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A Metaphysics for Freedom argues that agency itself-and not merely
the special, distinctively human variety of it-is incompatible with
determinism. For determinism is threatened just as surely by the
existence of powers which can be unproblematically accorded to many
sorts of animals, as by the distinctively human powers on which the
free will debate has tended to focus. Helen Steward suggests that a
tendency to approach the question of free will solely through the
issue of moral responsibility has obscured the fact that there is a
quite different route to incompatibilism, based on the idea that
animal agents above a certain level of complexity possess a range
of distinctive 'two-way' powers, not found in simpler substances.
Determinism is not a doctrine of physics, but of metaphysics; and
the idea that it is physics which will tell us whether our world is
deterministic or not presupposes what must not be taken for
granted-that is, that physics settles everything else, and that we
are already in a position to say that there could be no irreducibly
top-down forms of causal influence. Steward considers questions
concerning supervenience, laws, and levels of explanation, and
explores an outline of a variety of top-down causation which might
sustain the idea that an animal itself, rather than merely events
and states going on in its parts, might be able to bring something
about. The resulting position permits certain important concessions
to compatibilism to be made; and a convincing response is also
offered to the charge that even if it is agreed that determinism is
incompatible with agency, indeterminism can be of no possible help.
The whole is an argument for a distinctive and resolutely
non-dualistic, naturalistically respectable version of
libertarianism, rooted in a conception of what biological forms of
organisation might make possible in the way of freedom.
One of the most exciting developments in philosophy in the last
fifty years is the resurgence in the philosophy of action. The
concept of action now occupies a central place in ethics,
metaphysics and jurisprudence. This collection of original essays,
by some of the most astute and influential philosophers working in
this area, covers the entire range of the philosophy of action.
Topics covered include the nature of actions themselves; how the
concepts of act, agent, cause and event are related to each other;
self-knowledge, emotion, autonomy and freedom in human life; and
the place of the concept of action in criminal law. The volume
concludes with a major essay by one of America's leading
authorities in the philosophy of law on 'the 3.5 billion dollar
question': was the destruction of the World Trade Center one event
or two?
Helen Steward puts forward a radical critique of the foundations of
contemporary philosophy of mind, arguing that it relies too heavily
on insecure assumptions about the nature of some sorts of mental
entities it postulates - the nature of events, processes, and
states. She offers a fresh investigation of these three categories,
clarifying the distinction between them, and argues specifically
that the assumption that states can be treated as particular,
event-like entities has been a huge and serious mistake. Steward
argues that the category of 'token state' should be rejected, and
develops an alternative way of understanding those varieties of
causal explanation which have sometimes been thought to require an
ontology of token states for their education. She contends that
many current theories of mind are rendered unintelligible once it
is seen how these explanations really work. A number of prominent
features of contemporary philosophy of mind - token identity
theories, the functionist's conception of token role, a common form
of argument for eliminative materialism, and the structure of the
debate about the efficacy of mental content- are impugned by her
arguments. Steward concludes that the modern mind-body problem
needs to be substantially rethought.
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