Causal patterns and adequate explanations
Philosophical Studies 172 (5):1163-1182 (2015)
Abstract
Causal accounts of scientific explanation are currently broadly accepted (though not universally so). My first task in this paper is to show that, even for a causal approach to explanation, significant features of explanatory practice are not determined by settling how causal facts bear on the phenomenon to be explained. I then develop a broadly causal approach to explanation that accounts for the additional features that I argue an explanation should have. This approach to explanation makes sense of several aspects of actual explanatory practice, including the widespread use of equilibrium explanations, the formulation of distinct explanations for a single event, and the tight relationship between explanations of events and explanations of causal regularities.
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POTCPA-4
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Archival date: 2018-09-09
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Making Things Happen: A Theory of Causal Explanation.Woodward, James
Depth: An Account of Scientific Explanation.Strevens, Michael
The Devil in the Details: Asymptotic Reasoning in Explanation, Reduction, and Emergence.Batterman, Robert W.
View all 21 references / Add more references

Are More Details Better? On the Norms of Completeness for Mechanistic Explanations.Craver, Carl F. & Kaplan, David M.
The Diverse Aims of Science.Potochnik, Angela
Interdisciplinary Thinking About Mechanisms and Causes.Schulz, Armin W.
Added to PP index
2014-06-06
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136 ( #17,478 of 37,125 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
24 ( #14,570 of 37,125 )
2014-06-06
Total downloads
136 ( #17,478 of 37,125 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
24 ( #14,570 of 37,125 )
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