Control variables and mental causation

Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 110 (1pt1):15-30 (2010)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

I introduce the notion of a ‘control variable’ which gives us a way of seeing how mental causation could be an unproblematic case of causation in general, rather than being some sui generis form of causation. Psychological variables may be the control variables for a system for which there are no physical control variables, even in a deterministic physical world. That explains how there can be psychological causation without physical causation, even in a deterministic physical world.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

The nonreductivist’s troubles with mental causation.Jaegwon Kim - 1992 - In John Heil & Alfred R. Mele (eds.), Mental Causation. Oxford University Press.
Mental causation as multiple causation.Thomas Kroedel - 2008 - Philosophical Studies 139 (1):125-143.
Mental causation in a physical world.Eric Marcus - 2005 - Philosophical Studies 122 (1):27-50.
The Experience of Mental Causation.Jakob Hohwy - 2004 - Behavior and Philosophy 32 (2):377 - 400.
Mental causation without downward causation.John Gibbons - 2006 - Philosophical Review 115 (1):79-103.
Causation is macroscopic but not irreducible.David Papineau - 2013 - In Sophie C. Gibb & Rögnvaldur Ingthorsson (eds.), Mental Causation and Ontology. Oxford University Press. pp. 126.

Analytics

Added to PP
2010-04-25

Downloads
144 (#120,268)

6 months
7 (#176,166)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

J. Campbell
Georgia Southern University

Citations of this work

Interventionism and Causal Exclusion.James Woodward - 2015 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 91 (2):303-347.
High-Level Explanation and the Interventionist’s ‘Variables Problem’.L. R. Franklin-Hall - 2016 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 67 (2):553-577.
Halfway Proportionality.Bram Vaassen - 2022 - Philosophical Studies (9):1-21.

View all 27 citations / Add more citations

References found in this work

Causality: Models, Reasoning and Inference.Judea Pearl - 2000 - New York: Cambridge University Press.
Review of Woodward, Making Things Happen. [REVIEW]Michael Strevens - 2007 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 74 (1):233-249.

View all 6 references / Add more references