interactionist dualism
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Interactionism or interactionist dualism is the theory in the philosophy of mind which holds that matter and mind are two distinct and independent substances that exert causal effects on one another. It is one type of
dualism Dualism most commonly refers to: * Mind–body dualism, a philosophical view which holds that mental phenomena are, at least in certain respects, not physical phenomena, or that the mind and the body are distinct and separable from one another ** ...
, traditionally a type of
substance dualism Substance may refer to: * Matter, anything that has mass and takes up space Chemistry * Chemical substance, a material with a definite chemical composition * Drug substance ** Substance abuse, drug-related healthcare and social policy diagnosis o ...
though more recently also sometimes a form of
property dualism Property dualism describes a category of positions in the philosophy of mind which hold that, although the world is composed of just one kind of substance— the physical kind—there exist two distinct kinds of properties: physical properties ...
. Many philosophers and scientists have responded to this theory with arguments both supporting and opposing its relevance to life and whether the theory corresponds to reality.


Proponents


René Descartes

Interactionism was propounded by the French rationalist philosopher René Descartes (1596–1650), and continues to be associated with him. Descartes posited that the body, being physical matter, was characterized by spatial extension but not by thought and feeling, while the mind, being a separate substance, had no spatial extension but could think and feel. Nevertheless, he maintained that the two interacted with one another, suggesting that this interaction occurred in the
pineal gland The pineal gland, conarium, or epiphysis cerebri, is a small endocrine gland in the brain of most vertebrates. The pineal gland produces melatonin, a serotonin-derived hormone which modulates sleep, sleep patterns in both circadian rhythm, circ ...
of the brain.


Development of interactionism

In the 20th century, its most significant defenders have been the noted philosopher of science
Karl Popper Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian-British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the cl ...
and the neurophysiologist John Carew Eccles. Popper in fact divided reality into three "worlds"—the physical, the mental, and objective knowledge (outside the mind)—all of which interact, and Eccles adopted this same "trialist" form of interactionism. Other notable recent philosophers to take an interactionist stance have been Richard Swinburne, John Foster, David Hodgson, and Wilfrid Sellars, in addition to the physicist
Henry Stapp Henry Pierce Stapp (born March 23, 1928 in Cleveland, Ohio) is an American mathematical physicist, known for his work in quantum mechanics, particularly the development of axiomatic S-matrix theory, the proofs of strong nonlocality properties, an ...
. In his 1996 book '' The Conscious Mind'', David Chalmers questioned interactionism. In 2002 he listed it along with epiphenomenalism and what he calls " Type-F Monism" as a position worth examining. Rather than invoking two distinct substances, he defines interactionism as the view that "microphysics is not causally closed, and that phenomenal properties play a causal role in affecting the physical world." (See
property dualism Property dualism describes a category of positions in the philosophy of mind which hold that, although the world is composed of just one kind of substance— the physical kind—there exist two distinct kinds of properties: physical properties ...
.) He argues the most plausible place for consciousness to impact physics is the collapse of the wave function in quantum mechanics. The ''
New Catholic Encyclopedia The ''New Catholic Encyclopedia'' (NCE) is a multi-volume reference work on Roman Catholic history and belief edited by the faculty of The Catholic University of America. The NCE was originally published by McGraw-Hill in 1967. A second edition, ...
'' argues that a non-physical mind and mind-body interaction follow necessarily from the Catholic doctrines of the soul and free will.Maher, Michael (1909) "The Law of Conservation of Energy", ''Catholic Encyclopedia'', vol. 5, pp. 422 ff, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05422a.htm.


Objections


Problem of causal interaction

Today the problem of causal interaction is frequently viewed as a conclusive argument against interactionism. On the other hand, it has been suggested that given many disciplines deal with things they do not entirely understand, dualists not entirely understanding the mechanism of mind-body interaction need not be seen as definitive refutation. The idea that causation necessarily depends on push-pull mechanisms (which would not be possible for a substance that did not occupy space) is also arguably based on obsolete conceptions of physics.


Objection from Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia

One objection often posed to interactionism is the ''problem of causal interaction'' – how the two different substances the theory posits, the mental and the physical, can exert an impact on one another. This objection was initially made by Elisabeth, Princess of Bohemia and is known as ''Princess Elisabeth's objection''. She questions how something immaterial can make contact with the physical world. An example of a physical-physical interaction is how when a cue ball hits another billiards ball, it causes it to move. Princess Elisabeth questioned how a mental occurence, such as intention, can cause a finger to move if immaterial things never come into direct contact with the physical world.


Occasionalism

One objection often posed to interactionism is the ''problem of causal interaction'' – how the two different substances the theory posits, the mental and the physical, can exert an impact on one another. Descartes' theory that interaction between the mind and the physical world occurred in the pineal gland was seen as inadequate by a number of philosophers in his era, who offered alternate views: Nicholas Malebranche suggested occasionalism, according to which mind and body appear to interact but are in fact moved separately by God, while Gottfried Leibniz argued in '' The Monadology'' that mind and body are in a
pre-established harmony Gottfried Leibniz's theory of pre-established harmony (french: harmonie préétablie) is a philosophical theory about causation under which every " substance" affects only itself, but all the substances (both bodies and minds) in the world never ...
. On the other hand,
Baruch Spinoza Baruch (de) Spinoza (born Bento de Espinosa; later as an author and a correspondent ''Benedictus de Spinoza'', anglicized to ''Benedict de Spinoza''; 24 November 1632 – 21 February 1677) was a Dutch philosopher of Portuguese-Jewish origin, b ...
rejected Descartes' dualism and proposed that mind and matter were in fact properties of a single substance, thereby prefiguring the modern perspective of neutral monism. The problem of mental causation is also discussed in the context of other positions on the mind-body problem, such as
property dualism Property dualism describes a category of positions in the philosophy of mind which hold that, although the world is composed of just one kind of substance— the physical kind—there exist two distinct kinds of properties: physical properties ...
and
anomalous monism Anomalous monism is a philosophical thesis about the mind–body relationship. It was first proposed by Donald Davidson in his 1970 paper "Mental Events". The theory is twofold and states that mental events are identical with physical events, and ...
.


Compatibility with the conservation of energy

A more recent related objection is the ''argument from physics'', which argues that a mental substance impacting the physical world would contradict principles of physics. In particular, if some external source of energy is responsible for the interactions, it would violate the law of conservation of energy. Two main responses to this have been to suggest the mind influences the distribution but not the quantity of energy in the brain and to deny that the brain is a causally closed system in which conservation of energy would apply. It could of course also be argued that the law of conservation of energy is false in systems which realize a mind.


Causal closure

Taking the argument a step further, it has been argued that because physics fully accounts for the causes of all physical movements, there can be no place for a non-physical mind to play a role. The principle, in slightly different iterations, has variously been called ''causal closure'', ''completeness of the physical'', ''physical closure'', and ''physical comprehensiveness''. This has been the foremost argument against interactionism in contemporary philosophy. Some philosophers have suggested the influence of the mind on the body could be reconciled with deterministic physical laws by proposing the mind's impacts instead take place at points of
quantum indeterminacy Quantum indeterminacy is the apparent ''necessary'' incompleteness in the description of a physical system, that has become one of the characteristics of the standard description of quantum physics. Prior to quantum physics, it was thought that : ...
. Karl Popper and John Eccles, as well as the physicist Henry Stapp, have theorized that such indeterminacy may apply at the macroscopic scale. (See
quantum mind The quantum mind or quantum consciousness is a group of hypotheses proposing that classical mechanics alone cannot explain consciousness, positing instead that quantum-mechanical phenomena, such as entanglement and superposition, may play an imp ...
.) However, Max Tegmark has argued that classical and quantum calculations show that
quantum decoherence Quantum decoherence is the loss of quantum coherence. In quantum mechanics, particles such as electrons are described by a wave function, a mathematical representation of the quantum state of a system; a probabilistic interpretation of the wave ...
effects do not play a role in brain activity. David Chalmers has noted (without necessarily endorsing) a second possibility within quantum mechanics, that consciousness' causal role is to collapse the wave function as per the
Von Neumann-Wigner interpretation The term ''von'' () is used in German language surnames either as a nobiliary particle indicating a noble patrilineality, or as a simple Preposition and postposition, preposition used by commoners that means ''of'' or ''from''. Nobility directo ...
of quantum mechanics. He acknowledges this is at odds with the interpretations of quantum mechanics held by most physicists, but notes, "There is some irony in the fact that philosophers reject interactionism on largely physical grounds (it is incompatible with physical theory), while physicists reject an interactionist interpretation of quantum mechanics on largely philosophical grounds (it is dualistic). Taken conjointly, these reasons carry little force...". There remains a literature in philosophy and science, albeit a much-contested one, that asserts evidence for
emergence In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when an entity is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own, properties or behaviors that emerge only when the parts interact in a wider whole. Emergence ...
in various domains, which would undermine the principle of causal closure. (See
emergentism In philosophy, emergentism is the belief in emergence, particularly as it involves consciousness and the philosophy of mind. A property of a system is said to be emergent if it is a new outcome of some other properties of the system and their int ...
.) Another option that has been suggested is that the interaction may involve dark energy, dark matter or some other currently unknown scientific process.Robinson, H. (2003) "Dualism", in ''The Blackwell Guide to Philosophy of Mind'', ed. S. Stich and T. Warfield, Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 85-101.


Causal Overdetermination

Another possible resolution is akin to parallelism—Eugene Mills holds that behavioral events are causally overdetermined, and can be explained by either physical or mental causes alone. An overdetermined event is fully accounted for by multiple causes at once. To imagine this argument, Amy Kind refers to a case from ''Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation,'' where three snipers each fire a bullet into an Austrian Chancellor's heart. Regardless if the Chancellor was shot with three bullets or one, the outcome was inevitable. This is an example of overdetermination because it states that both mental and physical causes invoke reactions and like the bullets, no matter if there is a physical cause or a mental cause, the outcome is the same. However,
J. J. C. Smart John Jamieson Carswell Smart (16 September 1920 – 6 October 2012), was a British-Australian philosopher and was appointed as an Emeritus Professor by the Australian National University. He worked in the fields of metaphysics, philosophy of sc ...
and Paul Churchland have argued that if physical phenomena fully determine behavioral events, then by
Occam's razor Occam's razor, Ockham's razor, or Ocham's razor ( la, novacula Occami), also known as the principle of parsimony or the law of parsimony ( la, lex parsimoniae), is the problem-solving principle that "entities should not be multiplied beyond neces ...
a non-physical mind is unnecessary. Andrew Melnyk argues that overdetermination would require an "intolerable coincidence." While causal closure remains a key obstacle for interactionism, it is not relevant to all forms of dualism; epiphenomenalism and parallelism are unaffected as they do not posit that the mind affects the body.


Relationship to other positions

Interactionism can be distinguished from competing dualist theories of causation, including epiphenomenalism (which admits causation, but views causation as unidirectional rather than bidirectional), and parallelism (which denies causation, while seeking to explain the semblance of causation by other means such as
pre-established harmony Gottfried Leibniz's theory of pre-established harmony (french: harmonie préétablie) is a philosophical theory about causation under which every " substance" affects only itself, but all the substances (both bodies and minds) in the world never ...
or occasionalism). In ''The Conscious Mind'', David Chalmers argued that regardless of the mechanism by which the mental might impact the physical if interactionism were true, there was a deeper conceptual issue: the chosen mechanism could always be separated from its phenomenal component, leading to simply a new form of epiphenomenalism. Later, he suggested that while the causal component could be separated, interactionism was like "type-F monism" (
Russellian monism Neutral monism is an umbrella term for a class of metaphysical theories in the philosophy of mind. These theories reject the dichotomy of mind and matter, believing the fundamental nature of reality to be neither mental nor physical; in other wor ...
,
panpsychism In the philosophy of mind, panpsychism () is the view that the mind or a mindlike aspect is a fundamental and ubiquitous feature of reality. It is also described as a theory that "the mind is a fundamental feature of the world which exists thro ...
, and panprotopsychism) in that it gave entities externally characterized by physical relationships the additional intrinsic feature of conscious properties.


See also


References


External links


Interactionism
Philosophy Index.
Varieties of Dualism: Interaction
Stanford University. {{philosophy of mind Dualism (philosophy of mind) Philosophy of mind