Causality : philosophical theory meets scientific practice / Phyllis Illari, Federica Russo.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Illari, Phyllis, author.

Russo, Federica, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Science--Philosophy.

Science.

Causation.

Physical Description:

xiv, 310 páginas 25 cm

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Oxford, [England] : Oxford University Press, 2014.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Head hits cause brain damage - but not always. Should we ban sport to protect athletes? Exposure to electromagnetic fields is strongly associated with cancer development - does that mean exposure causes cancer? Should we encourage old fashioned communication instead of mobile phones to reduce cancer rates? According to popular wisdom, the Mediterranean diet keeps you healthy. Is this belief scientifically sound? Should public health bodies encourage consumption offresh fruit and vegetables? Severe financial constraints on research and public policy, media pressure, and public anxiety make such questions of immense current concern not just to pholosphers but to scientists, governments, public bodies, and the general public.

Contents:

Cover

Contents

Part I Prelude to Causality

1 Problems of Causality in the Sciences

1.1 Why this book on causality?

1.2 Five scientific problems

1.3 The contents of this book

2 A Scientific Toolbox for Philosophy

2.1 Methods for finding causes

2.2 Observational methods

2.3 Experimental methods

2.4 Between observation and experiment

2.5 Beyond observation and experiment

2.6 How to make a study work

3 A Philosophical Toolbox for Science

3.1 Arguments

3.2 Methods

3.3 Levels of abstraction

Part II Causality: Accounts, Concepts and Methods

4 Necessary and Sufficient Components

4.1 Examples: electrical short-circuit and AIDS

4.2 Component causes

4.3 INUS causes and related concepts

4.4 Rothman's pie charts

5 Levels of Causation

5.1 Examples: personalized medicine and migration behaviours

5.2 Three parallel literatures

5.3 Bridging the levels-and the terminology!

6 Causality and Evidence

6.1 Examples: effects of radiation and smoking causing heart disease

6.2 What do we want to know?

6.3 Evidence for causal relations

6.4 Evidence-based approaches

7 Causal Methods: Probing the Data

7.1 Examples: apoptosis and self-rated health

7.2 The need for causal methods

7.3 The most widespread causal methods

7.4 Key notions in causal methods

8 Difference-making: Probabilistic Causality

8.1 Example: smoking and lung cancer

8.2 Is causality probability-altering?

8.3 Beyond probabilistic causes

9 Difference-making: Counterfactuals

9.1 Example: mesothelioma and safety at work

9.2 The unbearable imprecision of counterfactual reasoning

9.3 Philosophical views of counterfactuals

9.4 Counterfactuals in other fields

10 Difference -making: Manipulation and Invariance

10.1 Example: gene knock-out experiments.

10.2 The manipulationists: wiggle the cause, and the effect wiggles too

10.3 What causes can't we wiggle?

11 Production Accounts: Processes

11.1 Examples: billiard balls colliding and aeroplanes crossing

11.2 Tracing processes

11.3 How widely does the approach apply?

12 Production Accounts: Mechanisms

12.1 Example: how can smoking cause heart disease?

12.2 What is a mechanism? The major mechanists

12.3 Important features of mechanisms and mechanistic explanation

12.4 What is not a mechanism?

13 Production Accounts: Information

13.1 Examples: tracing transmission of waves and of disease

13.2 The path to informational accounts

13.3 Integrating the informational and mechanistic approaches

13.4 Future prospects for an informational account of causality

14 Capacities , Powers, Dispositions

14.1 Examples: systems in physics and biology

14.2 The core idea of capacities, powers and dispositions

14.3 Capacities in science: explanation and evidence

15 Regularity

15.1 Examples: natural and social regularities

15.2 Causality as regular patterns

15.3 Updating regularity for current science

16 Variation

16.1 Example: mother's education and child survival

16.2 The idea of variation

16.3 Variation in observational and experimental methods

17 Causality and Action

17.1 Example: symmetry in physics

asymmetry in agency

17.2 Early agency theorists

17.3 Agency and the symmetry problem

17.4 Agency and action

17.5 Problems for agency theories

17.6 Merits of agency theories

18 Causality and Inference

18.1 Example: combatting the spread of AIDS

18.2 Different sorts of inferences

18.3 Does inferentialism lead to anti-realism?

18.4 The heart of inference

Part III Approaches to Examining Causality.

19 How We Got to the Causality in the Sciences Approach (CitS)

19.1 A methodological struggle

19.2 Causality and language

19.3 Causality, intuitions and concepts

19.4 Causality in the sciences

20 Examples and Counterexamples

20.1 Examples of examples!

20.2 Toy examples or scientific examples?

20.3 Counterexamples

21 Truth or Models?

21.1 Two approaches to causal assessment

21.2 Causal assessment using models

21.3 Causal assessment identifying truthmakers

21.4 Truth or models?

22 Epistemology , Metaphysics, Method, Semantics, Use

22.1 Fragmented theorizing about causality

22.2 Which question to answer when?

22.3 Which question interests me?

22.4 Should we integrate the fragments?

Part IV Conclusion: Towards a Causal Mosaic

23 Pluralism

23.1 If pluralism is the solution, what is the problem?

23.2 Various types of causing

23.3 Various concepts of causation

23.4 Various types of inferences

23.5 Various sources of evidence for causal relations

23.6 Various methods for causal inference

23.7 The pluralist mosaic

24 The Causal Mosaic Under Construction: the Example of Exposomics

24.1 Making mosaics

24.2 Preparing materials for the exposomics mosaic

24.3 Building the exposomics mosaic

Appendix Accounts, Concepts and Methods: Summary Tables

A.1 The scientific problems of causality

A.2 The philosophical questions about causality

A.3 The accounts: how they fare with scientific problems

A.4 The accounts: how they fare with philosophical questions

References

Index.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

978-0-19-966267-8

OCLC:

891993973