A nonreductionist’s solution to kim’s explanatory exclusion problem

Resumen

In this paper I shall give a close examination of Kim’s argument for the exclusion problem. Kim thinks that the only solution to the exclusion problem is reductionism. I shall propose another solution that does not require that mental properties be reducible to physical properties, or that psychology be reducible to neuroscience. My paper is divided into three parts. In the first part I shall explain how the explanatory exclusion problem is generated. In the second part I shall examine Kim’s argument for the exclusion of psychological explanation, namely, his supervenience argument. And finally in the third part, I shall offer my solution to this problem. In a nutshell, my solution will be that of mental/physical properties identity defined locally, holistically. My analysis is based on Davidson’s mental/physical event identity. An individual’s mental event is nothing but the physical event of the individual’s brain. But since the properties we use to specify a mental event and the properties we use to specify its corresponding a physical event must be defined through the whole system in which the event in question takes place, these properties cannot be the properties dealt with in either psychology or neuroscience. I shall explain how this analysis of identity does not commit one to mental/physical properties reductionism, or intertheoretic reductionism between psychology and neuroscience.