Dove, G. (2018). Redefining physicalism. Topoi, 37(3), 513-522 doi:10.1007/s11245-016-9405-0
[Abstract]Philosophers have traditionally treated physicalism as an empirically informed metaphysical thesis. This approach faces a well-known problem often referred to as Hempel’s dilemma: formulations of physicalism tend to be either false or indeterminate. The generally preferred strategy to address this problem involves an appeal to a hypothetical complete and ideal physical theory. After demonstrating that this strategy is not viable, I argue that we should redefine physicalism as an interdisciplinary research program seeking to explain the mental in terms of the physical that encompasses the physical sciences, the psychological and brain sciences, and philosophy. Redefining physicalism in this way improves upon previous reconstructive accounts while avoiding the indeterminacy associated with orthodox forms of futurist physicalism.
[Citing Place (1956)]  
Citing Place (1956) in context (citations start with an asterisk *):
Section 4 From Materialism to Research Program Physicalism
* The origins of research program physicalism can be traced back to Descartes, albeit to aspects of his views that are not always emphasized in orthodox discussions of the mind–body problem. Certainly, Descartes is one of the originators of classical materialism.
* Research program physicalism seeks to offer a positive, empirically informed account of the how the physical gives rise to or explains the mental. [...] [A] very brief survey will be sufficient to demonstrate that the positive Cartesian project is alive and well.
A good place to start is the identity theory (Place 1956; Feigl 1958; Smart 1959; Lewis 1966) because it was consciously developed in the context of physicalism. Broadly construed, the identity theory holds that mental state types can be identified with brain state types. In perhaps the most influential defense of this view, Smart (1959, p. 143) offers the following observation as an explanation of the impetus behind his proposal that sensations are nothing more than brain processes: "It seems to me that science is increasingly giving us a viewpoint whereby organisms are able to be seen as physico-chemical mechanisms." Now, strictly speaking, the identity theory is a metaphysical proposal and does not require a commitment to the sort of the interdisciplinary research program that I am advocating. There are a couple of reasons though to think that research program physicalism would be a reasonable extension of the philosophical project behind the identity theory. First, some supporters explicitly view the identity theory as a scientific hypothesis (Place 1956; Feigl 1958). Second, the relevant identities would underwrite a form of reductive explanation that is often associated with scientific progress (Nagel 1961; Schaffner 1967).