Andrew Melnyk
Biographic Data
| ID | 3865994 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Andrew Melnyk |
| GIVEN NAMES | Andrew |
| FAMILY NAME | Melnyk |
| SIGNATURE | MELNYK A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Missouri |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-3987-1877 |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 18 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 9 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1991 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2013 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Can Metaphysics Be Naturalized? And If So, How?
This is a critical, but sympathetic, examination of the manifesto for naturalized metaphysics that forms the first chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross's 2006 book, Every Thing Must Go, but it has wider implications than this description suggests.
Can Physicalism Be Non-Reductive
Can physicalism (or materialism) be non-reductive? I provide an opinionated survey of the debate on this question. I suggest that attempts to formulate non-reductive physicalism by appeal to claims of event identity, supervenience, or realization have produced doctrines that fail either to be physicalist or to be non-reductive. Then I treat in more detail a recent attempt to formulate non-reductive physicalism by Derk Pereboom, but argue that it …
Physicalist Manifesto
Physicalism and its Discontents
Physicalism, a topic that has been central to modern philosophy of mind and metaphysics, is the philosophical view that everything in the space-time world is ultimately physical. The physicalist will claim that all facts about the mind and the mental are physical facts and deny the existence of mental events and state insofar as these are thought of as independent of physical things, events and states. This collection of essays, first published i…
Searle's abstract argument against strong AI
Testament of A Recovering Eliminativist
If physicalism is true (e.g., if every event is a fundamental-physical event), then it looks as if there is a fundamental-physical explanation of everything. If so, then what is to become of special scientific explanations? They seem to be excluded by the fundamental-physical ones, and indeed to be excellent candidates for elimination. I argue that, if physicalism is true, there probably is a fundamental-physical explanation of everything, but th…
Formulating physicalism
Two Cheers for Reductionism
I argue that a certain version of physicalism, which is viewed by both its admirers and its detractors as non-reductionist, in fact entails two claims which, though not reductionist in the currently most popular sense of ‘reductionist’, conform to the spirit of reductionism sufficiently closely to compromise its claim to be a comprehensively non-reductionist version of physicalism. Putatively non-reductionist versions of physicalism in general, I…
Physicalism
The varieties of physicalism and of anti-physicalism are customarily regarded as doctrines pertaining narrowly to the philosophy of mind. But they are, I believe, best seen as different and competing responses to a quite general problem, which can be posed in the following terms. In describing and explaining the world, we make use of many, apparently distinct, vocabularies; and these vocabularies derive from the sciences, both physical and specia…
Can Physicalism Be Non-Reductive
Can physicalism (or materialism) be non-reductive? I provide an opinionated survey of the debate on this question. I suggest that attempts to formulate non-reductive physicalism by appeal to claims of event identity, supervenience, or realization have produced doctrines that fail either to be physicalist or to be non-reductive. Then I treat in more detail a recent attempt to formulate non-reductive physicalism by Derk Pereboom, but argue that it …
Two Cheers for Reductionism
I argue that a certain version of physicalism, which is viewed by both its admirers and its detractors as non-reductionist, in fact entails two claims which, though not reductionist in the currently most popular sense of ‘reductionist’, conform to the spirit of reductionism sufficiently closely to compromise its claim to be a comprehensively non-reductionist version of physicalism. Putatively non-reductionist versions of physicalism in general, I…
Searle's abstract argument against strong AI
Formulating physicalism
Physicalism
The varieties of physicalism and of anti-physicalism are customarily regarded as doctrines pertaining narrowly to the philosophy of mind. But they are, I believe, best seen as different and competing responses to a quite general problem, which can be posed in the following terms. In describing and explaining the world, we make use of many, apparently distinct, vocabularies; and these vocabularies derive from the sciences, both physical and specia…
Physicalism
The varieties of physicalism and of anti-physicalism are customarily regarded as doctrines pertaining narrowly to the philosophy of mind. But they are, I believe, best seen as different and competing responses to a quite general problem, which can be posed in the following terms. In describing and explaining the world, we make use of many, apparently distinct, vocabularies; and these vocabularies derive from the sciences, both physical and specia…
Formulating physicalism
Two Cheers for Reductionism
I argue that a certain version of physicalism, which is viewed by both its admirers and its detractors as non-reductionist, in fact entails two claims which, though not reductionist in the currently most popular sense of ‘reductionist’, conform to the spirit of reductionism sufficiently closely to compromise its claim to be a comprehensively non-reductionist version of physicalism. Putatively non-reductionist versions of physicalism in general, I…
Searle's abstract argument against strong AI
Testament of A Recovering Eliminativist
If physicalism is true (e.g., if every event is a fundamental-physical event), then it looks as if there is a fundamental-physical explanation of everything. If so, then what is to become of special scientific explanations? They seem to be excluded by the fundamental-physical ones, and indeed to be excellent candidates for elimination. I argue that, if physicalism is true, there probably is a fundamental-physical explanation of everything, but th…
Physicalism and its Discontents
Physicalism, a topic that has been central to modern philosophy of mind and metaphysics, is the philosophical view that everything in the space-time world is ultimately physical. The physicalist will claim that all facts about the mind and the mental are physical facts and deny the existence of mental events and state insofar as these are thought of as independent of physical things, events and states. This collection of essays, first published i…
Physicalist Manifesto
Can Physicalism Be Non-Reductive
Can physicalism (or materialism) be non-reductive? I provide an opinionated survey of the debate on this question. I suggest that attempts to formulate non-reductive physicalism by appeal to claims of event identity, supervenience, or realization have produced doctrines that fail either to be physicalist or to be non-reductive. Then I treat in more detail a recent attempt to formulate non-reductive physicalism by Derk Pereboom, but argue that it …
Can Metaphysics Be Naturalized? And If So, How?
This is a critical, but sympathetic, examination of the manifesto for naturalized metaphysics that forms the first chapter of James Ladyman and Don Ross's 2006 book, Every Thing Must Go, but it has wider implications than this description suggests.
Epistemology (8 works) · Metaphysics (8 works) · Philosophy (8 works) · Philosophy and Theoretical Science (6 works) · Physicalism (6 works) · Supervenience (6 works) · Philosophy and History of Science (5 works) · Materialism (4 works) · Appeal (2 works) · Classical Philosophy and Thought (2 works)