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Explanation and Understanding Revisited

In Niiniluoto Ilkka & Wallgren Thomas (eds.), On the Human Condition: Philosophical Essays in Honour of the Centennial Anniversary of Georg Henrik von Wright. Acta Philosophica Fennica vol 93. The Philosophical Society of Finland. pp. 339-353 (2017)

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  1. Teon teoria ja historiallinen selittäminen.Panu Raatikainen - 2011 - Tiede and Edistys 2011 (4):291-300.
    The essay exa­mines the views expressed in von Wright's Explanation and Understanding (1971) on human action and historical events from the perspective of the recent philosophy of science. Connecting causal explanation tightly to covering laws, as von Wright does, is found to be problematic, and his Logical connection argument invalid. On the other hand, von Wright's sketched theory of causation which is based on the concept of manipulation proves to be on the right track in light of current knowledge. From (...)
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  • Causality: Models, Reasoning and Inference.Judea Pearl - 2000 - Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 64 (1):201-202.
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  • An Essay on Metaphysics.C. J. Ducasse - 1941 - Philosophical Review 50 (6):639.
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  • (1 other version)Actions, Reasons, and Causes.Donald Davidson - 1963 - Journal of Philosophy 60 (23):685.
    What is the relation between a reason and an action when the reason explains the action by giving the agent's reason for doing what he did? We may call such explanations rationalizations, and say that the reason rationalizes the action. In this paper I want to defend the ancient - and common-sense - position that rationalization is a species of ordinary causal explanation. The defense no doubt requires some redeployment, but not more or less complete abandonment of the position, as (...)
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  • (3 other versions)The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to Philosophy.Peter Winch - 1958 - New York: Routledge.
    In the fiftieth anniversary of this book’s first release, Winch’s argument remains as crucial as ever. Originally published in 1958, _The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy_ was a landmark exploration of the social sciences, written at a time when that field was still young and had not yet joined the Humanities and the Natural Sciences as the third great domain of the Academy. A passionate defender of the importance of philosophy to a full understanding of (...)
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  • Why historians (and everyone else) should care about counterfactuals.Daniel Nolan - 2013 - Philosophical Studies 163 (2):317-335.
    Abstract There are at least eight good reasons practicing historians should concern themselves with counterfactual claims. Furthermore, four of these reasons do not even require that we are able to tell which historical counterfactuals are true and which are false. This paper defends the claim that these reasons to be concerned with counterfactuals are good ones, and discusses how each can contribute to the practice of history. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-19 DOI 10.1007/s11098-011-9817-z Authors Daniel Nolan, School of Philosophy, (...)
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  • Aspects of Scientific Explanation and Other Essays in the Philosophy of Science.Carl Gustav Hempel - 1965 - New York: The Free Press.
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  • Causality and determinism.Georg Henrik Von Wright - 1974 - New York,: Columbia University Press.
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  • Making things happen: a theory of causal explanation.James F. Woodward - 2003 - New York: Oxford University Press.
    Woodward's long awaited book is an attempt to construct a comprehensive account of causation explanation that applies to a wide variety of causal and explanatory claims in different areas of science and everyday life. The book engages some of the relevant literature from other disciplines, as Woodward weaves together examples, counterexamples, criticisms, defenses, objections, and replies into a convincing defense of the core of his theory, which is that we can analyze causation by appeal to the notion of manipulation.
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  • (1 other version)Intention.G. E. M. Anscombe - 1957 - Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
    This is a welcome reprint of a book that continues to grow in importance.
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  • Counterfactuals, thought experiments, and singular causal analysis in history.Julian Reiss - 2009 - Philosophy of Science 76 (5):712-723.
    Thought experiments are ubiquitous in science and especially prominent in domains in which experimental and observational evidence is scarce. One such domain is the causal analysis of singular events in history. A long‐standing tradition that goes back to Max Weber addresses the issue by means of ‘what‐if’ counterfactuals. In this paper I give a descriptive account of this widely used method and argue that historians following it examine difference makers rather than causes in the philosopher’s sense. While difference making is (...)
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  • Mental causation and neural mechanisms.James Woodward - 2008 - In Jakob Hohwy & Jesper Kallestrup (eds.), Being Reduced: New Essays on Reduction, Explanation, and Causation. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 218-262.
    This paper discusses some issues concerning the relationship between the mental and the physical, including the so-called causal exclusion argument, within the framework of a broadly interventionist approach to causation.
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  • Counterfactual theories of causation.Peter Menzies - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
    The basic idea of counterfactual theories of causation is that the meaning of causal claims can be explained in terms of counterfactual conditionals of the form “If A had not occurred, C would not have occurred”. While counterfactual analyses have been given of type-causal concepts, most counterfactual analyses have focused on singular causal or token-causal claims of the form “event c caused event e”. Analyses of token-causation have become popular in the last thirty years, especially since the development in the (...)
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  • Causation, exclusion, and the special sciences.Panu Raatikainen - 2010 - Erkenntnis 73 (3):349-363.
    The issue of downward causation (and mental causation in particular), and the exclusion problem is discussed by taking into account some recent advances in the philosophy of science. The problem is viewed from the perspective of the new interventionist theory of causation developed by Woodward. It is argued that from this viewpoint, a higher-level (e.g., mental) state can sometimes truly be causally relevant, and moreover, that the underlying physical state which realizes it may fail to be such.
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  • Explanation and invariance in the special sciences.James Woodward - 2000 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 51 (2):197-254.
    This paper describes an alternative to the common view that explanation in the special sciences involves subsumption under laws. According to this alternative, whether or not a generalization can be used to explain has to do with whether it is invariant rather than with whether it is lawful. A generalization is invariant if it is stable or robust in the sense that it would continue to hold under a relevant if it is stable or robust in the sense that it (...)
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  • Dissecting explanatory power.Petri Ylikoski & Jaakko Kuorikoski - 2010 - Philosophical Studies 148 (2):201–219.
    Comparisons of rival explanations or theories often involve vague appeals to explanatory power. In this paper, we dissect this metaphor by distinguishing between different dimensions of the goodness of an explanation: non-sensitivity, cognitive salience, precision, factual accuracy and degree of integration. These dimensions are partially independent and often come into conflict. Our main contribution is to go beyond simple stipulation or description by explicating why these factors are taken to be explanatory virtues. We accomplish this by using the contrastive-counterfactual approach (...)
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  • The function of general laws in history.Carl Gustav Hempel - 1942 - Journal of Philosophy 39 (2):35-48.
    The classic logical positivist account of historical explanation, putting forward what is variously called the "regularity interpretation" (#Gardiner, The Nature of Historical Explanation), the "covering law model" (#Dray, Laws and Explanation in History), or the "deductive model" (Michael #Scriven, "Truisms as Grounds for Historical Explanations"). See also #Danto, Narration and Knowledge, for further criticisms of the model. Hempel formalizes historical explanation as involving (a) statements of determining (initial and boundary) conditions for the event to be explained, and (b) statements of (...)
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  • (4 other versions)Causation.D. Lewis - 1986 - In David K. Lewis (ed.), Philosophical Papers Vol. II. Oxford University Press. pp. 159-213.
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  • (1 other version)Causality.Judea Pearl - 2000 - New York: Cambridge University Press.
    Written by one of the preeminent researchers in the field, this book provides a comprehensive exposition of modern analysis of causation. It shows how causality has grown from a nebulous concept into a mathematical theory with significant applications in the fields of statistics, artificial intelligence, economics, philosophy, cognitive science, and the health and social sciences. Judea Pearl presents and unifies the probabilistic, manipulative, counterfactual, and structural approaches to causation and devises simple mathematical tools for studying the relationships between causal connections (...)
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  • (5 other versions)Explanation and understanding.Georg Henrik von Wright - 1971 - Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.
    I Two Traditions. Scientific inquiry, seen in a very broad perspective, may be said to present two main aspects. One is the ascertaining and discovery of ...
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  • Causation and manipulability.James Woodward - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
    Manipulablity theories of causation, according to which causes are to be regarded as handles or devices for manipulating effects, have considerable intuitive appeal and are popular among social scientists and statisticians. This article surveys several prominent versions of such theories advocated by philosophers, and the many difficulties they face. Philosophical statements of the manipulationist approach are generally reductionist in aspiration and assign a central role to human action. These contrast with recent discussions employing a broadly manipulationist framework for understanding causation, (...)
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  • The role of contrast in causal and explanatory claims.Christopher Hitchcock - 1996 - Synthese 107 (3):395 - 419.
    Following Dretske (1977), there has been a considerable body of literature on the role of contrastive stress in causal claims. Following van Fraassen (1980), there has been a considerable body of literature on the role of contrastive stress in explanations and explanation-requesting why-questions. Amazingly, the two bodies of literature have remained almost entirely disjoint. With an understanding of the contrastive nature of ordinary causal claims, and of the linguistic roles of contrastive stress, it is possible to provide a unified account (...)
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  • Explanation, invariance, and intervention.James Woodward - 1997 - Philosophy of Science 64 (4):41.
    This paper defends a counterfactual account of explanation, according to which successful explanation requires tracing patterns of counterfactual dependence of a special sort, involving what I call active counterfactuals. Explanations having this feature must appeal to generalizations that are invariant--stable under certain sorts of changes. These ideas are illustrated by examples drawn from physics and econometrics.
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  • Causation and recipes.Douglas Gasking - 1955 - Mind 64 (256):479-487.
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  • Review of M aking Things Happen. [REVIEW]Eric Hiddleston - 2005 - Philosophical Review 114 (4):545-547.
    Woodward's long awaited book is an attempt to construct a comprehensive account of causation explanation that applies to a wide variety of causal and explanatory claims in different areas of science and everyday life. The book engages some of the relevant literature from other disciplines, as Woodward weaves together examples, counterexamples, criticisms, defences, objections, and replies into a convincing defence of the core of his theory, which is that we can analyse causation by appeal to the notion of manipulation.
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  • Review of E xplanation and Understanding. [REVIEW]Jaegwon Kim - 1973 - Philosophical Review 82 (3):380-388.
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  • (1 other version)Review of C ausality and Determinism. [REVIEW]John L. Mackie - 1976 - Journal of Philosophy 73 (8):213-218.
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  • (1 other version)Free Action.A. I. Melden - 1961 - Philosophy 37 (141):280-281.
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  • (1 other version)Intention.P. L. Heath - 1960 - Philosophical Quarterly 10 (40):281.
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  • The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to Philosophy.Leon J. Goldstein - 1960 - Philosophical Review 69 (3):411.
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  • Explanation and understanding: The debate over Von Wright's philosophy of action revisited.Martin Kusch - 2003 - Poznan Studies in the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities 80 (1):327-353.
    Finland is internationally known as one of the leading centers of twentieth century analytic philosophy. This volume offers for the first time an overall survey of the Finnish analytic school. The rise of this trend is illustrated by original articles of Edward Westermarck, Eino Kaila, Georg Henrik von Wright, and Jaakko Hintikka. Contributions of Finnish philosophers are then systematically discussed in the fields of logic, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, history of philosophy, ethics and social philosophy. Metaphilosophical reflections on (...)
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  • (1 other version)Explanation and Understanding. Von Wright - 1977 - Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 82 (1):108-120.
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  • (1 other version)An Essay on Metaphysics.R. G. Collingwood - 1941 - Philosophy 16 (61):74-78.
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  • (1 other version)An Essay on Metaphysics.R. G. Collingwood - 1941 - Mind 50 (198):184-190.
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