Nonreductive Physicalism: Integrating Science, Theology, and Philosophy of Mind
I argue briefly that during the modern period there has been no adequate account of the “metaphysical makeup” of the human person—one that met scientific, philosophical, and religious requirements. Only now, with the development of the concepts of emergence and downward causation in “postmodern Anglo-American philosophy” can a suitable position be defined: nonreductive physicalism. Physicalism (i.e., anti-dualism, whether mind-body or soul-body) is the only metaphysical account compatible with current developments in neuroscience. In contemporary philosophy of mind, however, it is hotly debated whether physicalism can avoid being reductive (i.e., taking mental events to be merely epiphenomenal). Furthermore, while most lay Christians; many Jews, both lay and scholarly; and most Muslims hold a dualist or more complex trichotomist account, Christian scholarship over the past one hundred years has increasingly called for the acceptance of a physicalist account. However, the theological workability of physicalism depends on the success of an argument against reductionism.
In this his paper I will take for granted the scientific acceptability of physicalism. I will review the history of Christian scholarship, both biblical studies and critical church history, calling for the rejection of dualism. I will then sketch a philosophical solution to the reductionist problem. I argue that reductionism has been an assumed element of the modern worldview until the present day. However, reductionism is now being called into question by a new paradigm, across all the sciences, namely the shift from mechanical metaphors to the use of the conceptual resources of complex dynamical systems theory.
