Timeless Causation?

Acta Analytica 38 (3):471-479 (2023)
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Abstract

This paper presents a line of thought against the possibility of causation without time. That possibility, insofar as it is supposedly rested upon a Lewisian counterfactual theory of causation, does not stand up to scrutiny. The key point is that, as a reflection on the trans-world identity of events reveals, (distinct) events deprived of times are—according to Lewis’s own semantics of counterfactuals—no longer eligible to stand in counterfactual dependence.

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Zhiheng Tang
Shandong University

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References found in this work

Essence and modality.Kit Fine - 1994 - Philosophical Perspectives 8 (Logic and Language):1-16.
Causation.David Lewis - 1973 - Journal of Philosophy 70 (17):556-567.
The unreality of time.John Ellis McTaggart - 1908 - Mind 17 (68):457-474.
Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 36 (3):602-605.

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