I’m totally in agreement with Eric concerning the way philosophers make “a priori” predictions and see few problems with their own views, but a myriad with everyone else’s. In fact I think philosophy’s wax nose is so pliant that even after the most thorough scientific investigation of the brain/mind and how it works, there will STILL be substance dualists and physicalists. (Leibnitz for instance introduced the notion of substance dualism that did not even require interactionism! He argued that there was a predetermined parallelism from the point of the mind and brains origins, which of course works if you believe in both physical and divine determinism. Other philosophers like Colin McGinn believe philosophy may never know exactly how the brain/mind functions in a complete sense, just as we can’t know exactly what it’s like to be a bat, to experience life from a bat’s point of view.)

All in all, I think philosophy by its nature cannot help but raise more questions than answers concerning ALL of the BIG questions.

For instance, concerning substance dualism and interactionism one might ask:

Is it only the human brain that needs to interact with a supernatural mind?

How do all those other brains in nature function then?

And if all those other brains in nature can function without needing a supernatural mind to direct them, could a human mind also function without an immaterial mind directing it?

Assuming that all human brains are being directed by individual supernatural minds, what about ingrained habits, both physical and mental that seem to take no thought at all?

Where does the supernatural mind goes when you sleep dreamlessly?

What is the supernatural mind doing the moment before you have a conscious thought or right before you think or speak a word?

Assuming that all human brains are channelling a supernatural mind, could some people have lost their supernatural mind and be running on natural automatic brain power alone? Where are their supernatural minds when that happens?

Does a split-brain patient have two supernatural minds, one for each hemisphere of their split-brain? I ask that because experimental evidence has not discovered any evidence that the split-hemispheres of the split-brain patients can communicate with one another. In fact sometimes they are at odds, one hand opening a door, the other slamming it shut, one hand pulling up his trousers to go to work, the other pulling them down. Yet there is plenty of evidence that consciousness exists in both hemispheres. Even the hemisphere that cannot speak can point to objects or photos or pictures in answer to questions. And some split-brain patients have a normally silent hemisphere that can even speak a little, at least one word replies.

Your comments are right on the money, IMO. Everyone in these debates (naturalists included) is essentially predicting how the problem will look once the science is done.