The Role of Causality in Scientific Models of Explanation in the Context of the Retrieval of the Classical Concept of Divine Action
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.12775/SetF.2020.010Keywords
Acausalism, Aristotle, Bunge Mario, Categories of determination, Causalism, Causation, Divine Action, Scientific models of explanation, SemicausalismAbstract
The legitimacy of going back to the classical view of God’s action in the world based on the list of causes and understanding of chance in the works of Aristotle and Aquinas – in the context of contemporary science – seems to depend on whether there is a space for causal analysis within the current models of scientific explanation. This article offers a brief account of the path leading to negation and rediscovery of the importance of causality in scientific explanation and reintroduces the semicausal position of the prominent philosopher of science, Mario Bunge, who treats causation as one of several categories of determination. The diversity of the categories he lists finds analogy in the commonly accepted pluralist approach to the search of the model which adequately describes the practice of scientific research. What is more, the same diversity of the categories of determination opens the way back to the classical Aristotle’s fourfold account of causation and his understanding of chance. This fact allows us, in turn, to defend the contemporary version of the classical notion of divine action against the accusation of methodical error in the form of imposing the notion of the ancient categories of causality on the results of contemporary scientific research, which notion, as some maintain, has little in common with the models of explanation currently accepted in natural sciences.
References
Arystoteles. 1990. Fizyka, tł. Kazimierz Leśniak. W Arystoteles, Dzieła Wszystkie, Tom 2, 23–204. Warszawa: PWN.
Arystoteles. 1990. Metafizyka, tł. Kazimierz Leśniak. W Arystoteles, Dzieła Wszystkie, Tom 2, 615–857. Warszawa: PWN.
Ayala, Francisco José. 1998. “Teleological Explanations in Evolutionary Biology.” In Nature’s Purposes: Analyses of Function and Design in Biology, edited by Colin Allen, Marc Bekoff, and George Lauder, 29–49. Cambridge, Mass: A Bradford Book.
Bacon, Francis. 1869. The Works of Francis Bacon. 15 Vols. Edited by James Spedding, Robert L. Ellis, and Douglas D. Heath. New York: Hurd and Houghton.
Bechtel, William, and Robert C. Richardson. 2010. Discovering Complexity: Decomposition and Localization as Strategies in Scientific Research. First published in 1993. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Beebee, Helen. 2006. Hume on Causation. London, New York: Routledge.
Berkeley, George. 1948. The Works of George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne. Edited by A. A. Luce and T. E. Jessop. Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson & Sons.
Bird, Alexander, B. D. Ellis, and Howard Sankey, eds. 2012. Properties, Powers, and Structures: Issues in the Metaphysics of Realism. New York: Routledge.
Born, Max. 1949. Natural Philosophy of Cause and Chance. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Braillard, Pierre-Alain, and Christophe Malaterre. 2015. “Explanation in Biology: An Introduction.” In Explanation in Biology: An Enquiry into the Diversity of Explanatory Patterns in the Life Sciences, edited by Pierre-Alain Braillard and Christophe Malaterre, 1–28. Dordrecht: Springer.
Broadie, Sarah. 2009. “The Ancient Greeks.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 21–39. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Buczyńska-Garewicz, Hanna. 1983. “Instrumentalizm Johna Deweya.” W Filozofia Współczesna, red. Zbigniew Kuderowicz, 2:158–72. Warszawa: Wiedza Powszechna.
Bunge, Mario. 1968. O przyczynowości. Miejsce zasady przyczynowej we współczesnej nauce. Tłum. Stefan Amsterdamski. Warszawa: PWN.
Bunge, Mario. 1979. Causality and Modern Science. First published in 1959. New York: Dover.
Clatterbaugh, Kenneth C. 2009. “The Early Moderns.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 55–72. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Craver, Carl F., and Lindley Darden. 2013. In Search of Mechanisms: Discoveries across the Life Sciences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Craver, Carl, and James Tabery. 2017. “Mechanisms in Science.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Edward N. Zalta, Spring 2017. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University.
Cummins, Robert. 2010. “Neo-Teleology.” In Philosophy of Biology: An Anthology, edited by Alex Rosenberg and Robert Arp, 164–74. Oxford: Blackwell.
Deacon, Terrence W., and Tyrone Cashman. 2013. “Teleology versus Mechanism in Biology: Beyond Self-Organization.” In Beyond Mechanism: Putting Life Back into Biology, edited by Brian G. Henning and Adam C. Scarfe. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Dowe, Phil. 2009. “Causal Process Theories.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 213–33. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ducasse, Curt J. 1926. “On the Nature and the Observability of the Causal Relation.” Journal of Philosophy 23, no. 3: 57–68.
Duhem, Pierre. 1906. La Théorie Physique. Son Objet, Sa Structure. Paris: Chevalier & Riviére.
El-Hani, Charbel Niño, and Antonio Marcos Pereira. 2000. “Higher-Level Descriptions: Why Should We Preserve Them?” In Downward Causation: Mind, Bodies and Matter, edited by Peter Bøgh Andersen, Claus Emmeche, Niels O. Finnemann, and Peder Voetmann Christiansen, 118–42. Aarhus and Oxford: Aarhus University Press.
Emmeche, Claus, Simo Køppe, and Frederic Stjernfelt. 2000. “Levels, Emergence, and Three Versions of Downward Causation.” In Downward Causation: Mind, Bodies and Matter, edited by Peter Bøgh Andersen, Claus Emmeche, Niels O. Finnemann, and Peder Voetmann Christiansen, 13–34. Aarhus and Oxford: Aarhus University Press.
Garrett, Don. 2009. “Hume.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 73–91. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Glennan, Stuart S. 1996. “Mechanisms and the Nature of Causation.” Erkenntnis 44, no. 1: 49–71.
Glennan, Stuart. 2005. “Modeling Mechanisms.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 36, no. 2: 443–64.
Glennan, Stuart S. 2009. “Mechanisms.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 315–25. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Groff, Ruth, and John Greco, eds. 2013. Powers and Capacities in Philosophy: The New Aristotelianism. New York: Routledge.
Handfield, Toby, ed. 2009. Dispositions and Causes. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Hempel, Carl G., and Paul Oppenheim. 1948. “Studies in the Logic of Explanation.” Philosophy of Science 15, no. 2: 135–175.
Hume, David. 1952. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Great Books of the Western World, Vol. 35. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica.
Hume, David. 1978. A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by L. A. Selby-Bigge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Illari, Phyllis, and Federica Russo. 2014. Causality: Philosophical Theory Meets Scientific Practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lewis, David. 1973. Counterfactuals. Oxford: Blackwell.
Losee, John. 2011. Theories of Causality: From Antiquity to the Present. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction Publishers.
Mach, Ernst. 1960. The Science of the Mechanics: A Critical and Historical Account of Its Development. Translated by McCormack. LaSalle, IL: Open Court.
Machamer, Peter, Lindley Darden, and Carl F. Craver. 2000. “Thinking about Mechanisms.” Philosophy of Science 67, no. 1: 1–25.
Marmodoro, Anna, ed. 2010. The Metaphysics of Powers: Their Grounding and Their Manifestations. New York: Routledge.
McMullin, Ernan, ed. 1963. The Concept of Matter in Modern Philosophy. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.
Menzies, Peter, and Huw Price. 1993. “Causation as a Secondary Quality.” The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 44, no. 2: 187–203.
Molnar, George. 2003. Powers: A Study in Metaphysics. Edited by Stephen Mumford. New York: Oxford University Press.
Morange, Michel. 2015. “Is There an Explanation for ... the Diversity of Explanations in Biological Studies?” In Explanation in Biology: An Enquiry into the Diversity of Explanatory Patterns in the Life Sciences, edited by Pierre-Alain Braillard and Christophe Malaterre, 31–46. Dordrecht: Springer.
Moreno, Alvaro, and Jon Umerez. 2000. “Downward Causation at the Core of Living Organization.” In Downward Causation: Mind, Bodies and Matter, edited by Peter Bøgh Andersen, Claus Emmeche, Niels O. Finnemann, and Peder Voetmann Christiansen, 99–116. Aarhus and Oxford: Aarhus University Press.
Mumford, Stephen, and Rani Lill Anjum. 2011. Getting Causes from Powers. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Pearson, Karl. 1892. The Grammar of Science. London: Walter Scott.
Perlman, Mark. 2010. “The Modern Philosophical Resurrection of Teleology.” In Philosophy of Biology: An Anthology, edited by Alex Rosenberg and Robert Arp, 149–63. Oxford: Blackwell.
Paul, L.A. 2009. “Counterfactual Theories.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 158–84. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Piwowarczyk, Marek. (poblikacja w przygotowaniu) „Forma i części substancji: Hylemorfizm Mieczysława A. Krąpca w kontekście analitycznych nurtów hylemorfizmu” w Szkoła lubelska w kontekstach, red. J. Wojtysiak.
Psillos, Stathis. 2009. “Regulatory Theories.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 131–57. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Reichenbach, M. 1978. “The Causal Structure of the World and the Difference between Past and Future.” In Hans Reichenbach: Selected Writings 1909–1953 Volume Two, edited by Robert S. Cohen, translated by Elizabeth Hughes Schneewind, 81–119. Dordrecht: Springer.
Russell, Bertrand. 1992. “On the Notion of Cause.” In Logical and Philosophical Papers 1909-13, edited by John Greer Slater and Bernd Frohmann. The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell, 6:190–212. London and New York: Routledge.
Salmon, Wesley Charles. 1984. Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Silberstein, Michael. 2006. “In Defence of Ontological Emergence and Mental Causation.” In The Re-Emergence of Emergence: The Emergentist Hypothesis from Science to Religion, edited by Philip Clayton and P. C. W. Davies, 203–26. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.
Stöltzner, Michael. 2009. “The Logical Empiricists.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 108–27. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Suppes, Patrick. 1970. A Probabilistic Theory of Causality. Amsterdam: North-Holland Pub.
Tabaczek, Mariusz. 2019. Emergence: Towards A New Metaphysics and Philosophy of Science. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.
Tabaczek, Mariusz. 2019. “Klasyczny i Współczesny Hylemorfizm a Dusza Ludzka.” Roczniki Filozoficzne 67, no. 1: 149–176.
Tabaczek, Mariusz. 2018. „Czy współczesne nauki przyrodnicze mogą inspirować filozoficzny i teologiczny namysł nad przyczynowością?” Scientia et Fides 6, no. 2: 147–80.
Waismann, Friedrich. 1959. “The Decline and Fall of Causality.” In Turning Points in Physics, edited by A. A. Crombie, 84–154. Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing.
Wallace, William A. 1972-1974. Causality and Scientific Explanation. Vol.1-2: Medieval and Early Classical Science. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Walsh, Denis. 2008. “Teleology.” In The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Biology, edited by Michael Ruse, 113–37. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Williamson, Jon. 2009. “Probabilistic Theories.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 185–212. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Woodward, James. 2009. “Agency and Interventionist Theories.” In The Oxford Handbook of Causation, edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Charles Menzies, 234–62. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2020 Scientia et Fides
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
CC BY ND 4.0. The Creator/Contributor is the Licensor, who grants the Licensee a non-exclusive license to use the Work on the fields indicated in the License Agreement.
- The Licensor grants the Licensee a non-exclusive license to use the Work/related rights item specified in § 1 within the following fields: a) recording of Work/related rights item; b) reproduction (multiplication) of Work/related rights item in print and digital technology (e-book, audiobook); c) placing the copies of the multiplied Work/related rights item on the market; d) entering the Work/related rights item to computer memory; e) distribution of the work in electronic version in the open access form on the basis of Creative Commons license (CC BY-ND 3.0) via the digital platform of the Nicolaus Copernicus University Press and file repository of the Nicolaus Copernicus University.
- Usage of the recorded Work by the Licensee within the above fields is not restricted by time, numbers or territory.
- The Licensor grants the license for the Work/related rights item to the Licensee free of charge and for an unspecified period of time.
FULL TEXT License Agreement
Stats
Number of views and downloads: 1643
Number of citations: 2
