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REGULARITY THEORIES OF CONSTITUTION COMPARED 131
6.2 Symmetry and Reflexivity
In his article, Couch does not explicitly deal with the question whether the constitution
relation as defined is symmetrical, asymmetrical or anti-symmetrical. Furthermore, he does
not specify whether constitution is reflexive. However, in personal correspondence he has
stated that he agrees with Craver in considering constitutive relevance to be symmetric but
not reflexive.
With respect to the issue of symmetry, this may actually be a problem. Unlike Craver, Couch
provides an extensional definition of mechanistic constitution. If symmetry holds for such a
relation, a conditional of the form ABC → F always implies a conditional F → ABC. The latter
conditional, however, is incompatible with a multiple constitution of F, which Couch wished
to allow explicitly (see Section 5 above and Couch 2011, 385). Consequently, the
characterization of mechanistic constitution as a symmetric relation is somewhat at tension
with other assumptions that are present in his article.
With respect to the question of reflexivity, it is clear that Harbecke’s definition of a reflexive
and anti-symmetric relation of constitution offers a criterion for the ontological distinction, or
the reduction, of cognitive and neural processes. With the rejection of reflexivity, Couch,
however, seems to have already introduced an ontological distinction. The point is that now
no cognitive capacity can be identical to the neural mechanisms constituting it. Otherwise
constitution should at least sometimes be reflexive.
This predetermining commitment may be a problem for the analysis of actual constitutional
explanations in neurobiology, as it has been elaborated, for instance, by Craver (2007, 165-
170). At an early stage of research in neuroscience, it typically remains an open question
whether the phenomena under investigation can ultimately be reduced to mechanisms of
lower levels or not. A theory of mechanistic constitution should therefore not exclude identity
a priori.
6.3 Spurious Regularities
A further difference between the two theories lies in the fact that Harbecke’s definition, in
contrast to Couch’s, introduces a condition that excludes certain spurious regularities
between mechanisms and constituted phenomena. These regularities are imagined analogous
to “Factory Manchester Hooters” cases that pose a serious problem for certain regularity
theories of causation (cf. Mackie 1974, 83-87). As it can be easily checked, the causal structure
represented by Figure 1 is a model of the following minimal theory: A¬CF → B. However,
according to the causal structure depicted, A should not be a cause of B. This problem for
regularity theories of causation was only solved by Grasshoff & May (2001).
Figure 1: “Manchester Factory Hooters” (conditions D and E are causally sufficient for A,
and C is the only alternative cause of A; conditions E and F are causally sufficient for, and G
is the only alternative cause of B).