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Single Idea 13601

[filed under theme 14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism ]

Full Idea

Explanations of particular events in history, geology, or evolution, are causal explanations, requiring belief in some causal mechanisms. But they are not essentialist explanations because they do not seek to lay bare the essential structure of anything.

Gist of Idea

Explanations of particular events are not essentialist, as they don't reveal essential structures

Source

Brian Ellis (Scientific Essentialism [2001], 4.05)

Book Ref

Ellis,Brian: 'Scientific Essentialism' [CUP 2007], p.160

A Reaction

The explanation might be two-stage, as when we explain an earthquake by a plate boundary rupture, which is in turn explained by a theory of plate techtonics. The relationship between mechanistic and essentialist explanation needs study.

The 32 ideas with the same theme [explanation by revealing underlying mechanisms]:

16560 Galileo introduced geometrico-mechanical explanation, based on Archimedes [Galileo, by Machamer/Darden/Craver]
15960 Explanation is deducing a phenomenon from some nature better known to us [Boyle]
18716 A machine strikes us as being a rule of movement [Wittgenstein]
16557 Salmon's mechanisms are processes and interactions, involving marks, or conserved quantities [Salmon, by Machamer/Darden/Craver]
13045 Explanation at the quantum level will probably be by entirely new mechanisms [Salmon]
13062 Does an item have a function the first time it occurs? [Salmon]
13063 Explanations reveal the mechanisms which produce the facts [Salmon]
17093 Causation produces productive mechanisms; to understand the world, understand these mechanisms [Salmon]
17492 Salmon's interaction mechanisms needn't be regular, or involving any systems [Glennan on Salmon]
13601 Explanations of particular events are not essentialist, as they don't reveal essential structures [Ellis]
15885 The necessity of Newton's First Law derives from the nature of material things, not from a mechanism [Harré]
15254 If the nature of particulars explains their powers, it also explains their relations and behaviour [Harré/Madden]
15317 Powers and natures lead us to hypothesise underlying mechanisms, which may be real [Harré/Madden]
16842 We want to know not just the cause, but how the cause operated [Lipton]
16528 Mechanisms are not just push-pull systems [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
16529 Mechanisms are systems organised to produce regular change [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
16530 A mechanism explains a phenomenon by showing how it was produced [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
16553 Our account of mechanism combines both entities and activities [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
16559 Descriptions of explanatory mechanisms have a bottom level, where going further is irrelevant [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
17493 Modern mechanism need parts with spatial, temporal and function facts, and diagrams [Glennan]
17487 Mechanistic philosophy of science is an alternative to the empiricist law-based tradition [Glennan]
17489 Mechanisms are either systems of parts or sequences of activities [Glennan]
17490 17th century mechanists explained everything by the kinetic physical fundamentals [Glennan]
17491 Unlike the lawlike approach, mechanistic explanation can allow for exceptions [Glennan]
17500 General theories may be too abstract to actually explain the mechanisms [Portides]
12787 Mechanisms can't explain on their own, as their models rest on pragmatic regularities [Leuridan]
14384 We can show that regularities and pragmatic laws are more basic than mechanisms [Leuridan]
14386 Mechanisms are ontologically dependent on regularities [Leuridan]
14388 Mechanisms must produce macro-level regularities, but that needs micro-level regularities [Leuridan]
14568 A structure won't give a causal explanation unless we know the powers of the structure [Mumford/Anjum]
17471 Using mechanisms as explanatory schemes began in chemistry [Weisberg/Needham/Hendry]
17472 Thick mechanisms map whole reactions, and thin mechanism chart the steps [Weisberg/Needham/Hendry]