BOOK REVIEW
By Bradford McCall
Holy Apostles College and Seminary, USA
Structure and the Metaphysics of Mind: How Hylomorphism Solves the Mind-Body Problem. By William Jaworski. (Oxford: OUP, 2016. Pp. ix + 361. Price $82.95.)
William Jaworski is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Fordham University. His previous book is Philosophy of Mind: A Comprehensive Introduction (2011) and he is also the author of a number of papers relating to metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of religion. Structure and the Metaphysics of Mind attempts to show how hylomorphism can be used to solve mind-body problems such as understanding how thought, feeling, perception, and other mental phenomena fit into the physical world described by science.
Articulating an acceptable mind-body theory has been a major objective of philosophy of mind for more than fifty years. Hylomorphic metaphysics, Jaworski notes, have been neglected since the seventeenth century. As a result, it is necessary to articulate hylomorphism in a rigorous manner that makes it able to compete with more familiar alternatives. Familiar anti-reductive and broadly naturalistic theories of this sort include various forms of non-reductive physicalism and emergentism. Jaworski’s form of hylomorphism rejects both physicalism and some tenets of emergentism.
Hylomorphism claims that structure is a basic ontological and explanatory principle. Some individuals consist of materials that are structured or organized in various ways. You and I are not mere physical quantities; rather, we are quantities of physical material arranged with a certain organizational structure. The structure is responsible for individuals being the kinds of things they are, and having the kinds of developmental, metabolic, reproductive, perceptive, and cognitive capacities we have. From Jaworski’s hylomorphic perspective, mind-body problems are symptomatic of a worldview that rejects structure. Hylomorphic structure carves out distinctive individuals from the otherwise undifferentiated matter that is or will be described by our best physics, and it confers on those individuals distinctive powers.
Despite differing in its basic principles from familiar mind-body theories, hylomorphism has a familiar profile. It is, for example, naturalistic; it is also nonreductive. As nonreductive, it denies that descriptions and explanations of the powers to think, feel, perceive, and act are reducible to the models provided by fundamental physics, chemistry, or neuroscience. This denial is due to hylomorphism affirming that there are higher-level structures that unify simpler lower-level entities and occurrences into more complex individuals and activities, which are the subject matters of sciences such as biology and psychology. The descriptions and explanations of living behaviour advanced by biologists posit notions of organization or structure that play theoretical roles like the hylomorphic theory. Hylomorphic theory claims that structure really exists and Jaworski makes three claims about structure as a running theme throughout this text: structure matters, for it operates as an irreducible ontological principle; structure makes a difference, as it accounts at least in part for what things can do; structure counts, as it explains the unity of composite things, including the persistence a living individual through the dynamic influx and efflux of matter and energy. He defends a hylomorphic theory built around a notion of structure that plays these three roles.
Jaworski’s hylomorphic theory is based on a substance-attribute ontology that takes properties to be powers and tropes. The hylomorphic theory that he defends is similar to Peter van Inwagen’s (1990), who weds an account of structure to an account of composition that happens when the activities of fundamental physical particles constitute a life. One area of convergence with van Inwagen’s view is that composite individuals are emergent on the hylomorphic view in that they have distinctive powers different from the powers of unstructured materials. It is this aspect, Jaworski claims, that enables hylomorphic theory to solve the mind-body problem that its competitors cannot.
There are several philosophical challenges that Jaworski defends his hylomorphic theory against. Some of the concerns relate to the metaphysics of powers and tropes on which it is based, and Jaworski addresses these concerns in chs. two through five. Other challenges to the hylomorphic view concern its account of composition, which includes the following: arguments advanced by van Inwagen (1981) that purport to show that there are no functional parts within bodies; arguments advanced by Ted Sider (1993) and Dean Zimmerman (2003) that purport to show that a view of composition similar to van Inwagen’s has the problem of infinitely divisible stuff; arguments such as those advanced by David Lewis (1986) and Sider (2001) that purport to show that composition cannot be restricted; and arguments advanced by various Thomists that purport to show things like electrons cannot be incorporated into more inclusive wholes. Jaworski defends his hylomorphic theory against these objections in chs. 6 and 7.
In ch. 8, Jaworski defends the embodiment thesis, which claims that the capacities of structured wholes are essentially embodied in their parts; this thesis represents the default hylomorphic position. It is challenged, however, by Aristotelian and Thomistic hylomorphists who claim that the operation of one capacity in particular like thought or understanding is not essentially embodied. Jaworski argues that this position is flawed in a number of ways. Chapters nine through eleven address the concern, in varying ways, that hylomorphism is just a polite form of materialism, with materialism being synonymous with physicalism. A related challenge is from those who argue that any theory which approaches phenomenal consciousness in the way hylomorphism does must be false, an argument that hylomorphists reject since conceivability is not a general guide to possibility; this concern is addressed in chs. 12 and 13.
Additionally, chs. 13 and 14 form an argument against competing versions of hylomorphism and argues positively for Jaworski’s form of hylomorphism because it is superior with regard to metaphysics and how addresses issues in the philosophy of mind. Indeed, part of what makes hylomorphism so attractive to Jaworski is how elegant the solutions are that it forms for the problems of emergence and mental causation, and the problem of other minds. Herein, Jaworski stipulates that it is easier to defend hylomorphism than it is to defend physicalism because it does not make the totalizing claims about physics that physicalism does. Hylomorphism endorses a plurality of structures and a plurality of autonomous scientific disciplines that describe them. Consequently, it does not fall prey to the limitations of monistic theories of physicalism.
Although Jaworski’s form of hylomorphism rejects both physicalism and some tenets of emergentism, it shares some similarities with these more familiar theories so that their exponents will see within hylomorphic theory a congenial alternative or a worthy competitor. Hylomorphism is superior to emergence, in Jaworski’s opinion, however, because it can solve the problem of downward causation and the problem of other minds. Mental phenomena are structural phenomena, and therefore they are non-controversially part of the physical world, for on the hylomorphic view, structure is non-controversially part of the physical world. The hylomorphic theory that Jaworski defends dovetails with current work in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, biology in general and neuroscience in particular. In this title, Jaworski argues that there are good philosophical and empirical reasons to reintroduce hylomorphism’s core notions of organization and structure. While I have not been convinced of hylomorphism’s worthiness in lieu of emergence theory, to which I have subscribed for years, Jaworski has nonetheless given me food for thought. I recommend this title unhesitantly for anyone interested in philosophy of science generally, and philosophy of mind in particular.
REFERENCE
Jaworski W. (2011) Philosophy of Mind: A Comprehensive Introduction. Wiley-Blackwell