Introduction: The law of causality and its methodology -- Recent causal realism in quantum physics -- The law of causality : Hume, Quine and quantum physics -- Ontological and probabilistic causalisms -- Laplacean causalism in quantum physics -- Ontological commitment in quantum physics -- Causality in some quantum experiments -- Interpretations of important results in quantum physics -- Causality in the EPR paradox: Part 1. The physics -- Causality in (...) the EPR paradox: Part 2. The physical ontology -- Causality in a new double slit experiment and in EPR -- Causality in the special theory of relativity -- Micro-physical and cosmic causal continuity -- Conclusion: Causal ubiquity in the micro-world. (shrink)

Much has been written on the role of causal notions and causal reasoning in the so-called 'special sciences' and in common sense. But does causal reasoning also play a role in physics? Mathias Frisch argues that, contrary to what influential philosophical arguments purport to show, the answer is yes. Time-asymmetric causal structures are as integral a part of the representational toolkit of physics as a theory's dynamical equations. Frisch develops his argument partly through a critique of anti-causal arguments (...) and partly through a detailed examination of actual examples of causal notions in physics, including causal principles invoked in linear response theory and in representations of radiation phenomena. Offering a new perspective on the nature of scientific theories and causal reasoning, this book will be of interest to professional philosophers, graduate students, and anyone interested in the role of causal thinking in science. (shrink)

The paper revisits the old controversy over causality and determinism and argues, in the first place, that non˗deterministic theories of modern science are largely irrelevant to the philosophical issue of the causality principle. As it seems to be the ‘moral’ of the uncertainty principle, the reason why a deterministic theory cannot be applied to the description of certain physical systems is that it is impossible to capture such properties of the system, which are required by a desired theory. (...) These properties constitute what is called ‘the state’ of a system. However, the notion of a state of a system is relative: it depends on a particular theory which one would like to use to describe given kinds of phenomena. This implies that, even in the case where the desired state of a system is fundamentally impossible to be captured, neither ontological nor epistemological determinism may be excluded. Some following critical considerations are also offered with regard to the claim that uncertainty is “rooted in the things themselves”. The cradle of modern discussions about causality and determinism is, of course, quantum mechanics. Because, as it appears, a judgment on deterministic or non˗deterministic character of a theory can be made only after some interpretation of this theory has been given, the paper briefly reminds some chosen interpretations of quantum mechanics (Schrödinger's, probabilistic, statistical, Copenhagen, and the interpretation of quantum ensembles). Many of such interpretations, offered in the past, have now been rejected, and some gained more credibility than the others. Nonetheless, even the claim that indeterminism is irremovable from the description of the micro-world doesn't imply the rejection of the most general formula of the philosophical causality principle. There is no direct implication between theses of the epistemology of scientific knowledge and those of the ontology of the real world. (shrink)

In this classic, David Bohm was the first to offer us his causal interpretation of the quantum theory. _Causality and Chance in Modern Physics_ continues to make possible further insight into the meaning of the quantum theory and to suggest ways of extending the theory into new directions.

The argument from causal closure of the physical is usually considered the most powerful argument in favor of the ontological doctrine of physicalism. Many authors, most notably Papineau, assume that CCP implies that physicalism is supported by physics. I demonstrate, however, that physical science has no bias in the ontological debate between proponents of physicalism and dualism. I show that the arguments offered for CCP are effective only against the accounts of mental causation based on the action of the (...) mental forces of a Newtonian nature, i.e. those which manifest themselves by causing accelerations. However, it is conceivable and possible that mental causation is manifested through the redistribution of energy, momentum and other conserved quantities in the system, brought about by altering the state probability distribution within the living system and leading to anomalous correlations of neural processes. After arguing that a probabilistic, interactionist model of mental causation is conceivable, which renders the argument from causal closure of the physical ineffective, I point to some basic features that such a model must have in order to be intelligible. At the same time, I indicate the way that conclusive testing of CCP can be done within the theoretical framework of physics. (shrink)

The argument from causal closure of the physical is usually considered the most powerful argument in favor of the ontological doctrine of physicalism. Many authors, most notably Papineau, assume that CCP implies that physicalism is supported by physics. I demonstrate, however, that physical science has no bias in the ontological debate between proponents of physicalism and dualism. I show that the arguments offered for CCP are effective only against the accounts of mental causation based on the action of the (...) mental forces of a Newtonian nature, i.e. those which manifest themselves by causing accelerations. However, it is conceivable and possible that mental causation is manifested through the redistribution of energy, momentum and other conserved quantities in the system, brought about by altering the state probability distribution within the living system and leading to anomalous correlations of neural processes. After arguing that a probabilistic, interactionist model of mental causation is conceivable, which renders the argument from causal closure of the physical ineffective, I point to some basic features that such a model must have in order to be intelligible. At the same time, I indicate the way that conclusive testing of CCP can be done within the theoretical framework of physics. (shrink)

The article discusses Philip Goff’s latest projects of developing panpsychist research program as one that is capable of revealing the place of consciousness in the physical world and accounting for the intrinsic nature of physical reality, while avoiding the problem of the causal closure of the physical that is supposed to be pernicious for psychophysical dualism. The case is made that on the one hand, dualism has pretty good resources to meet the inductive no-gap objection appealing to the causal closure, (...) while on the other hand, insofar as this objection has some force, panpsychism in the forms discussed in Goff’s book Galileo’s Error (Goff, P. 2019. Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness. New York: Pantheon Books) faces nearly the same difficulties and its capability of overcoming these difficulties is problematic. While the hybrid cosmopsychism, as developed in Goff’s later manuscript, circumvents the causal closure problem, it does so at the price of relying on assumptions that are hardly intelligible. (shrink)

Norton has recently argued that causation is merely a useful folk concept and that it fails to hold for some simple systems even in the supposed paradigm case of a causal physical theory – namely Newtonian mechanics. The purpose of this article is to argue against this devaluation of causality in physics. My main argument is that Norton’s alleged counterexample to causality within standard Newtonian physics fails to obey what I shall call the causal core of (...) Newtonian mechanics. In particular, I argue, Norton’s example is not in conformity with Newton’s first law. Moreover, Norton’s reformulation of this first law seems insufficient as a replacement for the original version since the notion of inertial frames in the resulting reformulated theory lacks a physical justification, and since an intelligible notion of time in Newtonian mechanics appears to be closely tied to Newton’s first law in its standard form. I will finally suggest how, given a plausible relationist account of time, the causal core of Newtonian mechanics may play a central role also in relativity and quantum theory. (shrink)

Hitchcock demonstrated that the validity of causal exclusion arguments as well as the plausibility of several of their premises hinges on the specific theory of causation endorsed. In this paper I show that the validity of causal exclusion arguments—if represented within the theory of causal Bayes nets the way Gebharter suggests—actually requires much weaker premises than the ones which are typically assumed. In particular, neither completeness of the physical domain nor the no overdetermination assumption are required.

While scientific realism generally assumes that successful scientific explanations yield information about reality, realists also have to admit that not all information acquired in this way is equally well warranted. Some versions of scientific realism do this by saying that explanatory posits with which we have established some kind of causal contact are better warranted than those that merely appear in theoretical hypotheses. I first explicate this distinction by considering some general criteria that permit us to distinguish causal warrant from (...) theoretical warrant. I then apply these criteria to a specific case from particle physics, claiming that scientific realism has to incorporate the distinction between causal and theoretical warrant if it is to be an adequate stance in the philosophy of particle physics. (shrink)

Nonreductive physicalists endorse the principle of mental causation, according to which some events have mental causes: Sid climbs the hill because he wants to. Nonreductive physicalists also endorse the principle of physical causal completeness, according to which physical events have sufficient physical causes: Sid climbs the hill because a complex neural process in his brain triggered his climbing. Critics typically level the causal exclusion problem against this nonreductive physicalist model, according to which the physical cause is a sufficient cause of (...) the behavioural effect, so the mental cause is excluded from causally influencing Sid’s behaviour. In this paper I demonstrate how numerous nonreductive physicalists have responded to the causal exclusion problem by weakening the principle of physical causal completeness in numerous ways. The result: either numerous nonreductive physicalist solutions fail on account of the fact that they do not satisfy a robustly defined principle of physical causal completeness, or there is an accelerating trend of solving the causal exclusion problem by suitably weakening the principle of physical causal completeness. (shrink)

The evolution of the human mind through natural selection mandates that our conscious experiences are causally potent in order to leave a tangible impact upon the surrounding physical world. Any attempt to construct a functional theory of the conscious mind within the framework of classical physics, however, inevitably leads to causally impotent conscious experiences in direct contradiction to evolution theory. Here, we derive several rigorous theorems that identify the origin of the latter impasse in the mathematical properties of ordinary (...) differential equations employed in combination with the alleged functional production of the mind by the brain. Then, we demonstrate that a mind--brain theory consistent with causally potent conscious experiences is provided by modern quantum physics, in which the unobservable conscious mind is reductively identified with the quantum state of the brain and the observable brain is constructed by the physical measurement of quantum brain observables. The resulting quantum stochastic dynamics obtained from sequential quantum measurements of the brain is governed by stochastic differential equations, which permit genuine free will exercised through sequential conscious choices of future courses of action. Thus, quantum reductionism provides a solid theoretical foundation for the causal potency of consciousness, free will and cultural transmission. (shrink)

An influential tradition in the philosophy of causation has it that all token causal facts are, or are reducible to, facts about difference-making. Challenges to this tradition have typically focused on pre-emption cases, in which a cause apparently fails to make a difference to its effect. However, a novel challenge to the difference-making approach has recently been issued by Alyssa Ney. Ney defends causal foundationalism, which she characterizes as the thesis that facts about difference-making depend upon facts about physical causation. (...) She takes this to imply that causation is not fundamentally a matter of difference-making. In this paper, I defend the difference-making approach against Ney’s argument. I also offer some positive reasons for thinking, pace Ney, that causation is fundamentally a matter of difference-making. (shrink)

The causal closure of physics is usually discussed in a context free way. Here I discuss it in the context of engineering systems and biology, where strong emergence takes place due to a combination of upwards emergence and downwards causation. Firstly, I show that causal closure is strictly limited in terms of spatial interactions because these are cases that are of necessity strongly interacting with the environment. Effective Spatial Closure holds ceteris parabus, and can be violated by Black Swan (...) Events. Secondly, I show that causal closure in the hierarchy of emergence is a strictly interlevel affair, and in the cases of engineering and biology encompasses all levels from the social level to the particle physics level. However Effective Causal Closure can usefully be defined for a restricted set of levels, and one can experimentally determine Effective Theories that hold at each level. This does not however imply those effective theories are causally complete by themselves. In particular, the particle physics level is not causally complete by itself in the contexts of solid state physics, digital computers, or biology. Furthermore Inextricably Intertwined Levels occur in all these contexts. (shrink)

The existence of causal explanations in science has been an issue of interest in Western philosophy from its very beginnings. That is the reason this work, following an idea of Mario Bunge, makes a historical review of this matter. The modern treatment of this subject takes place since the postulation by Popper and Hempel of the D-N model of scientific explanation, whose viability is scrutinized here from different points of view in the current philosophy of science. The main object of (...) this paper is to present two arguments against the possibility of causal explanations in theoretical physics. The first one concerns the existence, in certain cases, of inter-theoretical incompatibilities, and the second refers to the need to resort, in other cases, to concatenations of laws of different theories and disciplines. The final conclusion will be the defence of a form of theoretical explanation, which follows the Popper-Hempel model, but devoid of any ontological and metaphysical connotations. (shrink)

In this work we try to study theories of causation based upon causal processes and causal interactions in the context of classical and quantum physics. Our central aim is to find out whether such causal theories are compatible with the world picture suggested by contemporary theories of physics. In the first part, we review, compare and try to place among more general taxonomical schemes, the causal theories by Russell (the causal lines approach), Reichenbach (mark method, probabilistic causality (...) and the principle of common cause), Salmon (mark method, structure, invariant and conserved quantities approaches) and Dowe (conserved quantity theory). In the second part of the work, we deal with some problems that process theories of causation face whenever one tries to define, rigorously, causal concepts (e.g. “causal process” or “conjunctive common cause”) in the context of classical relativistic physical theories (van Dam – Wigner particle theory, the free Klein-Gordon field, classical electromagnetic theory) as well as quantum theories (algebraic relativistic quantum field theory). In this vein, special attention has been given to the locality problem in physical theories as it emerges from the structure of local classical the quantum theories (semantic locality), the relation between global and local conditions for physical systems (global and local determinism) as well as the problem of action at a distance, which is of central importance for the theories of causation under examination (Bell’s inequalities, EPR paradox, Reeh-Schlieder theorem and local independence conditions). We argue for three different theses: first, there are physical theories in the context of which it is impossible even to formulate the necessary physical hypotheses that allow us to define basic causal concepts and causal principles; second, there are physical theories which allow us to formulate these hypotheses only ad hoc; finally, in some cases it is necessary to revise basic causal principles and concepts bequeathed by the philosophical tradition. (shrink)

Many philosophers now regard causal approaches to explanation as highly promising, even in physics. This is due in large part to James Woodward's influential argument that a wide variety of scientific explanations are causal, based on his interventionist approach to causation. This article argues that some derivations describing causal relations and satisfying Woodward's criteria for causal explanation fail to be explanatory. Further, causal relations are unnecessary for a range of explanations, widespread in physics, involving highly idealized models. These (...) constitute significant limitations on the scope of causal explanation. We have good reason to doubt that causal explanation is as widespread or important in physics as Woodward and other proponents maintain. (shrink)

In his book Personal Agency, E. J. Lowe has argued that a dualist theory of mental causation is consistent with “a fairly strong principle of physical causal closure” and, moreover, that it “has the potential to strengthen our causal explanations of certain physical events.” If Lowe’s reasoning were sound, it would undermine the most common arguments for reductive physicalism or epiphenomenalism of the mental. For it would show not only that a dualist theory of mental causation is consistent with a (...) widely held scientific principle, but also that there is some positive reason for accepting the theory. However, I argue that Lowe’s reasoning is unsound, for it requires that causation both is, and is not, transitive: a contradiction. I conclude that if Lowe succeeds in proving that a dualist theory is consistent with physical causal closure, he fails to show that it serves an explanatory purpose. (shrink)

We plead for a fluid margin, or mixed/indeterminate buffer zone, between Physical and Non-Physical Causal Closures, and for a Neutrosophic Causal Closure Principle claiming that the chances of all physical effects are determined by their prior partially physical and partially non-physical causes.

In their paper "How Fundamental Physics represents Causality", Andreas Bartels and Daniel Wohlfarth maintain that there is place for causality in General Relativity. Their argument contains two steps: First they show that there are time-asymmetric models in General Relativity, then they claim to derive that two events are causally connected if and only if there is a time-asymmetric energy flow from one event to the other. In our comment we first give a short summary of their paper (...) followed by a section introducing and pondering different conceptions of causation since Bartels and Wohlfarth don’t explicitly declare which notion of causation they build on in the paper. In order to analyze their argument in detail we formalize their crucial step in logical terms. This helps to pose the question whether their proposed derivation is not just a definition in a more precise way. (shrink)

According to an increasing number of authors, the best, if not the only, argument in favour of physicalism is the so-called 'overdetermination argument'. This argument, if sound, establishes that all the entities that enter into causal interactions with the physical world are physical. One key premise in the overdetermination argument is the principle of the causal closure of the physical world, said to be supported by contemporary physics. In this paper, I examine various ways in which physics may (...) support the principle, either as a methodological guide or as depending on some other laws and principles of physics. (shrink)

This paper, like its companion explores some ways in which, on the one hand, normative theorizing about causation and causal reasoning and, on the other, empirical psychological investigations into causal cognition can be mutually illuminating. The paper carries out this exploration in connection with a variety of topics—the role of information about the presence of a “physical connection” between cause and effect in causal judgment, the role of “proportionality” in choosing the appropriate “level” of explanation, and the role of mechanism (...) information in causal judgment. (shrink)

Contrasting accounts of physicalism and strong emergentism face two problems. According to the neutrality problem, contrasting supervenience-based formulations of these positions cannot be neutral with respect to certain unrelated metaphysical commitments. According to the collapse problem, emergent properties can be accounted for using an appropriately expansive physical ontology, rendering strong emergentism metaphysically suspect. I argue that both these problems can be solved with a principled distinction between emergent causal laws and physical laws. I propose such a distinction based on a (...) finite discontinuity in the behavior of fundamental physical constituents as a function of complexity. (shrink)

Is the physical world causally closed? Can something immaterial have any causal role within physics? This article seeks to answer these questions by explaining the theory of Causal Closure. Causal Closure says that nothing immaterial can have any causal efficacy upon the material world. Physicalists have long held this position and have used it as an argument against Dualism, but does it hold? The hope of this article is that we may better understand the arguments for and against Causal (...) Closure in order to discover a cogent philosophy of science. (shrink)

Many factors are operative in the scientific enterprise to provide the epistemic warrant which finally convinces people to accept a scientific theory. The methods, goals and meanings of terms do not remain fixed, but evolve over time. This paper concentrates on one aspect of this shifting pattern of scientific practice - the role and meaning of causality in modern physics.

We plead for a fluid margin, or mixed/indeterminate buffer zone, between Physical and Non-Physical Causal Closures, and for a Neutrosophic Causal Closure Principle claiming that the chances of all physical effects are determined by their prior partially physical and partially non-physical causes.

It is commonly thought that before the introduction of quantum mechanics, determinism was a straightforward consequence of the laws of mechanics. However, around the nineteenth century, many physicists, for various reasons, did not regard determinism as a provable feature of physics. This is not to say that physicists in this period were not committed to determinism; there were some physicists who argued for fundamental indeterminism, but most were committed to determinism in some sense. However, for them, determinism was often (...) not a provable feature of physical theory, but rather an a priori principle or a methodological presupposition. Determinism was strongly connected with principles of causality and continuity and the principle of sufficient reason; this thesis examines the relevance of these principles in the history of physics. Moreover, the history of determinism in this period shows that there were essential changes in the relation between mathematics and physics: whereas in the eighteenth century, there were metaphysical arguments which lent support to differential calculus, by the early twentieth century the development of rigorous foundations of differential calculus led to concerns about its applicability in physics. The thesis consists of six papers. In the first paper, "On the origins and foundations of Laplacian determinism", I argue that Laplace, who is usually pointed out as the first major proponent of scientific determinism, did not derive his statement of determinism directly from the laws of mechanics; rather, his determinism has a background in eighteenth century Leibnizian metaphysics, and is ultimately based on the law of continuity and the principle of sufficient reason. These principles also provided a basis for the idea that one can find laws of nature in the form of differential equations which uniquely determine natural processes. In "The Norton dome and the nineteenth century foundations of determinism", I argue that an example of indeterminism in classical physics which has attracted attention in philosophy of physics in recent years, namely the Norton come, was already discussed during the nineteenth century. However, the significance which this type of indeterminism had back then is very different from the significance which the Norton dome currently has in philosophy of physics. This is explained by the fact that determinism was conceived of in an essentially different way: in particular, the nineteenth century authors who wrote about this type of indeterminism regarded determinism as an a priori principle rather than as a property of the equations of physics. In "Vital instability: life and free will in physics and physiology, 1860-1880", I show how Maxwell, Cournot, Stewart and Boussinesq used the possibility of unstable or indeterministic mechanical systems to argue that the will or a vital principle can intervene in organic processes without violating the laws of physics, so that a strictly dualist account of life and the mind is possible. Moreover, I show that their ideas can be understood as a reaction to the law of conservation of energy and to the way it was used in physiology to exclude vital and mental causes. In "The nineteenth century conflict between mechanism and irreversibility", I show that in the late nineteenth century, there was a widespread conflict between the aim of reducing physical processes to mechanics and the recognition that certain processes are irreversible. Whereas the so-called reversibility objection is known as an objection that was made to the kinetic theory of gases, it in fact appeared in a wide range of arguments, and was susceptible to very different interpretations. It was only when the project of reducing all of physics to mechanics lost favor, in the late nineteenth century, that the reversibility objection came to be used as an argument against mechanism and against the kinetic theory of gases. In "Continuity in nature and in mathematics: Boltzmann and Poincaré", I show that the development of rigorous foundations of differential calculus in the nineteenth century led to concerns about its applicability in physics: through this development, differential calculus was made independent of empirical and intuitive notions of continuity and was instead based on mathematical continuity conditions, and for Boltzmann and Poincaré, the applicability of differential calculus in physics depended on whether these continuity conditions could be given a foundation in intuition or experience. In the final paper, "Determinism around 1900", I briefly discuss the implications of the developments described in the previous two papers for the history of determinism in physics, through a discussion of determinism in Mach, Poincaré and Boltzmann. I show that neither of them regards determinism as a property of the laws of mechanics; rather, for them, determinism is a precondition for science, which can be verified to the extent that science is successful. (shrink)

This monograph section of Theoria is devoted to the notion of causation in modern physics. The four long essays and short epilogue contained in this volume constitute a representative sample of recent work by philosophers of physics on causality. All the contributions to this volume share a healthy respect for science, and what science may be able to tell us about causation: these essays look for a notion of causation that can make sense of modern physical science. (...) And, as is the norm in contemporary philosophy of physics, the discussions engage with science in its own terms, and not through the distorting lens of rational reconstruction. Although these are philosophical essays and are primarily aimed at a philosophical readership, they may also interest scientists. (shrink)

The concept of causality as it appears in a specific scientific theory involves two factors: the relation of necessary connection between the states of a system at different times, and the definition of state at a given time.

According to a widespread view, which can be traced back to Russell’s famous attack on the notion of cause, causal notions have no legitimate role to play in how mature physical theories represent the world. In this paper I first critically examine a number of arguments for this view that center on the asymmetry of the causal relation and argue that none of them succeed. I then argue that embedding the dynamical models of a theory into richer causal structures can (...) allow us to decide between models in cases where our observational data severely underdetermine our choice of dynamical models. (shrink)

According to Papineau’s qualitative view, experiences instantiate both representational and phenomenal properties. The instantiation of phenomenal properties is people undergoing the relevant experience. In contrast, the instantiation of representational properties relies on changing relationships between the person and the environment in which the person is embedded. The upshot is that phenomenal and representational properties are only contingently related: phenomenal properties are neither identical to, nor supervene on, representational properties. In this article, the author gives a detailed criticism of Papineau’s qualitative (...) view. Papineau’s qualitative view left unexplained the relevant causal role of consciousness in accounting for actions—assuming that a mental state only becomes conscious when it is poised to make a direct difference to what the subject believes and later remembers, how the subject reasons, what decisions the subject makes, and what rational actions the subject performs. The author argues that the same reasons that support Papineau’s complaint that it is hard to see how distal particulars and properties make their way into the realm of consciousness—namely some traditional arguments against representationalism—also show that it is hard to see how phenomenal consciousness makes its way back into the outside world in explaining the rational control of actions. (shrink)

This book provides a post-positivist theory of deterministic and probabilistic causality that supports both quantitative and qualitative explanations. Features of particular interest include the ability to provide true explanations in contexts where our knowledge is incomplete, a systematic interpretation of causal modeling techniques in the social sciences, and a direct realist view of causal relations that is compatible with a liberal empiricism. The book should be of wide interest to both philosophers and scientists. Originally published in 1989. The Princeton (...) Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

Determinism, causality, chance, free will and divine providence form a class of interlaced problems lying in three domains: philosophy, theology, and physics. Recent article by Dariusz Łukasiewicz in Roczniki Filozoficzne (no. 3, 2020) is a great example. Classical physics, that of Newton and Laplace, may lead to deism: God created the world, but then it goes like a mechanical clock. Quantum mechanics brought some “hope” for a rather naïve theology: God acts in gaps between quanta of indetermination. (...) Obviously, any strict determinism jeopardizes the existence of free will. Yes, but only if human mind follows the laws of physics and only if nothing exists outside the physical limits of space and time. We argue that human action lies in-between two worlds: “earth” and “heavens” using the language of Genesis. In that immaterial world, outside time and space constraints, there is no place for the chain of deterministic events. We discuss, in turn, that the principle of causality, a superior law even in physics, reigns also in the non-material world. Though, determinism in the material universe and causality in both worlds seem to be sufficient conditions, to eliminate “chaotic”, or probabilistic causes from human (and divine) action. (shrink)