Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T04:20:49.958Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Causal Loops and the Independence of Causal Facts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Phil Dowe
Phil Dowe*
Affiliation:
University of Tasmania
*
†Please send requests for reprints to the author. School of Philosophy, University of Tasmania, GPO Box 252–41, Hobart, 7001 Australia; email: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

According to Hugh Mellor in Real Time II (1998, Ch. 12), assuming the logical independence of causal facts and the ‘law of large numbers’, causal loops are impossible because if they were possible they would produce inconsistent sets of frequencies. I clarify the argument, and argue that it would be preferable to abandon the relevant independence assumption in the case of causal loops.

Type
Metaphysics and Methodology of Science
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 68 , Issue S3: No. 3 Supplement: Proceedings of the 2000 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. Part I: Contributed Papers Sep., 2001 , 2001 , pp. S89 - S97
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 2001

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

‡

I thank Jossi Berkovitz for first drawing my attention to this problem, in particular to the result proved in Appendix 2. His work on this point has priority over mine (see Berkovitz 2001). This work was supported by the Australian Research Council.

References

Berkovitz, Joseph (2001), “On Chance in Causal Loops”, Mind 110:1–23.10.1093/mind/110.437.1CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dowe, Phil (2000), Physical Causation. New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511570650CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hausman, Daniel (1998), Causal Asymmetries. New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511663710CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mellor, Hugh (1981), Real Time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mellor, Hugh (1995), The Facts of Causation. London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203302682CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mellor, Hugh (1998), Real Time II. New York: Routledge.10.4324/9780203302675CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nordoff, Paul (1998), “Critical Notice: Causation, Probability and Chance”, Mind 107:855–875.10.1093/mind/107.428.855CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Price, Huw (1996), Time's Arrow and Archimedes' Point. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar