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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
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    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Davidson's principle of the nomological character of causality requires causal relations to be backed by strict physical laws, which dualist mental substances cannot satisfy.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.Davidson himself endorsed non-strict laws and multiple realizability, weakening the nomological closure argument.
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    • 2.Causation may not require strict laws; probabilistic, ceteris paribus, or emergent causal relations are philosophically legitimate.
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    • 3.Mental-to-physical causation could operate through identity or constitution without violating physical closure.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Strict physical laws are deterministic and universal; mental substances lack such lawlike regularities across contexts.
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    • 2.If mental causation occurred, it would require psychophysical laws connecting non-physical to physical properties.
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    • 3.We have no empirical evidence for psychophysical laws; physics appears causally closed without mental intervention.
      ?

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