Most discussions of causal explanations of behavior focus on the problem of whether it makes sense to regard reasons as causes of human behavior, whether there can be laws connecting reasons with behavior, and the like. This essay discusses explanations of human behavior that do not appeal to reasons. Such explanations can be found in several areas of the social sciences. Moreover, these explanations are both causal and non-reductionist. Historical linguists, for example, offer causal explanations of changes in how words (...) are pronouncedand linguistic change in generalwithout appealing to human intentions. I use examples from linguistics, anthropology, and evolutionary psychology to discuss the importance of this sort of explanation and to examine its compatibility with recent philosophical accounts of causation. (shrink)

This essay examines the possibility that phenomenological laws might be implemented by a computational mechanism by carefully analyzing key passages from the Prolegomena to Pure Logic. Part I examines the famous Denkmaschine passage as evidence for the view that intuitions of evidence are causally produced by computational means. Part II connects the less famous criticism of Avenarius & Mach on thought-economy with Husserl's 1891 essay 'On the Logic of Signs (Semiotic).' Husserl is shown to reaffirm his earlier opposition to associationist (...) (Humean) and adaptationist (Darwinian) explanations of our thought-machine on the ground that they cannot reconstruct the notion of truth and its syntactic mental preservation in symbolic thought-trains. Part III reveals Husserl's interesting commitment to the idea that descriptive sciences necessarily transform into explanatory sciences on pain of contradicting the essence of science as a rational ideal. Since explanation in relation to phenomenology means causal explanation, and causal explanation in the form of the Denkmaschine accounts for phenomenological intuition, it is inferred that the rationally compelling ideal of explanatory science requires a computationalist reading of the subsequent logical investigations. (shrink)

It is shown that three common conditions for scientific explanations are violated by a widely used class of domain-independent explanations. These explanations can accommodate both complex and noncomplex systems and do not require the use of detailed models of system-specific processes for their effectiveness, although they are compatible with such model-based explanations. The approach also shows how a clean separation can be maintained between mathematical representations and empirical content.

RESUMOA climatologia está no centro de um dos debates mais polarizados da atualidade, apresentado como confronto entre os defensores da existência de um aquecimento global antropogênico e aqueles que rejeitam sua existência. A instituição chave para esse tema é o Painel Intergovernamental sobre Mudanças Climáticas, um corpo simultaneamente científico e político. O debate surge aí mesclado com a discussão política sobre as respostas adequadas ao aquecimento global. Mas, rechaçados nesse terreno, os negacionistas transpõem o debate para a mídia, onde mobilizam (...) a pseudociência para deslegitimar as conclusões das disciplinas científicas ligadas ao entendimento do clima. Temos, assim, uma produção consciente da ignorância em larga escala sobre o tema do aquecimento global, demandando o uso da agnotologia para desvendar o mecanismo de produção da ignorância. A climatologia revela-se, então, um campo exemplar para o estudo da inserção histórico-social do conhecimento científico e das tensões e trajetórias conflitivas no seu interior, dos dilemas éticos que coloca e das possibilidades universalistas do conhecimento científico na era da tecnociência. ABSTRACTClimatology is at the center of one of the most polarized debates of today. It is presented as a confrontation between supporters of the existence of anthropogenic global warming and those who deny its existence. The key institution for this theme is the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is both a scientific and political body. In this context, the debate arises merged with the political discussion on appropriate responses to global warming. However, contested on this ground, the deniers transfer the debate to the media, mobilizing pseudo-science to delegitimize the conclusions of the scientific disciplines related to climate understanding. Therefore, we have a deliberate production of large-scale ignorance on this subject, which requires the use of agnotology to unravel it. Thus, climatology reveals itself an exemplary space to study the historical and social roots of scientific knowledge and the tensions and conflicting trajectories inside it, the ethical dilemmas posed and the universalist possibilities of scientific knowledge in the age of technoscience. (shrink)