to make it satisfy energy conservation. This paper examines several such attempts, especially including E. J. Lowe’s varying constants proposal, show- ing how they all miss their goal due to lack of engagement with the physico-mathematical roots of energy conservation physics: the first Noether theorem (that symmetries imply conservation laws), its converse (that conservation (...)
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  2. Interacting Minds in the Physical World.Alin C. Cucu - 2022 - Dissertation, University of Lausanne
    Mental causation, idea that it is us – via our minds – who cause bodily actions is as commonsensical as it is indispensable for our understanding of ourselves as rational agents. Somewhat less uncontroversial, but nonetheless widespread (at least among ordinary people) is the idea that the mind is non-physical, following the intuition that what is physical can neither act nor think nor judge morally. Taken together, and cast into a metaphysical thesis, the two intuitions yield interactive dualism: the view (...)
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  3. Does Consciousness-Collapse Quantum Mechanics Facilitate Dualistic Mental Causation?Alin C. Cucu - forthcoming - Journal of Cognitive Science.
    One of the most serious challenges (if not the most serious challenge) for interactive psycho-physical dualism (henceforth interactive dualism or ID) is the so-called ‘interaction problem’. It has two facets, one of which this article focuses on, namely the apparent tension between interactions of non-physical minds in the physical world and physical laws of nature. One family of approaches to alleviate or even dissolve this tension is based on a collapse solution (‘consciousness collapse/CC) of the measurement problem in quantum mechanics (...)
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  4. Turning the Tables: How Neuroscience Supports Interactive Dualism.Alin C. Cucu - 2023 - Mind and Matter 21 (2):219-239.
    Physicalists typically believe that neurophysiology has refuted the thesis that non-physical minds can interact with the brain. In this paper, I argue that it is precisely a closer look at the neurophysiology of volitional actions that suggests otherwise. I start with a clarification of how the present inquiry relates to the main argument for physicalism, and how the most common alternative views relate to the findings of my study. I then give a brief overview of the neurophysiological research about volitional (...)
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  5. There Is No Interaction Problem.Alin C. Cucu - manuscript
    The interaction problem – the problem of how mind and body interact – is typically taken to be the most severe problem for mind-body dualism. There are different types of interaction problems: the heterogeneity problem, the problem of the non-spatiality of the mind, the objection from conservation laws and the pairing problem. I review the responses to all of them and find that none of these so-called problems stand scrutiny. Recently, Derek Shiller has presented an intensified version of the pairing (...)
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  6.  57
    The Many Inadequate Justifications of the Causal Closure Principle.Alin C. Cucu - manuscript
    The principle of the causal closure of the physical world (CCP) is a main rationale for physicalism. This article examines whether the justifications given for this principle are successful. I start by specifying the principle as claiming that every physical effect has a necessary and sufficient physical cause, thereby ruling out mental causes as well as causal overdetermination. I then proceed to the first justification, the argument from basic forces. It inductively extrapolates from our knowledge of known physical (conservative) forces (...)
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  7. Turning the Tables: How Neuroscience Supports Interactive Dualism.Alin C. Cucu - 2023 - Mind and Matter 21 (2):219-239.
    Physicalists typically believe that neurophysiology has refuted the thesis that non-physical minds can interact with the brain. In this paper, I argue that it is precisely a closer look at the neurophysiology of volitional actions that suggests otherwise. I start with a clarification of how the present inquiry relates to the main argument for physicalism, and how the most common alternative views relate to the findings of my study. I then give a brief overview of the neurophysiological research about volitional (...)
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  8. Why the Incarnation Is Incompatible With An Atemporal Concept of God.Alin C. Cucu - manuscript
    In this essay, I argue that the Incarnation of the Son of God, understood in a traditionally orthodox way, is incompatible with an atemporalist concept of God. First, I explain what I mean by atemporalism, namely the idea that God exists outside time. I also show the main corollaries of that doctrine, most notably that all of God’s life occurs eternally simultaneously. Second, based on New Testament teaching and widely accepted creeds, I spell out philosophically what I mean by the (...)
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  9. Debunking The Hellenistic Myth: Why Christians Should Believe That God Is In Time.Alin C. Cucu - 2017 - Piate Pietro 2 (2):16-22.
    In this essay I will try to convince you: (1) that the question of God’s relation to time is of practical relevance for every believer (2) that the idea of God being outside time is a philosophically untenable concept which creates major clashes with Christian doctrine and therefore that every Christian should adopt some temporalist view of God To do that, I will present four arguments against the “outside time” view of God. I then briefly treat the question where the (...)
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  10. Henry P. Stapp. Quantum Theory and Free Will: How Mental Intentions Translate into Bodily Actions.Alin Christoph Cucu - 2020 - Philosophia Christi 22 (1):175-179.
  11.  22
    More Substance, Please: A Reply To Michael Esfeld’s Minimalist Ontology of Persons.Alin Christoph Cucu - 2023 - Eidos. A Journal for Philosophy of Culture 7 (3):48-66.
    Michael Esfeld has recently put forth his ontology of persons, with which he hopes to secure freedom and irreducible personhood as well as scientific realism, all by working with minimal ontological assumptions. I present his view and investigate it, finding it too minimalistic: Esfeld’s featureless matter points do not warrant an emergence of persons from matter, and his claim that persons can create themselves by adopting a normative attitude seems more like a just-so story. Also, Esfeld’s rejection of classical mind-body (...)
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  12.  36
    The Mind-Body Problem and Metaphysics. [REVIEW]Alin C. Cucu - 2024 - Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 10 (4).