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Single Idea 22616

[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 8. Particular Causation / b. Causal relata ]

Full Idea

It is the empiricists' refusal to deal with anything other than observable events that motivated the shift in conception of efficient causation …to influence by an event on another event (one motion on another) rather than by an object on an object.

Gist of Idea

Empiricists preferred events to objects as the relata, because they have observable motions

Source

R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 3.10)

Book Ref

'Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Time', ed/tr. Callender,Craig [OUP 2013], p.54

A Reaction

I suppose events supply the necessary activity, whereas objects seem to be too passive for the job - because that's how they look. Ingthorsson persuades that objects are the correct causal relata, for those of us who believe in powers.

The 32 ideas from 'A Powerful Particulars View of Causation'

22606 Neo-Humeans say there are no substantial connections between anything [Ingthorsson]
22605 Humeans describe the surface of causation, while powers accounts aim at deeper explanations [Ingthorsson]
22607 Time and space are not causal, but they determine natural phenomena [Ingthorsson]
22608 Casuation is the transmission of conserved quantities between causal processes [Ingthorsson]
22609 Philosophers accepted first-order logic, because they took science to be descriptive, not explanatory [Ingthorsson]
22610 It is difficult to handle presentism in first-order logic [Ingthorsson]
22611 Metaphysics can criticise interpretations of science theories, and give good feedback [Ingthorsson]
22639 Causal events are always reciprocal, and there is no distinction of action and reaction [Ingthorsson]
22614 Interventionist causal theory says it gets a reliable result whenever you manipulate it [Ingthorsson]
22613 Most materialist views postulate smallest indivisible components which are permanent [Ingthorsson]
22612 Endurance and perdurance just show the consequences of A or B series time [Ingthorsson]
22615 One effect cannot act on a second effect in causation, because the second doesn't yet exist [Ingthorsson]
22616 Empiricists preferred events to objects as the relata, because they have observable motions [Ingthorsson]
22617 Science now says all actions are reciprocal, not unidirectional [Ingthorsson]
22618 In modern physics the first and second laws of motion (unlike the third) fail at extremes [Ingthorsson]
22619 Causes are not agents; the whole interaction is the cause, and the changed compound is the effect [Ingthorsson]
22620 If causation involves production, that needs persisting objects [Ingthorsson]
22621 Causation as transfer only works for asymmetric interactions [Ingthorsson]
22622 Any process can go backwards or forwards in time without violating the basic laws of physics [Ingthorsson]
22624 A cause can fail to produce its normal effect, by prevention, pre-emption, finks or antidotes [Ingthorsson]
22625 Science suggests causal aspects of the constitution and persistance of objects [Ingthorsson]
22627 Compound objects are processes, insofar as change is essential to them [Ingthorsson]
22629 Basic processes are said to be either physical, or organic, or psychological [Ingthorsson]
22630 If particles have decay rates, they can't really be elementary, in the sense of indivisible [Ingthorsson]
22631 Properties are said to be categorical qualities or non-qualitative dispositions [Ingthorsson]
22632 Physics understands the charge of an electron as a power, not as a quality [Ingthorsson]
22633 Indirect realists are cautious about the manifest image, and prefer the scientific image [Ingthorsson]
22634 Counterfactuals don't explain causation, but causation can explain counterfactuals [Ingthorsson]
22635 People only accept the counterfactual when they know the underlying cause [Ingthorsson]
22637 Counterfactual theories are false in possible worlds where causation is actual [Ingthorsson]
22636 Every philosophical theory must be true in some possible world, so the ontology is hopeless [Ingthorsson]
22638 Worlds may differ in various respects, but no overall similarity of worlds is implied [Ingthorsson]