Physicalism and Mental Causation

<p>This book presents a range of essays on the conceptual foundations of physicalism mental causation and human agency. Physicalism—the thesis that everything there is in the world including human<br />minds is constituted by basic physical entities—has dominated the philosophy of<br />mind during the last few decades. Yet there is no generally accepted definition for<br />most of the core notions of physicalism including fundamental notions such as<br />‘causation’ ‘determination’ ‘realization’ or even ‘physicalism’ itself. This lack of<br />an unanimous conceptual foundation for the physicalist agenda impedes the<br />solution of more specific problems in the philosophy of mind for instance problems<br />pertaining to mental causation and human agency.<br />—<br />—<br />As of yet a comprehensive philosophical reflection on various key concepts and<br />how they relate to the more specific problems physicalism attempts to solve is still<br />missing. This book presents a range of essays written by established and<br />leading authors in the field on the conceptual foundations of physicalism and<br />its interconnections with philosophical problems concerning mental causation<br />and human agency.</p>