Introduction:
To have freedom of will is to say, ‘I could have chosen to do otherwise.’
But how can we make such a claim in a world of causes and effects? In a world where everything that happens is part of a great causal chain? Where every event, including every human decision and action, was determined at the creation of the universe?
It is not my intention in this series of 4 blogs to address the broad issue of determinism versus free will. There are plenty of books and articles available on this issue. Rather my purpose is to say look at the nature of mental events and ask if they allow us to be free. To this end this book will address the issue of Anomalous Monism.
Anomalous Monism is a theory about the scientific status of psychology. In the theory developed by Donald Davidson he claims that psychology cannot be a science like basic physics. This is because it cannot in principle yield exceptionless laws for predicting or explaining human thoughts and actions (mental anomalism). Davidson also claims that thoughts and actions must be physical (monism). Thus, according to Anomalous Monism, psychology cannot be reduced to physics, but must nonetheless share a physical ontology.
The anomalousness of the mental and the problem of free will are distinct issues each worthy of consideration from the other. However, Davidson believes the anomalousness of the mental is a necessary condition for free will. The scope of this paper is therefore to provide a critical assessment of anomalous monism and in the process determine whether the anomalousness of the mental establishes free will.
I proceed in §1.1 by establishing what Davidson’s holds to be the connection between free will and the anomalousness of the mental. By stating this connection as three claims I am able to show what is required of Davidson’s thesis of anomalous monism to establish free will, but also provide the basis for assessing his enterprise in §4. My brief, uncritical, exegesis of anomalous monism in §1.2 shows how Davidson believes freedom is possible within a physicalist framework.
§2 I provided a detailed examination of anomalous monism. I do this by way of examining various thesis held by Davidson which characterise anomalous monism; identity, non-reduction, the nomological connection of events under their physical descriptions only, the anomalousness of the mental, and supervenience (§2.1-5 respectively). The purpose of this iterative process is to engage in the polemic surrounding the various theses, and not to provide knock-down arguments. In so proceeding I hope to make clear Davidson’s position in light of criticisms raised since the initial thesis was spelled-out in ‘Mental Events’.
In §3 I turn my attention toward the final two theses examined in §2; the anomalousness of the mental and supervenience, and argue for their incompatibility. Given the arguments raised in §3 I conclude that Davidson is confronted with two unpalatable choices. The consequences of these two choices are considered in §4.
In §4.1 I argue that if Davidson wants to maintain that mental properties are causally relevant and efficacious of physical events then this would entail that there are psychophysical laws, so the mental is not anomalous. In §4.2 I argue that if Davidson insists on the anomalousness of the mental then this would entail the mental is epiphenomenal. Given the conclusions in §4.1 and §4.2 I offer in §4.3 and §4.4 some tentative proposals. First I argue that we can allow that there are laws or generalisations which relate types of mental events without undermining the anomalousness of the mental. Second, I take a more radical approach and argue for the abandonment of the principle of the nomological character of causality, suggesting in the process a different conception of freedom. Finally, I conclude in §4.5 by arguing that Davidson conception of freedom fails to address the underlying issue in the free will determinism debate; that where he sees a contradiction to be resolved exists only a tension.
§1. Freedom & Anomalous Monism
1.1 The connection to freedom
In ‘Mental Events’ Davidson opens with the following statement:
Mental events such as perceivings, rememberings, decisions, and actions resist capture in the nomological net of physical theory. How can this fact be reconciled with the causal role of mental events in the physical world? Reconciling freedom with causal determinism is a special case of the problem if we suppose that causal determinism entails capture in, and freedom requires escape from, the nomological net […]. I start from the assumption that both causal dependence, and the anomalousness, of mental events are undeniable facts. My aim is therefore to explain, in the face of apparent difficulties, how this can be. I am in sympathy with Kant […]. Kant believed freedom entails anomaly.
His attempt to show how these apparently contradictory claims can be reconciled is the subject of §2. For the moment I want only to make clear what Davidson takes to be the connection between the anomalousness of the mental and freedom. This can be shown by unpacking the salient elements of the quoted passage, doing so will also enable me to more clearly assess these claims in later parts of this paper, most notably in §4. From the above passage we can discern three claims:
i) Mental events resist capture in the nomological net of physical theory.
ii) Causal determinism entails capture in, and freedom requires escape from, the nomological net of physical theory.
iii) Freedom entails anomaly.
We might further unpack these various claims in the following way: by virtue of i) Davidson rejects the thesis that all events, including human actions, are explicable (and ultimately describable) in terms of an interaction between material entities in accordance with the physical laws. This is a claim for the anomalousness of the mental. Given that his conception of freedom at ii) is that freedom requires escape from the nomological net of physical theory, we can understand iii) as claiming that the anomalousness of the mental is a necessary condition for free will. On this understanding if he can show that our mental life is not captured in the nomological net of physical theory, he will have established a necessary condition for free will. Supposing Davidson can then resolve the apparent contradiction between the demands of physical theory and the claimed causal role for anomalous mental events he can, like Kant, answer affirmatively the question posed in Critique of Pure Reason: ‘is it possible to regard one and the same event as being in one aspect merely an effect of nature and in another aspect due to freedom?’ Such a resolution need not concern us for the moment for here it is sufficient only to establish the connection between the anomalousness of the mental and freedom. This I think I have now done.
With the connection now establish we can see that a failure to show either the causal dependence, and the anomalousness, of mental events, both of which he takes as being ‘undeniable facts’, would undermine the possibility of freedom by Davidson’s lights. Whether in fact these remain plausible claims given the arguments to follow will be the topic of discussion in §4. With this thought in mind these preliminaries may usefully conclude by making clear Davidson’s position within a physicalist framework.
Establishing free will was, I contend, a major motivating factor behind Davidson’s thesis of anomalous monism. Were he not concerned to show that our thoughts and actions are free he would have advocated a physicalism of the sort he calls ‘nomological monism’. This view includes the claim that every mental event is a physical event, but also the claim that there are psychophysical laws, such that the occurrence of any given mental event could in principle be predicted, given enough knowledge of the physical events with which they are correctly identified. Davidson accepts the first of these theses but not the second. On the other hand he also rejects the counter thesis he calls ‘anomalous dualism’ according to which no mental event is identical with any physical event, and that no mental event may be predicted, however complete our knowledge of physical events. Here Davidson accepts the second theses but not the first.
So, Davidson’s anomalous monism accepts the monism of first position and the anomalousness of the second according to which, when conjoined, entails that every mental event is identical with some physical event, but no mental event may be predicted, no matter how complete our knowledge of physical events. More pertinently, he claims that this conjunction allows that our thoughts and actions be free within a physicalist framework. Moreover, he claims that mental events may be the cause of physical events by virtue of being physical events, so a person’s thoughts and actions may have effects in the physical world. That ones thoughts and actions be causally efficacious in this way, and that they be inexplicable qua thoughts and actions by any deterministic natural science is, arguably I suggest, a large part of what he must mean by saying they are performed freely. However, for Davidson’s motivation not to be ambiguous between what he wants to be the case, and what he has good reason to believe to be the case, he needs to provide such good reason. In §2 I consider the arguments presented.
1.2. Anomalous monism
The two central tenets of Davidson’s anomalous monism are the physicalist view that every mental event is identical with some physical event, and the view (usually denied by the physicalist) that there are no psychophysical laws. It remains an open possibility on Davidson’s theory that every event is mental under some description, but he holds it as certain that, if some event is mental, then it is also physical. The fact that there exist no psychophysical laws; that mental events cannot be subsumed under deterministic scientific generalisations, entails that mental events cannot be explained in purely physical terms. Despite denying the existence of psychophysical laws Davidson holds that by the truth of the identity theory the mental supervenes on the physical; that is to say, there is a dependence relation between the mental and the physical. However, he denies that his supervenience thesis entails the existence of psychophysical laws. Consequently he denies the view held by some physicalists that mental terms are translatable into physical terms without loss of meaning.
The claim that our mental life resists capture in the nomological net of physical theory seems to pose a problem though for the identity theorist. If all mental events are physical events then they must, surely, be subject to physical laws. Davidson is aware of the problem and makes it explicit by arguing this need not be a problem if we can resolve the appearance of a contradiction between three principles that are, when taken together, prima facie inconsistent. He maintains that these principles, though not entailing anomalous monism, if understood in a certain way, give credence to it
(i) The principle of causal interaction is the claim that mental events interact with the physical world, that is to say they both cause and are caused by physical events.
(ii) The principle of the nomological character of causality is the claim that ‘where there is causality there is a law: events related as cause and effect fall under strict deterministic laws.’
(iii) The principle of anomalousness of the mental is the claim that the mental cannot be explained or predicted by strict deterministic physical laws because we cannot formulate connecting physical events with mental events. That we cannot formulate such laws is, for Davidson, not a contingent matter but rather it is the claim that we necessarily cannot formulate such laws.
Given these premises the argument for anomalous monism can be summed up as follows: By (i) there are some true singular causal statements relating mental events and physical events. By (ii), there must be laws which these singular causal statements instantiate, but by (iii) these laws cannot be psychological or psychophysical. They must therefore be physical laws, so the events related in the singular causal statements, including mental events, must have some physical description under which they instantiate these physical laws. The conclusion is that any mental event which causally interacts with physical events itself has a physical description under which it instantiates a physical law. So argued, Davidson can claim that our thoughts and actions resist capture in the nomological net of physical theory, thus they are performed freely. The thesis now having been baldly stated it needs closer scrutiny.
Blog #2 - An Assessment of Anomalous Monism