ORIENTATION

The main aim of this first chapter is simply to provide a clear and tolerably precise formulation of realization physicalism, the version of physicalism whose consequences and plausibility the remainder of the book examines. I postpone until chapter 5 and 6 the question of whether there is actually any evidence for or against it, contenting myself here with getting onto the table a formulation of physicalism definite enough to serve as a rallying point for its friends and a target for its foes. Doing so, however, also yields two desirable by-products: first, it rebuts the charge that physicalism cannot even be formulated adequately (so that any search for evidence in its support is premature); and, second, it reveals realization physicalism's thoroughly a posteriori character.

To get an intuitive grasp of what realizationism claims about the world, consider a humble can opener. Surely there is some good sense in which a can opener is a purely physical object. And yet can openers are in one clear sense not physical: fundamental physics does not speak of can openers as such, because “can opener” is not a predicate of any physical theory. So what is the sense in which can openers are physical? Well, it is plausible upon reflection to say that all it takes for there to be a can opener is for there to exist some object that meets a certain job description: that of having the capacity to help in the opening of cans (and perhaps of being designed or at least deliberately used for this purpose).