Is There a Disappearing Agent Problem for Agent Causalists?

Abstract

The disappearing agent problem is traditionally cast as a tension between events and event-causation, on the one hand, and agents and agent-causation on the other. However, as we show, the tension between events and agents can be recast as a tension between causation by agents and causation by parts of agents. If this is right, agent-causalists have their own disappearing agent problem to deal with. After setting out a version of this problem in the form of an overdetermination argument, we present available responses to it. By examining these responses, our aim is to motivate the elaboration of an idea of derivative causation within agent-causal theories of action, whereby complex agents with parts cause whatever they must cause in order to act by way of their parts causing it.