Who Should Fear Type Epiphenomenalism?

Abstract

The causal exclusion argument purports to show that various forms of nonreductive physicalism in philosophy of mind (including especially Davidson’s anomalous monism) inevitably lead to type epiphenomenalism, i.e. the view that mental properties are causally ineffective. In a recent paper, Mariusz Grygianiec claimed that a proponent of Davidson’s theory, as a nominalist, should be unmoved by considerations of that sort. The aim of this paper is to analyze this claim. It turns out that, given certain assumptions, both nominalist’s and realist’s position can be threatened by this charge, but the nominalist is better equipped to resist it.