You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
The main point I would like to raise concerns the presence of a plurality of metaphysical commitments in the target article. These commitments seem to arise because of the different ways in which the term correlation and its cognates may be used. I will briefly describe some of these in order to show what these commitments are. This may place us in a better position to appreciate some of the problems that characterize the search for the neural correlates of consciousness.
It is possible to use the term in a neutral manner to indicate coinstantiation and covariation of two kinds of states/properties (e.g., mental and physical). In its neutral use, the term need not commit us to a specific kind of relation between the two kinds. But once we depart from this neutral position the relation of correlation may be fleshed out in a variety of directions some of which are: causal interactionism, preestablished harmony, occasionalism, the doubleaspect theory, epiphenomenalism, the identity theory, and emergentism (Kim, 1996). The first option is typically associated with Cartesian dualism; this cannot be a viable option for the authors since one of them has rejected it in the past (Crick, 1994). The options of preestablished harmony and occasionalism are also