Stephen Yablo has recently argued for a novel solution to the mental causation problem: the mental is related to the physical
as determinables are related to determinates; determinables are not causal rivals with their determinates; so the mental and
the physical are not causal rivals. Despite its attractions the suggestion seems hard to accept. In this paper I develop the
idea that mental properties and physical properties are not causal rivals. Start with property dualism, supervenience, multiple
realizability, and the claim that no more than one supervenience base for a mental property can be had by a single instance
of the mental property. Then a probabilistic account of causation will be unable to certify either mental properties or physical
properties as causal factors for effect types. I suggest that this shows that we should not count mental properties as causal
rivals with physical properties.
Keywords Mental causation - Probabilistic causation - Supervenience - Mind/Body Problem - Non-reductive physicalism