Causal Explanation in Psychiatry - Beyond Scientism and Scepticism

We can use quantum theory to explain an enormous variety of phenomena by showing why they were to be expected and what they depend on. These explanations of probabilistic phenomena involve applications of the Born rule: to accept quantum theory is to let relevant Born probabilities guide one’s credences about presently inaccessible events. We use quantum theory to explain a probabilistic phenomenon by showing how its probabilities follow from a correct application of the Born rule, thereby exhibiting the phenomenon’s dependence on the quantum state to be assigned in circumstances of that type. This is not a causal explanation since a probabilistic phenomenon is not constituted by events that may manifest it: but each of those events does depend causally on events that actually occur in those circumstances. Born probabilities are objective and sui generis, but not all Born probabilities are chances.

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Beyond Causal Explanation: Einstein’s Principle Not Reichenbach’s

Entropy ◽

10.3390/e23010114 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 23 (1) ◽

pp. 114

Author(s):

Michael Silberstein ◽

William Mark Stuckey ◽

Timothy McDevitt

Keyword(s):

Quantum Mechanics ◽

Quantum Information ◽

Causal Explanation ◽

Causal Structure ◽

Minkowski Spacetime ◽

Physical Principle ◽

Causal Principle ◽

Complete Rejection ◽

Epr Correlations ◽

Tsirelson Bound

Our account provides a local, realist and fully non-causal principle explanation for EPR correlations, contextuality, no-signalling, and the Tsirelson bound. Indeed, the account herein is fully consistent with the causal structure of Minkowski spacetime. We argue that retrocausal accounts of quantum mechanics are problematic precisely because they do not fully transcend the assumption that causal or constructive explanation must always be fundamental. Unlike retrocausal accounts, our principle explanation is a complete rejection of Reichenbach’s Principle. Furthermore, we will argue that the basis for our principle account of quantum mechanics is the physical principle sought by quantum information theorists for their reconstructions of quantum mechanics. Finally, we explain why our account is both fully realist and psi-epistemic.

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Philosophy as Synchronic History

Journal of the American Philosophical Association ◽

10.1017/apa.2020.14 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-18

Author(s):

DANIEL STOLJAR

Keyword(s):

Causal Explanation ◽

David Lewis ◽

Analytic Philosophy ◽

Philosophy Of History ◽

Bernard Williams ◽

History Of ◽

The 1960S ◽

Philosophical Progress ◽

The Way

Abstract Bernard Williams argues that philosophy is in some deep way akin to history. This article is a novel exploration and defense of the Williams thesis (as I call it)—though in a way anathema to Williams himself. The key idea is to apply a central moral from what is sometimes called the analytic philosophy of history of the 1960s to the philosophy of philosophy of today, namely, the separation of explanation and laws. I suggest that an account of causal explanation offered by David Lewis may be modified to bring out the way in which this moral applies to philosophy, and so to defend the Williams thesis. I discuss in detail the consequences of the thesis for the issue of philosophical progress and note also several further implications: for the larger context of contemporary metaphilosophy, for the relation of philosophy to other subjects, and for explaining, or explaining away, the belief that success in philosophy requires a field-specific ability or brilliance.

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The Inflation Technique Completely Solves the Causal Compatibility Problem

Journal of Causal Inference ◽

10.1515/jci-2018-0008 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 8 (1) ◽

pp. 70-91 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Miguel Navascués ◽

Elie Wolfe

Keyword(s):

Linear Programming ◽

Latent Variables ◽

Causal Explanation ◽

Causal Structure ◽

Categorical Variables ◽

False Negatives ◽

The Given ◽

Causal Structures ◽

Compatibility Question ◽

Structure Graph

AbstractThe causal compatibility question asks whether a given causal structure graph — possibly involving latent variables — constitutes a genuinely plausible causal explanation for a given probability distribution over the graph’s observed categorical variables. Algorithms predicated on merely necessary constraints for causal compatibility typically suffer from false negatives, i.e. they admit incompatible distributions as apparently compatible with the given graph. In 10.1515/jci-2017-0020, one of us introduced the inflation technique for formulating useful relaxations of the causal compatibility problem in terms of linear programming. In this work, we develop a formal hierarchy of such causal compatibility relaxations. We prove that inflation is asymptotically tight, i.e., that the hierarchy converges to a zero-error test for causal compatibility. In this sense, the inflation technique fulfills a longstanding desideratum in the field of causal inference. We quantify the rate of convergence by showing that any distribution which passes the nth-order inflation test must be $\begin{array}{} \displaystyle {O}{\left(n^{{{-}{1}}/{2}}\right)} \end{array}$-close in Euclidean norm to some distribution genuinely compatible with the given causal structure. Furthermore, we show that for many causal structures, the (unrelaxed) causal compatibility problem is faithfully formulated already by either the first or second order inflation test.

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Flock size and formation in black-billed gulls

Canadian Journal of Zoology ◽

10.1139/z82-234 ◽

1982 ◽

Vol 60 (8) ◽

pp. 1806-1811 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Roger M. Evans

Keyword(s):

Size Distribution ◽

Causal Model ◽

Causal Explanation ◽

Flock Size ◽

Group Foraging ◽

Foraging Site ◽

Site Tenacity

Black-billed gulls (Larus bulleri) depart form breeding colonies and foraging sites in nonrandom, clumped formations (flocks). Flocks leaving colonies were significantly smaller than those leaving foraging sites, in part owing to more "upflights" at foraging sites. When more birds left a colony per unit time, flocks were both larger and more frequent.A causal model was developed based on the assumptions that flock departures from a colony or foraging site result from the effects of social attractions superimposed on otherwise random departure intervals. This model successfully predicted the size distribution of flocks departing from four colonies and foraging sites. In conjunction with the concepts of site tenacity and habituation, the model also permits a causal explanation of differences in the size of flocks departing colonies compared with foraging sites, and of size differences in flocks arising from "upflights" as opposed to the more common "straggling" columnar formations. The model and results are consistent with the hypothesis that colonies function as assembly points that facilitate group foraging.

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