Mind-body dualism is false

I will certainly try to put up a good fight on a topic which I am sure my opponent has familiarized himself with much more than I have. To summarize before I begin, my argument will rest on the causal closure of the physical realm and from this, the necessary conclusion that causes in a mental realm would not be able to supervene on objects in the physical. Thus, my argument goes, mind-body dualism could not be true as there is no way for it to supervene in any causal way on the physical realm therefore it provides an inadequate explanation to the problem of action and how action could originate from a mental realm. ===Interaction and Causal Closure=== If we accept the premise that dualism is true, we must be able to fit it in to our general conception of the mind. Currently, we know that when someone decides to do something, neurons in the brain fire and activate nerve impulses to make whatever muscles necessary for the action contract (for instance wiggling your toes or twisting your neck). Of course this is a large simplification of the process (more detailed information can be found here[1] and in a plethora of educational sites on the subject), but all in all we have good reason to believe that physical forces are involved in most if not all parts of how we perform actions. For dualism to be true, it must be able to show how the originating mental cause of actions are able to supervene on the physical. If it cannot than dualism cannot be true (or at the very least we are left with no reason to think so, effectively achieving the same effect for the practical purposes of the debate). The way we can know that causes and forces within some mental realm would not be able to affect objects in the physical is through the physical causal closure principle (hereon referred to as PCCP). The principle states simply that "No physical event has a cause outside the physical domain. "[2] Credence is given to the validity of the principle through the law of conservation of energy. The law states that the amount of energy contained in the universe remains constant over time. Based on this, we have good reason to believe that there is no energy transfer (nor can there for that matter) between the physical realm and some external system since if there was, there would be a fluctuating amount of energy within the universe. If there is no energy transfer than there is no way (which we can conceive) that mental causal forces could interact with the physical. I would implore my opponent to provide some other way in which causation can occur (that without energy transfer). If no other way can be shown than there is not good reason to believe that causal forces in a mental realm have any effect on physical objects. ===Conclusion=== I apologize to my opponent for the relative shortness of this round. I mean it purely to be introductory to the main tenets of my case. The 'Argument from Causal Closure' is rather easily stated, therefore I would rather provide a summary of the basic argument, allowing my opponent to bring his rebuttals to the specific points he finds at fault. Summarized, the universe is an isolated system, thus energy transfers between it and external systems is not possible. Without energy transfer though, causation does not appear to be conceivably possible. Thus dualism is incompatible with the reality of mental causation. I look forward to my opponent's response. ===Sources=== [1] . http://people.eku.edu... [2] . http://www.iscid.org...