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The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Advance Access originally published online on October 29, 2009
The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 2009 60(4):737-764; doi:10.1093/bjps/axp037
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© The Author 2009. 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

Physical Causation and Difference-Making

Alyssa Ney

University of Rochester alyssa.ney{at}rochester.edu


  Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between physical theories of causation and theories of difference-making. It is plausible to think that such theories are compatible with one another as they are aimed at different targets: the former, an empirical account of actual causal relations; the latter, an account that will capture the truth of most of our ordinary causal claims. The question then becomes: what is the relationship between physical causation and difference-making? Is one kind of causal fact more fundamental than the other? This paper defends causal foundationalism: the view that facts about difference-making are dependent on the obtaining of facts about physical causation. However, the paper's main goal is to clarify the structure of the debate. At the end of the paper, it is shown how settling the issue about the relationship between physical theories of causation and theories of difference-making has more than mere intrinsic interest in unifying the very different pursuits that have been undertaken in the philosophy of causation. It can help to break a stalemate that has arisen in the current debate about mental causation.

  1. Two Pursuits in the Philosophy of Causation
  2. Causal Foundationalism and its Rivals
  3. Anti-foundationalism: Russell and Field
  4. Against the Russell/Field Arguments
  5. The Case for Foundationalism
  6. Causing and ‘Causing’
  7. An Application: Mental Causation


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