ENGLISH

Physical Realization

Book information

Publisher
Oxford University Press, USA
Year
2007
ISBN
0199214395, 9781435621633, 9780199214396
LCC
B835 .S56 2007
Open Library ID
OL10145738M
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
774 kB (792350 bytes)
Pages
160\162
Topic
Physics
Scanned
yes
Time added
2011-04-11 19:55:47

Description

In Physical Realization, Sydney Shoemaker considers the question of how physicalism can be true: how can all facts about the world, including mental ones, be constituted by facts about the distribution in the world of physical properties? Physicalism requires that the mental properties of a person are 'realized in' the physical properties of that person, and that all instantiations of properties in macroscopic objects are realized in microphysical states of affairs. Shoemaker offers an account of both these sorts of realization, one which allows the realized properties to be causally efficacious. He also explores the implications of this account for a wide range of metaphysical issues, including the nature of persistence through time, the problem of material constitution, the possibility of emergent properties, and the nature of phenomenal consciousness.

Similar books