Physicalism and Alternatives

Abstract

Physicalism is the thesis that all there really is is whatever there has to be given the way reality is physically. Thus, if physicalism is true and there really are people, shopping malls, cities, and countries, then, given the way reality is physically, there have to be people, shopping malls, cities, and countries. The alternatives to physicalism imply that there are actual phenomena in addition to whatever phenomena there have to be given the way reality is physically. Substance dualism is an alternative that maintains that there are actual substances—for example, immaterial souls, or entelechies, or disembodied spirits—that need not exist given the way reality is physically. Property dualism, another alternative to physicalism, maintains that there are properties—for example, irreducible mental properties or irreducible moral properties—whose actual pattern of distribution need not occur given the way reality is physically. Physicalism is a controversial thesis. Even if it is true, it might have been false; one or more of the alternative views might have been true instead. The debate over whether physicalism or one of its alternatives is true is thus an empirical debate.