"Back to the Rubbish Bin"

Dr. Jonathan Livengood
"Back to the Rubbish Bin"
Friday, October 28 | 1:30-3:30 p.m.
3rd Floor Conference Room, Lovejoy Library
For at least the last fifty years, philosophical research on causation has relied heavily on judgments about cases. Some metaphysicians have defended the method, thinking like Ned Hall (2004), that we can "find some useful theoretical role that a concept of causation could play ... that would vindicate the tacit assumption of philosophers working in this area that they are doing more than just the semantics of the English word 'cause'." I argue that they are wrong. Empirical work by psychologists and experimental philosophers shows that ordinary causal judgments are heavily influenced by evaluative considerations, and my own empirical work in this broad area suggests that ordinary causal judgments are indistinguishable from judgments of broadly moral responsibility--at least in most cases involving agents. Since metaphysicians do not take causation to be evaluative in character, they should not rely on ordinary causal judgments in theorizing about the material metaphysics of causations; the method of cases used for this purpose really does belong in the rubbish bin. Of course, we need not aim at producing a material metaphysics of causation, so I conclude my talk with a discussion of some alternatives, including what role, if any, the methods of cases might play if we decide to pursue some other project.