Papers by Alin C Cucu
Mind and Matter, 2023
Physicalists typically believe that neurophysiology has refuted the thesis that non-physical mind... more Physicalists typically believe that neurophysiology has refuted the thesis that non-physical minds can interact with the brain. In this paper, I argue that it is precisely a closer look at the neurophysiology of volitional actions that suggests otherwise. I start with a clarification of how the present inquiry relates to the main argument for physicalism, and how the most common alternative views relate to the findings of my study. I then give a brief overview of the neuro- physiological research about volitional actions, finding that there is no research specifically directed at the pertinent question. I proceed by pointing out what it would take for a complete physical explanation of volitional actions to be true: namely a complete physical explanation of the increase in the firing rate of the neurons with which the sequence leading up to volitional actions starts. Since no dedicated research about this question is available, I offer a study of the known mechanisms of neuronal excitation as a substitute, find- ing that there is no plausible biochemical or physical mechanism that could explain the causal initiation of volitional actions – at least none that upholds energy conservation. But non-conservation is precisely what interactive dualism, in its most plausible version, predicts. Thus, rather than buttressing physicalism, our empirical knowledge of volitional actions points toward interactive dualism.
Eidos, 2023
Michael Esfeld has recently put forth his ontology of persons, with which he hopes to secure free... more Michael Esfeld has recently put forth his ontology of persons, with which he hopes to secure freedom and irreducible personhood as well as scientific realism, all by working with minimal ontological assumptions. I present his view and investigate it, finding it too minimalistic: Esfeld's featureless matter points do not warrant an emergence of persons from matter, and his claim that persons can create themselves by adopting a normative attitude seems more like a just-so story. Also, Esfeld's rejection of classical mind-body dualism seems premature. I present as an alternative a modified mind-body dualism which solves the problems of Esfeld's view and argue that embedding it in a theistic worldview is favorable for any account that seeks to establish irreducible personhood.
Philosophia Christi, 2020
Journal of Cognitive Science, 2020
One of the most serious challenges (if not the most serious challenge) for interactive psycho-phy... more One of the most serious challenges (if not the most serious challenge) for interactive psycho-physical dualism (henceforth interactive dualism or ID) is the so-called 'interaction problem'. It has two facets, one of which this article focuses on, namely the apparent tension between interactions of non-physical minds in the physical world and physical laws of nature. One family of approaches to alleviate or even dissolve this tension is based on a collapse solution ('consciousness collapse/CC) of the measurement problem in quantum mechanics (QM). The idea is that the mind brings about the collapse of a superposed wave function onto one of its eigenstates. Thus, it is claimed, can the mind change the course of things without violating any law figuring in physical theory. I will first show that this hope is premature because energy and momentum are probably not conserved in collapse processes, and that even if this can be dealt with, the violations are either severe or produce further ontological problems. Second, I point out several conceptual difficulties for interactionist CC. I will also present solutions for those problems, but it will become clear that those solutions come at a high cost. Third, I shall briefly list some empirical problems which make life even harder for interactionist CC. I conclude with remarks about why no-collapse interpretations of QM don't help either and what the present study has shown is the real issue for ID: namely to find a plausible integrative view of dualistic mental causation and laws of nature.
Mind and Matter, 2019
The principle of energy conservation is widely taken to be a serious difficulty for interactionis... more The principle of energy conservation is widely taken to be a serious difficulty for interactionist dualism (whether property or substance). Interactionists often have therefore tried to make it satisfy energy conservation. This paper examines several such attempts, especially including E. J. Lowe's varying constants proposal, showing how they all miss their goal due to lack of engagement with the physico-mathematical roots of energy conservation physics: the first Noether theorem (that symmetries imply conservation laws), its converse (that conservation laws imply symmetries), and the locality of continuum/field physics. Thus the "conditionality re-sponse", which sees conservation as (bi)conditional upon symmetries and simply accepts energy non-conservation as an aspect of interactionist dualism, is seen to be, perhaps surprisingly, the one most in accord with contemporary physics (apart from quantum mechanics) by not conflicting with mathematical theorems basic to physics. A decent objection to interactionism should be a posteri-ori, based on empirically studying the brain.
Drafts by Alin C Cucu
Michael Esfeld has recently put forth his ontology of persons, with which he hopes to secure free... more Michael Esfeld has recently put forth his ontology of persons, with which he hopes to secure freedom and irreducible personhood as well as scientific realism, all by working with minimal ontological assumptions. I present his view and investigate it, finding it too minimalistic: Esfeld’s featureless matter points do not warrant an emergence of persons from matter, and his claim that persons can create themselves by adopting a normative attitude seems more like a just-so story. Also, Esfeld’s rejection of classical mind-body dualism seems premature. I present as an alternative a modified mind-body dualism which is embedded in a theistic worldview and argue that this position solves the problems not only of Esfeld’s view, but also of many versions of mind-body dualism.
Journal of Consciousness Studies, 2022
It is a tenet of physicalists and generally a widespread belief that the findings of neurophysiol... more It is a tenet of physicalists and generally a widespread belief that the findings of neurophysiology leave no room for non-physical minds to interact with the brain. I argue against this that a closer look at the neurophysiology of volitional actions suggests otherwise. For one, there is no research specifically directed at the pertinent question, resulting in too coarse-grained a picture. Nonphysical mental interactions plausibly are very gentle and would thus only be detectable if looked for specifically. Second, a study of the known mechanisms of neuronal excitation strongly suggests that there is no biochemical or physical mechanism available that could explain the causal initiation of volitional actions. Third, the phenomenon of neuroplasticity provides further grounds to believe that non-physical minds can act on the brain.
Philosophia Christi, 2022
In this essay, I seek to embed J.P. Moreland's Thomistic-like dualism (TLD) in a more comprehensi... more In this essay, I seek to embed J.P. Moreland's Thomistic-like dualism (TLD) in a more comprehensive metaphysics of nature, and harmonize it with the laws of nature. One question Moreland leaves open is what the metaphysical status of former body parts is, whether macro- or microscopic, a status that should be commensurate with biological findings. The other issue concerns the role of the soul as efficient cause, which entails that the soul somehow interacts with the body, which consists of matter governed by the laws of nature. I will address the question whether such interaction violates the laws of nature.
Theologica, 2022
The Christian ontology of the human person has for the greatest part of church history been duali... more The Christian ontology of the human person has for the greatest part of church history been dualistic in some way, a notion that has come under attack in the last few decades. In the present paper, I wish to defend J.P. Moreland's Thomistic-like Dualism (TLD) as the most adequate metaphysical account of the Christian view of the human person. To do that, I first clarify some important methodological points about how to read Scripture for present purposes. I then present the two extant main competitors for a Christian metaphysical anthropology, Cartesian substance dualism and Thomism, followed by an analysis of important passages of Holy Scripture for their metaphysical content. My result is that, taken as a whole, the biblical text requires an ontology of the human person to meet the two desiderata of SEPARABILITY and UNITY. I also briefly discuss extra-biblical evidence for SEPARABILITY, namely near-death experiences. Cartesian substance dualism is strong on SEPARABILITY but not on UNITY, while Thomism meets the requirements of UNITY but not of SEPARABILITY. Based on these investigations, I then present J.P. Moreland's Thomistic-like Dualism (TLD) as the most adequate Christian ontology of the human person. TLD successfully combines SEPARABILITY with UNITY, or so I argue. I conclude with some remarks about possible weaknesses of TLD.
The ontology of the human person is a matter of ongoing debate. Substance dualism is a view that ... more The ontology of the human person is a matter of ongoing debate. Substance dualism is a view that solves virtually all the intractable problems that haunt its materialist rivals. It does that in virtue of its conception of the human person as a single, unified, indivisible immaterial substance, distinct from the body conceived as a separate substance. This gives rise to the charge of an unnatural 'dismantlement' of the human person, of losing the intuitively felt union of the embodied human being. Thomism with its broadly Aristotelian hylomorphic metaphysics can help out here, but only at the cost of being difficult to square with Christian doctrine and the growing evidential body of near-death experiences. On a more abstract level, it looks indeed hard to find an account which combines the separability and the union of body and soul: it might even seem like 'squaring the circle'. J.P. Moreland has recently offered a view he calls 'Thomistic-like dualism' (TLD) which he claims combines the advantages of substance dualism and of Thomism. I will argue that TLD is indeed able to do that. I further identify an objection Moreland has not anticipated and answer to it with the aid of Rob Koons' Aristotelian philosophy of inanimate and biological substances.
In this essay, I argue that the Incarnation of the Son of God, understood in a traditionally orth... more In this essay, I argue that the Incarnation of the Son of God, understood in a traditionally orthodox way, is incompatible with an atemporalist concept of God. First, I explain what I mean by atemporalism, namely the idea that God exists outside time. I also show the main corollaries of that doctrine, most notably that all of God's life occurs eternally simultaneously. Second, based on New Testament teaching and widely accepted creeds, I spell out philosophically what I mean by the Incarnation. In short, I take it to be the doctrine that the Second Person of the Trinity at some point in time took on a human body as part of a fully human nature. I then proceed to my central argument, which derives a contradiction from the definitions of the Incarnation and of atemporalism, respectively. In the last section, I shall treat some possible objections to my argument and show that they do not solve the problem satisfactorily.
In this paper, I aim to show (1) that the principle of energy conservation (PEC) cannot be used a... more In this paper, I aim to show (1) that the principle of energy conservation (PEC) cannot be used as an a priori argument against dualism; (2) that PEC constitutes a problem for physicalism because energy is probably not conserved in brains; and (3) to show that even if energy is conserved in brains, dualism is still the better framework to account for human volitional actions. To do that, I will first formulate a proper a priori version of the widely shared ‘objection from energy conservation’ (OEC). Second, I will refute its central premise, namely that energy is necessarily conserved. I then proceed to “turn the tables” on physicalism, i.e. I seek to show that empirically, energy is probably not conserved in brains, and explore the resources of physicalism to deal with such a scenario, which turn out to be scarce.
Books by Alin C Cucu
Ipoteze religioase în studiul naturii umane, 2023
Volumul de față reunește textele comunicărilor prezentate la Conferința interdisciplinară Ipoteze... more Volumul de față reunește textele comunicărilor prezentate la Conferința interdisciplinară Ipoteze religioase în studiul naturii umane care a avut loc la Universitatea de Vest din Timișoara, în perioada 28-29 octombrie 2022.
Această conferință și-a propus să analizeze din punct de vedere empiric și conceptual anumite ipoteze fundamentale ale literaturii religioase, preponderent creștine.
Université de Lausanne, 2022
Mental causation, idea that it is us – via our minds – who cause bodily actions is as commonsensi... more Mental causation, idea that it is us – via our minds – who cause bodily actions is as commonsensical as it is indispensable for our understanding of ourselves as rational agents. Somewhat less uncontroversial, but nonetheless widespread (at least among ordinary people) is the idea that the mind is non-physical, following the intuition that what is physical can neither act nor think nor judge morally. Taken together, and cast into a metaphysical thesis, the two intuitions yield interactive dualism: the view that human persons and their minds are non-physical but can nonetheless interact with their bodies, most notably through their brains.
This thesis has two main objectives: first, to defend interactive dualism against objections, and second, to show how it can blend in with a physical world in which laws of nature hold. The first part (chapter 1) consists in a brief motivation of interactive dualism as opposed to non-interactive dualism. I argue that non-interactive, epiphenomenalist dualism sacrifices so many crucial aspects of our human existence that interactive dualism is highly to be preferred to it, barring even stronger counterarguments against the latter.
It is those putative counterarguments I address in parts II and III. Part II takes on the philosophical objections from the causal closure of the physical and from causal heterogeneity. The former takes the success of physics and physiology as basis for the doctrine of the causal closure of the physical (CCP). I argue against this that there is not only no convincing argument for CCP, but also that any science-based belief in CCP cannot be epistemically justified. As regards the causal heterogeneity objection, it is ‘weighed and found wanting’, because it relies on unwarranted assumptions about causation.
In part III, I examine the objection from energy conservation. It roughly says that if interactive dualism were true, then energy would not be conserved, which physics taught us cannot be the case. My reply is that the underlying conception of energy (and momentum) conservation is wrong-headed and not the one that actual physicists use. Instead of being categorical and global, conservation laws are conditional and local, thereby making natural room for mental interaction. Some dualists, however, have sought to make interactive dualism conservation-friendly, notably by invoking quantum physics; I show that these attempts are unnecessary and create more problems than they solve. Finally, in chapter 9, I turn the tables on non-interactionists by investigating current neurophysiological literature on volitional actions, which, though not addressing the question directly, still encourages the interactive dualist picture more than a non-interactionist one.
Part IV is about the interplay between interactive dualism and the laws of nature. The ultimate goal is, if possible, to come up with a theory of the laws of nature that explains the lawlike behavior of nature and at the same time makes room for interaction. I begin by pointing out that the laws of nature are or at least should be what physicalists worry about (chapter 10). I then proceed with a historical survey on the development of the notion of laws of nature (chapter 11) that sheds light on its theistic origin. This is followed by an inquiry into the question how a law of nature could possibly be broken (chapter 12) and a survey of the extant metaphysical theories of the laws of nature with special regard to their receptivity to interaction (chapter 13). Finally, in chapter 14 I develop a theory of the laws of nature both faithful to their divine origin and the possibility of mental interaction: dispositionalist divine decretalism, a synthesis of dispositionalism and Jeffrey Koperski’s divine decretalism.
Thesis Chapters by Alin C Cucu
Interacting Minds in the Physical World, 2022
The thesis of this chapter is that the notion of ‘laws of nature’ has Christian origins, and that... more The thesis of this chapter is that the notion of ‘laws of nature’ has Christian origins, and that modern science and philosophy have adopted it while eviscerating it of its theistic roots, thereby bequeathing to us the almost tyrannical ideology of laws without a lawmaker and thus without exceptions.
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Papers by Alin C Cucu
Drafts by Alin C Cucu
Books by Alin C Cucu
Această conferință și-a propus să analizeze din punct de vedere empiric și conceptual anumite ipoteze fundamentale ale literaturii religioase, preponderent creștine.
This thesis has two main objectives: first, to defend interactive dualism against objections, and second, to show how it can blend in with a physical world in which laws of nature hold. The first part (chapter 1) consists in a brief motivation of interactive dualism as opposed to non-interactive dualism. I argue that non-interactive, epiphenomenalist dualism sacrifices so many crucial aspects of our human existence that interactive dualism is highly to be preferred to it, barring even stronger counterarguments against the latter.
It is those putative counterarguments I address in parts II and III. Part II takes on the philosophical objections from the causal closure of the physical and from causal heterogeneity. The former takes the success of physics and physiology as basis for the doctrine of the causal closure of the physical (CCP). I argue against this that there is not only no convincing argument for CCP, but also that any science-based belief in CCP cannot be epistemically justified. As regards the causal heterogeneity objection, it is ‘weighed and found wanting’, because it relies on unwarranted assumptions about causation.
In part III, I examine the objection from energy conservation. It roughly says that if interactive dualism were true, then energy would not be conserved, which physics taught us cannot be the case. My reply is that the underlying conception of energy (and momentum) conservation is wrong-headed and not the one that actual physicists use. Instead of being categorical and global, conservation laws are conditional and local, thereby making natural room for mental interaction. Some dualists, however, have sought to make interactive dualism conservation-friendly, notably by invoking quantum physics; I show that these attempts are unnecessary and create more problems than they solve. Finally, in chapter 9, I turn the tables on non-interactionists by investigating current neurophysiological literature on volitional actions, which, though not addressing the question directly, still encourages the interactive dualist picture more than a non-interactionist one.
Part IV is about the interplay between interactive dualism and the laws of nature. The ultimate goal is, if possible, to come up with a theory of the laws of nature that explains the lawlike behavior of nature and at the same time makes room for interaction. I begin by pointing out that the laws of nature are or at least should be what physicalists worry about (chapter 10). I then proceed with a historical survey on the development of the notion of laws of nature (chapter 11) that sheds light on its theistic origin. This is followed by an inquiry into the question how a law of nature could possibly be broken (chapter 12) and a survey of the extant metaphysical theories of the laws of nature with special regard to their receptivity to interaction (chapter 13). Finally, in chapter 14 I develop a theory of the laws of nature both faithful to their divine origin and the possibility of mental interaction: dispositionalist divine decretalism, a synthesis of dispositionalism and Jeffrey Koperski’s divine decretalism.
Thesis Chapters by Alin C Cucu
Această conferință și-a propus să analizeze din punct de vedere empiric și conceptual anumite ipoteze fundamentale ale literaturii religioase, preponderent creștine.
This thesis has two main objectives: first, to defend interactive dualism against objections, and second, to show how it can blend in with a physical world in which laws of nature hold. The first part (chapter 1) consists in a brief motivation of interactive dualism as opposed to non-interactive dualism. I argue that non-interactive, epiphenomenalist dualism sacrifices so many crucial aspects of our human existence that interactive dualism is highly to be preferred to it, barring even stronger counterarguments against the latter.
It is those putative counterarguments I address in parts II and III. Part II takes on the philosophical objections from the causal closure of the physical and from causal heterogeneity. The former takes the success of physics and physiology as basis for the doctrine of the causal closure of the physical (CCP). I argue against this that there is not only no convincing argument for CCP, but also that any science-based belief in CCP cannot be epistemically justified. As regards the causal heterogeneity objection, it is ‘weighed and found wanting’, because it relies on unwarranted assumptions about causation.
In part III, I examine the objection from energy conservation. It roughly says that if interactive dualism were true, then energy would not be conserved, which physics taught us cannot be the case. My reply is that the underlying conception of energy (and momentum) conservation is wrong-headed and not the one that actual physicists use. Instead of being categorical and global, conservation laws are conditional and local, thereby making natural room for mental interaction. Some dualists, however, have sought to make interactive dualism conservation-friendly, notably by invoking quantum physics; I show that these attempts are unnecessary and create more problems than they solve. Finally, in chapter 9, I turn the tables on non-interactionists by investigating current neurophysiological literature on volitional actions, which, though not addressing the question directly, still encourages the interactive dualist picture more than a non-interactionist one.
Part IV is about the interplay between interactive dualism and the laws of nature. The ultimate goal is, if possible, to come up with a theory of the laws of nature that explains the lawlike behavior of nature and at the same time makes room for interaction. I begin by pointing out that the laws of nature are or at least should be what physicalists worry about (chapter 10). I then proceed with a historical survey on the development of the notion of laws of nature (chapter 11) that sheds light on its theistic origin. This is followed by an inquiry into the question how a law of nature could possibly be broken (chapter 12) and a survey of the extant metaphysical theories of the laws of nature with special regard to their receptivity to interaction (chapter 13). Finally, in chapter 14 I develop a theory of the laws of nature both faithful to their divine origin and the possibility of mental interaction: dispositionalist divine decretalism, a synthesis of dispositionalism and Jeffrey Koperski’s divine decretalism.