This chapter analyzes some theses on causation that are characteristic of empiricism. The principle of antecedence and the causal principle are independent of each other. Most positivists have held that the concept of causation should be replaced by or actually reduced to invariable succession in time. The identification of cause with constant antecedent, of causation with invariable succession, has been criticized many times by philosophers. The identification of causal laws with differential equations that can be made to represent an unlimited variety of types of continuous evolution in time has led to a widespread naive solution of the puzzle of quantum mechanics. The validity and usefulness of the field concept are demonstrated, at least in the macroscopic domain, in an indirect way, as is usual with elaborate theoretical concepts, namely, by the far-reaching testable consequences to which field theories lead.
This chapter analyzes some theses on causation that are characteristic of empiricism. The principle of antecedence and the causal principle are independent of each other. Most positivists have held that the concept of causation should be replaced by or actually reduced to invariable succession in time. The identification of cause with constant antecedent, of causation with invariable succession, has been criticized many times by philosophers. The identification of causal laws with differential equations that can be made to represent an unlimited variety of types of continuous evolution in time has led to a widespread naive solution of the puzzle of quantum mechanics. The validity and usefulness of the field concept are demonstrated, at least in the macroscopic domain, in an indirect way, as is usual with elaborate theoretical concepts, namely, by the far-reaching testable consequences to which field theories lead.
Causalism is the traditional attitude of disowning all noncausal categories of determination, holding dogmatically that every connection in the world is causal. The entirely negative attitude taken by indeterminism and by empiricism toward the principle of causation is inconsistent with the very goal of science, which is the search for the objective forms of determination and interconnection. This chapter deals with the question concerning the range of validity of the causal principle. The notion of causal range of the laws of nature will be clarified and illustrated, by analyzing in some detail a typical physical law with which every student of electricity is familiar. Science seems to show neither an enlargement nor a progressive shrinking of the domain of validity of the causal principle. Most scientists and philosophers of science believed that quantum mechanics had given causality the death blow, by showing that quantum phenomena are inherently random, hence only statistically predictable.
I have claimed that it is profitable to distinguish three key questions about causation. The first question, what are causal processes and interactions? , was addressed in Chapter 5. The second question, what is the connection between causes and effects? , was addressed in Chapter 7.The third question, what makes a cause different from an effect? , has not been addressed, and it is to that task that we turn in the present chapter. The question of the directionality and asymmetry of causation has long been an important ingredient in philosophical discussions of causation, although perhaps Reichenbach (1991) was the first to truly appreciate the significance of the question. It is certainly an aspect of folk intuitions. Many philosophers have held that an adequate analysis of causality should provide an explanation or account of causal asymmetry. On the other hand, it is precisely this aspect of causation that is the most common target for elimination from empirical accounts. This chapter looks at the ability of 'process' theories of causality to provide such an account, granting certain constraints. The major constraint, or premise, in the following analysis is the assumption that quantum mechanics reveals the presence of backwards-in-time causation. Thus, in the first instance, the argument presented here will not convince those who hold that there can be no backwards causation. However, I derive an empirical prediction, which, if confirmed, would give those sceptical about backwards causation reason to think again. The chapter begins with an analysis of some of the formal properties of causation. This is followed by a nontechnical presentation of the famous difficulties associated with Bell phenomena in quantum mechanics, and the backwards-in-time solution to those difficulties.
Abstract There is widespread agreement that quantum mechanics has something radical to teach us about causation. But opinions differ on what this is. Physicists have often taken the central lesson to be that many physical events occur spontaneously, so that a principle of causality is violated whenever an atom emits light, or a uranium nucleus decays, even though nothing that happened beforehand made this inevitable. Feynman urged philosophers to acknowledge that this implication of quantum mechanics undermines the view that causal determinism forms a precondition of scientific inquiry. But while some physicists have denied the implication, most philosophers since Reichenbach have accepted it with alacrity, and sought to develop accounts of causation equally applicable in an indeterministic or a deterministic world.
In this dissertation, I will argue that quantum field theory can be interpreted as a description of causal interactions. I will first discuss previous theories of physical causation, and come to the conclusion that they are inapplicable in quantum field theory. As a consequence, I will start to develop a new theory of causation by first analysing the concept ‘causation’ into the most basic and widely shared intuitions, in order to find out later whether these intuitions can be reduced to physics. I will then have a closer look on the intuition that causation is a directed relation, which is commonly regarded as incompatible with the symmetries of physics. I will present a new argument to the effect that causation and quantum field theory are compatible with respect to the directionality of causation. After that, I will analyse the theoretical description of interactions in quantum field theory, and in particular group structure, locality and local conservation laws will crystallise as the central concepts that a causal interpretation might be based on. Subsequently, I will discuss and present replies to what I believe are the most relevant objections to a causal interpretation of physics, namely, Haag’s theorem, the measurement problem and entanglement. In the final chapter of this dissertation, I will conjoin the results of the previous chapters to a new theory of causation for quantum field theory. The main result will be that a causal process is a quantum field theoretical interaction, i.e., the exchange of energy from an initial to a final state via a force.
Moritz Schlick’s interpretation of the causality principle is based on his understanding of quantum mechanics and on his conviction that quantum mechanics strongly supports an empiricist reading of causation in his sense. The present chapter compares the empiricist position held by Schlick with Bas van Fraassen’s more recent conception of constructive empiricism. It is pointed out that the development of philosophy of science from Schlick’s understanding of logical empiricism to constructive empiricism reflects a difference between the understanding of quantum mechanics endorsed by Schlick and the understanding that had been established by the time of van Fraassen’s writing.
In a recent number of Blackfriars (July, 1949) Dr A. W. Gledhill has discussed very competently some aspects of the statistical method as used in modern physics. He has tried to show there ‘that modern physical theory does not contradict the principle of causality’. Having made a study of this subject over quite a number of years, the writer, while agreeing with some of Dr Gledhill’s conclusions, feels nevertheless that there are a few points which have not been covered as adequately as the importance of the subject for modern philosophy seems to warrant. In order to understand the controversy about the validity or non-validity of the principle of causality, which has been initiated by Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, it is necessary to realise, first of all, that when a physicist speaks about causality, he usually does not mean the same thing as a scholastic philosopher. In scholastic philosophy one distinguishes different kinds of causes, such as the material, the efficient, the final, as well as the formal and exemplary causes. The classical physicist, on the other hand, since the time of Galileo, admits only efficient causes. Let us therefore give a brief sketch of the development of this concept of scientific causality and show the reasons for this limitation. The purpose of a scientific theory is the prediction of events among the natural objects which form the field of enquiry of the particular science concerned. Evidently, the more certain the prediction, the better the theory on which it is based.