Abstract
The article is about explanation of action. Alternative forms of explanation are measured against two criteria of explanatory success. One says that explanation should be supported by epistemic considerations and the other says that it should make for understanding of why people do what they do. Causal explanation fulfills both criteria provided it (i) rests on evidence and adequate reasoning and (ii) manages to lay bare the causal mechanism. Unless people act for reasons, the second criterion is not fulfilled. The question is whether causal connection may still be discerned by way of inference from the best explanation of correlation. Semantic considerations suggest a negative answer.
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Notes
- 1.
For a case of confusion, see Alexander Wendt (1998:105), who adduces two questions: (i) “How was it possible for Stalin, a single individual, to exercise so much power over the Soviet people?” (ii) “How is it possible for a gas to have temperature?” Both questions are, he says, about “what it is that instantiates some phenomenon, not why that phenomenon comes about” (ibid.:105). But (i) is not. Asking how it was possible for Stalin to exercise so much power is tantamount to wondering why he became powerful. The explanation lies in the course of events that lead to this state of affairs. Suppose, contrary to fact, that Stalin regularly got his will because he wanted people to do what they were intent on doing anyway. If so, was he powerful or not? This question, unlike (i), calls for a constitutive explanation of power – an account of what it is to be powerful, in particular, whether being powerful is conditional upon the need to overcome opposition.
- 2.
I adopt the terms “discernment” and “articulation” of causation from Newlands (2010:472).
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Malnes, R. (2019). Explanation: Guidance for Social Scientists. In: Valsiner, J. (eds) Social Philosophy of Science for the Social Sciences. Theory and History in the Human and Social Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33099-6_7
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