Dewey's Metaphysics of Mind

In Experience and Nature Dewey makes "an attempt to contribute to what has come to be calledan 'emergent' theory of mind". On a first approach, that doesn't look very innovative to ourcontemporary materialist convictions. Indeed, Kim argues persuasively that a central claim ofemergentism - concerning the irreducibility of emergent properties - is irremediably at oddswith a view of mental causation that follows from some very plausible physicalist assumptions.This is "the problem of downward causation." I intend to show that Dewey's brand ofemergentism actually allows an adequate reply to the very important worry formulated by Kim.