This post catches up with a nice paper published last year by Sam Baron and Baptiste Le Bihan called “Causal Set Theory is (Strongly) Causal.” (A post about a previous, related paper by the same authors is here.) Causal Set Theory (CST) is an approach to quantum gravity that features discrete, causally linked foundational elements,… Continue reading More About the “Causal” in CST
Tag: Causation
Constraint Closure and Autonomy
This post is an addendum to a previous one, “The Enactive Approach to Agency” (if you are interested check that out first). There I described “operational closure”, which is a proposed basis for understanding the organizational structure underlying biological autonomy. In particular, I praised the way it abstracts from the more complicated features of self-production… Continue reading Constraint Closure and Autonomy
New Paper: Causation, Explanation and Process Ontology
I have a new paper out (open access), called “Turning Salmon’s causal process theory into process ontology.” In it, I provide a modified account of causal process theory. It is intended to meet the aims of biology-inspired philosophers who advocate for a process-oriented metaphysics, while maintaining a close tie to the topic of scientific explanation.… Continue reading New Paper: Causation, Explanation and Process Ontology
Biological Agency and Free Will
Given my recent interest in the idea of naturalized biological agency (the topic of my last post), I was excited to read Kevin Mitchell’s book—Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will—which develops this notion and connects it to the debate over human free will. Mitchell is a neurogeneticist at Trinity College (Dublin); he blogs… Continue reading Biological Agency and Free Will
The Enactive Approach to Agency
Introduction Explaining the properties and behaviors of organisms leads us to introduce a repertoire of concepts foreign to the world of non-living things. Arguably the most important of these is agency. Agency implies that behaviors are structured by intrinsic goals or purposes, and this brings with it further notions, such as those of norms and… Continue reading The Enactive Approach to Agency
New Work on Causation and Conserved Quantities
I read an interesting and thought-provoking paper: “Causation and the conservation of energy in general relativity” by Sebastián Murgueitio Ramírez, James Read, and Andrés Páez (forthcoming in The BJPS[1]). The paper is about the apparent problems the general theory of relativity (GR) presents for Phil Dowe’s conserved quantity theory of causation (CQTC). The authors examine… Continue reading New Work on Causation and Conserved Quantities
The “Causal” in a Causal Theory of Spacetime
Across several posts, I have outlined how a causal process theory can provide an attractive ontology for phenomena described by the natural sciences, from quantum physics to biology. An exception, mentioned in a recent post, is that I haven’t had much to say about the spacetime of general relativity (GR). This topic is complicated by… Continue reading The “Causal” in a Causal Theory of Spacetime
The Causal Roots of Consciousness
In this post I recap my preferred framework for tackling the hard problem of consciousness, and then try to extend the analysis a bit deeper. I have favored a “divide and conquer” strategy that recognizes two dimensions to the problem. Our conscious experience has both a qualitative character and a subjective character, and both can… Continue reading The Causal Roots of Consciousness
What Scientific Understanding Implies About Causation
The last post discussed the idea that understanding is an epistemic achievement distinct from knowledge. In particular, some philosophers have made the case that understanding doesn’t require truth. I focused in on one corollary of this idea: scientific understanding can be achieved via causal explanations that utilize idealization. This is possible because false characterizations in… Continue reading What Scientific Understanding Implies About Causation
Thoughts on Scientific Understanding and Realism
I think one of the most helpful recent developments in philosophy has been the increased focus on understanding as an epistemic aim distinct from knowledge. For an overview, see Stephen Grimm’s new entry in the SEP. While I don’t specialize in epistemology, thinking about understanding has made some things clearer to me when it comes… Continue reading Thoughts on Scientific Understanding and Realism