معرفت فلسفی

In the framework of "emergentism," mental phenomena are considered to possess independent causal power, thereby affirming mental causation. Mental causation pertains to the interaction between mental phenomena and the body and is discussed at three levels: mental-body, mental-mental, and body-mental causation. Among these, the causation between the mind and body -referred to as "downward causation" in philosophy of mind- faces significant challenges. One of the key objections to mental causation is the causal exclusion problem. According to this objection, physical phenomena (including bodily interactions) have physical causes rooted in the neural structures observed by human brain. Thus, a physical phenomenon needs no mental cause, since acknowledging it would imply "overdetermination" (causal interference), which is generally rejected. The exclusion argument is grounded in the acceptance of the principle of "causal closure" in the physical domain. This article, employing a "descriptive-analytical" method, critiques the principle of causal closure as a premise for the exclusion problem. The findings suggest that the exclusion problem does not have sufficient grounds to negate mental causation.