Causation in action (2)

Photo taken by me at the Strassenindustriemuseum-in Ennepetal, Germany

According to Hume, causation (causality) refers to regular connections: The idea of cause excludes the possibility of causes that occur only once. However, in my blog last week we have seen that there are arguments that sustain the view that causes can be one-time, at least when we are talking about actions (as distinguished from physical phenomena). It is a view sustained by Donald Davidson, for instance. But is it possible to explain actions by causes, be it regular causes or one-time causes? This question has been a hot issue during the 1960s to 1980s in analytical philosophy, and maybe later as well. This question was also one of the central themes in my PhD thesis and what follows is a summary of the first part of chapter IV of this thesis. Basically, four different answer to this question have been given. I think that they are still relevant when talking about the causes of actions.

1) According to Hempel, who starts from a Humean concept of causality, the presence of a causal connection implies the presence of one or more general laws: “... the causal explanation implicitly claims that there are general laws – let us say, L₁, L₂, ..., L_r – in virtue of which the occurrence of the causal antecedents mentioned in C₁, C₂, ..., C_k is a sufficient condition of the explanandum event”. Providing a causal explanation supposes that such laws are being used: “[C]ausal explanation is, at least implicitly, deductive-nomological” and “reliance on general laws is essential to a D‑N explanation”, (Hempel, 1965: pp.349, 377) This model is not only valid for the explanation of physical phenomena but also for the explanation of actions. In particular, a general law is necessary for explaining actions with the help of reasons, so Hempel.

2) This is denied by Davidson, who argues that “generalizations connecting reasons and actions are not – and cannot be sharpened into – the kind of law on the basis of which accurate predictions can reliably be made”, but “ignorance of competent predictive laws does not inhibit valid causal explanation”, for “it is an error to think no explanation has been given until a law has been produced”. (Davidson 1980, p. 15-17) Or, as Davidson summarises his own position: “I accept the view that teleological explanation of action differs from explanation in the natural sciences in that laws are not essentially involved in the former but hold that both sorts of explanation can, and often must, involve causal connections” (id., p. xii). Later, Davidson puts it even more emphatically: “[T]here are no strict laws at all on the basis of which we can predict and explain mental phenomena” and this is especially true for the connection between reason and action (id., p. 224-225).

3) One step further is to deny not only that we need general laws for an action explanation but also the causal nature of such an explanation. This is done, for instance, by William Dray: “The goal of [an] explanation [of actions from reasons] is to show that what was done was the thing to have done for the reasons given, rather than merely the thing that is done on such occasions, perhaps in accordance with certain laws. ... [T]here is an element of appraisal of what was done in such explanations; that what we want to know when we ask to have the action explained is in what way it was appropriate” (Dray 1957, p. 124; italics by Dray). In other words, the connection between premises and conclusion in Dray's rational explanation model is not causal but evaluative in nature.

4a) Advocates of the so-called “logical connection argument” (note) have completely different objections against the view that action explanations are causal. According to them, the connection between a reason or intention and an action is not causal but logical. As Charles Taylor puts it, for example: “[W]e could not say that the intention was the causal antecedent of the behaviour. For the two are not contingently connected in the normal way. We are not explaining the behaviour by the ‘law’, other things being equal, intending X is followed by doing X, for this is part of what we mean by ‘intending X’, that, in the absence of interfering factors, it is followed by doing X. I could not be said to intend X if, even with no obstacles or other countervailing factors, I still didn’t do it. Thus my intention is not a causal antecedent of my behaviour” (Taylor 1964, p. 33).
4b) According to Georg Henrik von Wright, the logical connection argument is basically correct. However, so von Wright, that the connection between premisses and conclusion of an action explanation – so the connection between a reason or intention and an action – is logical leaves open the possibility that it is also causal. Nevertheless, von Wright thinks that the logical connection argument is a correct argument against the view that action explanations are causal. This becomes clear when one realizes that the logical connection argument is not about the logical dependence of premises and conclusion – of reason or intention and action – but that in fact it says that the premises and conclusion in an action explanation cannot be determined and verified independent from each other. (von Wright 1971)

These four views are the main answers to the question of whether it is possible to explain actions by causes, be it regular causes or one-time causes. To my mind, von Wrights view is correct, for how could we say that we acted (and not simply physically behaved) if there were not an intention in our action, but then how could we say that we had this intention to perform the action if we didn’t act according to this intention at the moment that all conditions to perform the action involved were met? However, we know the one only by the other.

Note
The term “logical connection argument” has been coined by Frederick Stoutland.

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Museums function like homes of the nobility to which the public at certain hours are admitted as visitors. The class nature of the ‘nobility’ may vary, but as soon as a work is placed in a museum it acquires the mystery of a way of life which excludes the mass.

John Berger, photographer (1926-2017)

Causation in action

Taken by me at the Strassenindustriemuseum-in Ennepetal, Germany

We have seen in my blog last week that causation is not only in the mind, as Hume thought, but that it is also something real. Moreover, according to Hume, causation requires repeated observations of correlations among events. This would exclude the possibility of causes that occur only once. However, we have seen that the Belgian psychologist Michotte argued that we don’t need to see a repeated occurrence of a connection between two events to conclude that this connection is causal. Often we infer that there is a causal connection between two events at their first occurrence together – rightly or wrongly.
Now I want to discuss some known cases from action philosophy that illustrate that causation is often not so simple as that, and certainly not so simply as Hume thought.

A) The nervous climber
A climber wants to rid himself of the weight and danger of holding another man on a rope. He knows that by loosening his hold on the rope he can rid himself of the weight and danger. This idea unnerves him so much as to cause him to loosen his hold, though he didn’t choose to loosen his hold, nor did he do it intentionally. (Davidson¸ Essays on Actions and Events, p. 79. I have discussed this case also in my blog “Philosophical puzzles”)
We can see here a causal connection between the climber’s nervousness and the fall of the other climber, although it’s a single case. Besides that it is unethical to repeat the case to see whether there really exists a causal connection, in fact it is impossible to repeat it. Each time the circumstances will be different, albeit only because the falling man will be dead. Moreover, what is actually the cause and what is the effect in this case? What is the “causal path”? According to Davidson, we can say only that the climber caused the fall of the co-climber if what the climber believed and wanted to do on the one hand and the fall of the co-climber on the other hand were causally related “in the right way”, and that is apparently not the case. It’s not that the climber made the man fall, but something within the climber (his nervousness) did, since he didn’t have himself under control. The causal path is important when we try to answer the question whether or not the climber made the man fall intentionally and so whether or not he was responsible for the fall of the man.

B) The wild pigs
A man tries to kill someone by shooting at him. The killer misses his victim by a mile, but the shot stampedes a herd of wild pigs that tramples the intended victim to death. (Davidson¸ Essays on Actions and Events, p. 79; originally from Bennett).
While in the case of the nervous climber, there was a direct connection between the climber and his victim , since both were connected by a rope and the climber loosened his hold on the rope, such a direct connection is lacking between the shooter and his intended victim. It was not the shooter who killed the victim but the herd did. Or did he, nevertheless? For it was the shooter who caused the stampede so that the herd killed the victim, albeit unintentionally this way. Although the effect is known, the cause depends on your point of view. Also this case cannot be repeated. The causal connection is intrinsically one-time, for one cannot repeat intentionally what has been unintentionally done. Also now the analysis is important, since the responsibility of the shooter for the death of the victim is at stake. Was the shooter guilty, responsible or liable for the death of the victim and to what extent? Was it a case of murder or was it an attempt to murder?

C) Of B's and Bees
Fred is taking a machine-readable multiple-choice test. His strategy is to circle on the question sheet the identifying letters next to the answers that he feels certain are correct and then, after all such circling is completed, to fill in the corresponding spaces on his answer sheet. Then he will take up the more difficult questions. An hour has elapsed, and Fred is reading the 45th question. He is confident that the answer is ‘bee’, which word appears next to the letter ‘a’ on his question sheet. However, as a result of an understandable momentary confusion, he circles the letter ‘b’. As luck would have it, ‘b’ is the correct answer. Later, when filling in the answer sheet, Fred looks at the circled ‘b’ under question 45 and fills in the space under ‘b’ on his answer sheet – intending thereby to provide the right answer. (Mele, Irrationality, p. 56).
In this example, Fred’s filling in ‘b’ on his answer sheet caused that he gave the right answer to question 45. Or did his confusion do? For Fred had no reason to do so, for he made a mistake. A mistake made him fill in the answer sheet in the right way, so actually in the wrong way, for filling in ‘b’ was not what Fred intended. What actually is the cause that made Fred fill in the answer sheet the way he did? Again we have a case of a one-time cause, for mistakes cannot be repeated as mistakes, for, again, one cannot repeat intentionally what has been unintentionally done.

Much more can be said about cases like these, but anyway they illustrate that one-time causes can exist. Moreover, they illustrate that causation need not be direct, and they attack Hume’s view that cause and effect are contiguous (case B) and that there is a necessary connection between them (A, C). However, I leave this analysis to the reader. Especially, the cases illustrate how intentions can cause their results in an indirect deviant way: Either because the causal connection between the antecedent mental events and the initiation of behaviour is deviant (antecedental deviance); or because the consequences of the activity once begun are not as expected (consequential deviance); or because the aetiology of (some element of) the plan component of an intention is deviant (tertiary deviance). These deviances question also the correctness of Hume’s elements of causation discussed in my blog “Humean causation”.

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Source of the case descriptions and of some of the conclusions the website “Some puzzles about action”. See also the sources in the text.

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[T]hey say that everyone should claim to be just, regardless of whether they are or are not, and anyone who is not pretending to be just is insane, because it is necessary for everyone to share in it in some way or other if they are to live with their fellow men.

Protagoras van Abdera (c. 490-420 BC) in Plato, Protagoras, 323 b-c 

The illusion of causation

Taken by me at the Strassenindustriemuseum-in Ennepetal, Germany

Causation is only in the mind. That is what Hume thinks, as we have seen in my blog three weeks ago. As Hume states (see my blog): “When we say … that one object is connected with another, we mean only, that they have acquired a connexion in our thought…” and we have no idea, whether in reality such a connection is a causal one or something different. This made me conclude my blog by saying: When the vase falls to the ground just at the moment that the crow caws, it is only in our mind that the latter causes the former (or the other way round). This conclusion does not only summarize Hume’s view but it suggests also that the mind tends to construct causal connections between events that in fact haven’t any relation at all. Indeed, as psychology has shown, humans have a predilection for causal thinking, even between events that have nothing to do with each other, such as that at the same moment that a crow caws a vase falls to the ground. It will be clear that this predilection can lead to serious mistakes. It is also the basis for much superstition and for conspiracy theories as well.
Read, for instance, this sentence (the next passage is mainly based on Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, pp. 74-78; 114-118):
After spending a day exploring beautiful sights in the crowded streets of New York, Jane discovered that her wallet was missing.
Many people will think that there is a causal connection between the crowd in the streets of New York and that Jane was missing her wallet, in the sense that a pickpocket had robbed Jane. Nevertheless, several other options are possible, like
- Jane simply lost her wallet
- Jane left her wallet in a restaurant.
“However,” so Kahneman, “when the idea of lost wallet, New York, and crowds are juxtaposed, they jointly evoke the explanation that a pickpocket caused the loss.” That a pickpocket would have stolen the wallet is a hasty conclusion.
Also the post hoc propter hoc fallacy, which I discussed here long ago, is a case in point: The thinking that because one thing happened after another, the first thing caused the second. It is related to the cum hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, i.e. the false argument saying that if two facts or events happen to take place together, one is the cause of the other. (mentioned in the same blog; see also my blog on the conjunction fallacy)
In a book published in 1945, the Belgian psychologist Albert Michotte, so Kahneman, attacked the Humean idea that we infer physical causation from repeated observations of correlations among events. (see also my blog “Humean causation”). Instead, Michotte argued that we see causality, just as directly as we see colour. Experiments have shown that already six-month-old infants do. “We are evidently ready from birth to have impressions of causality, which do not depend on reasoning about patterns of causation”, so Kahneman (p. 76). In short, we can say that we have an illusion of causality or causation, an illusion that can lead to serious mistakes, as we have seen.
Is it really so that causation is only in the mind? I have my doubts that there is not such a thing as causation in nature. How could we play billiards, if causation would be only an idea in the mind? How could we make something happen if there was no causation? Why would nature do what is in our minds, simply because it is in our minds, like moving a billiard ball when it is touched by another billiard ball? As James Woodward says somewhere: We use medicines because of their effects. The medicines and their effects are connected, and the connection is real and not only in the mind. Or take the photo series that I used for my blog “Humean causation”. The photos are stills from a video. I touched there a domino in order to make a row of dominos tip over. It was not only an idea in my mind but the event was recorded by a smartphone. The first domino tipped over, because I touched it; the second domino did, because the first domino touched it; etc. Doesn’t this exemplify that causation is a real phenomenon and not only something in the mind?

Random quote
[T]he philosopher … is always, so far as he is able, in communion through memory with those things the communion with which causes God to be divine. Now a man who employs such memories rightly is always being initiated into perfect mysteries and he alone becomes truly perfect; but since he separates himself from human interests and turns his attention toward the divine, he is rebuked by the vulgar, who consider him mad and do not know that he is inspired.

Socrates(c. 469-399 BC) in Plato, Phaedrus, 249c-d

The bandwagon effect

Barrel Organ "The Arab", once the most famous barrel organ in the Netherlands
Photo taken by me in the Museum Speelklok, Utrecht, NL

A bandwagon is a decorated wagon that carries a musical ensemble or band in a parade or other entertainment event. I think – but I am not sure – that it is a typical American phenomenon, although you find decorated wagons carrying a musical ensemble also during carnival parades, for instance. Wikipedia shows a picture of a bandwagon that resembles a Dutch barrel organ a little bit. Such a barrel organ is a large, automatically playing street organ that makes music with organ pipes, percussion and bellows. In the past, a barrel organ was not automatic but a man was turning a wheel and while he was turning, the organ played music. Now and then such a street organ passed through the streets when I was a child and it drew much attention. It still happens but I see them hardly anymore. Anyway, all children in my street followed the organ till it turned the corner. Like barrel organs, also bandwagons drew much attention, not only from children but from adults as well.
Bandwagons were excellent means to attract attention, already early in the 19th century, when radio and TV did not yet exist, let alone the internet with its social media. Wikipedia tells me that “in American politics in 1848 during the presidential campaign of Zachary Taylor. Dan Rice, a famous and popular circus clown of the time, invited Taylor to join his circus bandwagon. As Taylor gained more recognition and his campaign became more successful, people began saying that Taylor's political opponents ought to ‘jump on the bandwagon’ themselves if they wanted to be associated with such success.” This seems to be the origin of the expression “to jump on the bandwagon”: Following others in their behaviour, styles, opinions, voting behaviour etc., because this behaviour etc. is popular.

Although following and imitating others can be fun, it can also be the source of a fallacy: the bandwagon fallacy. This fallacy presumes that because a position, reasoning, behaviour etc. is popular, it must be correct as well. We can also say that the bandwagon fallacy is the logical error that happens when you assume that something is true, right, or best just because many people think so. But why should something be true, right or best because most people have that view? Should you jump off the bridge because your friends do? Or, if a political leader comes with a simple argument, should it be worth believing it because it appeals to many people? Certainly not. An argument must be believed because it is correct, good or worth adopting; not because it is shared by many.
This brings me to the flip side of the bandwagon coin. We have seen that the bandwagon fallacy involves that someone follows a popular position, reasoning, behaviour, etc. because it is popular. However, the bandwagon fallacy is also called “appeal to common belief” or “appeal to the masses”. This points to the effect that the bandwagon effect can also be used as an instrument of manipulation; consciously or implicitly. This happens when someone says that you must do this or that, because “everybody” does so; or that this or that is right, because “everybody” thinks so. This “everybody” can refer to a practical example or to a big group that, indeed, does think so, behaves so, etc.; or it can be just a way of speaking, if not an attempt to manipulate you. But again: An argument must be believed because it is correct, good or worth adopting, not because “everybody” thinks so. As an appeal to common belief or to the masses the effect is often used, for instance, in commercials or by manipulative – often autocratic – politicians. The tendency to conform, and with that the bandwagon effect, is a powerful instrument of manipulation in the hands of those who want to use or misuse it.
However, once you know this, don’t make the mistake that it is always wrong to jump on the bandwagon because most or many people do. Following the mass as such is a neutral act. Or, in other words, support by the majority doesn’t make an argument true, but it doesn’t make it false either. The bandwagon fallacy does not involve that “anything popular is false.” That would be the opposite mistake. The point is narrower: popularity alone does not make an argument sound. First think before you join. Don’t join assuming that others have thought for you!

Sources and useful websites (besides Wikipedia; see text)
- How to spot the bandwagon fallacy in arguments
- Excelsior Online Writing Lab. Bandwagon Fallacy