Re: Why choose a paragraph element for a paragraph?

In article <slrngsank8.3b8.spamspam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Ben C <spamspam@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 2009-03-21, dorayme <doraymeRidThis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
....
I am just mentioning it as a proposed solution to what makes
counterfactuals true, and ipso facto, what is one explanation of the
nature of causal connections.

But why does anything have to make them true, and what exactly is meant
by their "nature" here?

In ordinary language there is no problem with the meaning of the word
"cause". It doesn't have, or need, a single particular definition and
causal statements don't need truth conditions. It has a family of uses
including mechanical connections, concomitances of events, motives, etc.


You are right, in common use, the word 'cause' is well understood. I
would not be wanting a *definition* for any reason, even for us talking
about the idea now. But some clarity about what can be said to be causes
is a different matter.

To be clear, we need to distinguish all sorts of things. Your Sunday
walk example was a beauty. How can Sunday really be a cause of your
walking? Well, I tried to indicate how that could be by telling a story
about you *thinking it Sunday* was a clearly understood cause for your
walking and you thinking it was Sunday would have been caused in turn by
the fact that it was Sunday. Sure, there may be many links in this chain
and ultimately we get to links we cannot analyse too much further and
then our common understanding kicks in.

And when we characterise this common basic understanding, we understand
that at the very least we are saying that had it not been for the A in
the circumstances concerned, there would not have been a B. This
counterfactual is simply something that must be true if A really does
cause B. It is not a definition in the sense that we somehow understand
this counterfactual *better* than we understand the causal connection.
As I said, in the analysis I have suspected you lean towards, the
primitive notion of cause *is* the whole content and explanation of the
truth of the counterfactual.

....

There has to be a very good reason to say _anything_ is the
"nature" of causation.


Does there have to be a very good reason for philosophical speculation?
Hume looked at the mater and complained against essentialists that he
saw nothing but regularities. Most of just know he was wrong, no matter
how valiant the efforts of empiricists. Sure, no one admits to spooky.
But there is more than mere regularity! What more? That is philosophy.

According to the theory, the causal connection consists in the
existence of (a) world(s) that is/are just like ours in every relevant
respect except for A not happening. The parentheses in the last are to
cut some slack for how "relevant" is defined.

I suspect the complete specification of relevance is exactly equivalent
to the complete specification of all the little rods and pulleys in the
"only-one-world" picture.

In *none* of these worlds, does B happen.

....

[...]
I say A causes B, you ask why, I say I don't know probably some chemical
reaction in the brain or something. You could then say: rubbish, you
don't know anything about how the brain works. All you really mean is if
A hadn't happened B wouldn't have etc.

I guess that we can *try* to cut through all this to bare bones: is
there a stage at which we say here is an A and here is a B and they are
as clear as could be, and there is nothing hidden, there are no further
links in the chain, here we have the smallest link and one causes the
other! It might appear at this point that there are at least three
options:

1. Find the truth-makers for counterfactuals in other worlds.

2. Find them them in actual things - that are better understood than
'causes' - in this world.

or

3. Say we have a primitive concept, Houston. If A had not happened then
B would not happened simply because it was *caused* by B. This primitive
fact, if you like, is what makes the counterfactual true. That *is* the
truth-maker.

I would lean towards 3, but not that cause is a particularly primitive
concept-- it's just a concept like any other.


Well, not sure what you mean by it being a concept just like any other.
There is not all that much puzzling about the concept of 'a tree'. Or if
there is, the puzzles are quite different in kind or raise quite
different issues. There are some special puzzles about causation and
deep ones too. The whole nature of science can get dragged into the ring
on this one. How do laws really govern things? There is no
interuniversepolice to ensure apples fall to earth when they become
detached from apple trees.


1 and 2 are both contrivances really.

Any elaborate theory can be seen as a contrivance if you think it
untrue.


But if there is a good reason for
contrivances (which I'm skeptical about, but don't rule out completely)
then why choose 2 over 1? The real answer must lie in whatever the
reason was for choosing a contrivance in the first place.

With respect, this is a very biassed way of putting it. If you think 1.
is true, you are not likely to think of it as a contrivance! Same goes
for 2. And if you think 3. you are unlikely to be troubled enough by it
to see it as spooky. If you thought that, you would not be so
comfortable with 3. in the first place.

--
dorayme
.