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The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Advance Access originally published online on November 8, 2005
The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 2005 56(4):889-911; doi:10.1093/bjps/axi148
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© The Author (2005). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of British Society for the Philosophy of Science. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Causes and Explanations: A Structural-Model Approach. Part II: Explanations

Joseph Y. Halpern

Cornell University, Department of Computer Science, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA halpern{at}cs.cornell.edu

Judea Pearl

Department of Computer Science, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA judea{at}cs.ucla.edu

We propose new definitions of (causal) explanation, using structural equations to model counterfactuals. The definition is based on the notion of actual cause, as defined and motivated in a companion article. Essentially, an explanation is a fact that is not known for certain but, if found to be true, would constitute an actual cause of the fact to be explained, regardless of the agent's initial uncertainty. We show that the definition handles well a number of problematic examples from the literature.

  1. Introduction
  2. Causal models and the definition of actual causality: a review
    2.1 Causal models
    2.2 Syntax and semantics
    2.3 The definition of cause

  3. Explanation: the basic definition
  4. Partial explanations and explanatory power
  5. The general definition
  6. Discussion

Appendix: the formal definition of causality


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J. Y. Halpern and J. Pearl
Causes and Explanations: A Structural-Model Approach. Part I: Causes
Brit J Philos Sci, December 1, 2005; 56(4): 843 - 887.
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