Constraints and Selection
How Higher-Level Causal Eliminativism Leads to Superdeterminism
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21461646 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Miguel García-Valdecasas (0000-0001-6271-5181, Instituto de Filosofía, corresponding author), Javier Sánchez-Cañizares (0000-0002-4670-2011, Universidad de Navarra) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Publication date | 2025-12-05 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Erkenntnis (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0165-0106 • E-ISSN: 1572-8420 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s10670-025-01039-y |
| OpenAlex | W4417034528 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 33 |
From how a whirlpool is formed behind a rock to how temperature speeds up a chemical reaction, constraints are pervasive in nature. They are also essential for explaining the emergence of dissipative structures, the far-from-equilibrium systems responsible for increasingly complex forms of organization. In this article, we argue that the constraints on change exert a non-derivative causal influence on microphysics by introducing selection rules, and that they are causal not by what they produce, but by what they prevent. However, recent approaches in the philosophy of science, such as the one we call “higher-level causal eliminativism” (HLCE), deem constraints as non-causal explanations or derivative causal explanations. HLCE is a microphysicalist perspective according to which reality is the result of an interplay of microphysical interactions. It denies the causality of constraints; only their explanatory value is recognized. In so doing, HLCE commits itself to superdeterminism, the theory for which some unknown non-local hidden variables and the laws of nature utterly determine the outcomes of all events, including those of quantum physics. Superdeterminism considers all higher-order relationships as nothing but statistically salient effects of global microphysical field interactions. By undermining the dependence of mathematical selection on ontological processes, superdeterminism leads to an arbitrary selection of initial conditions for the universe. Yet we will argue that this arbitrariness undermines itself and the hopes of HLCE
Arbitrariness · Causation · Eliminative materialism · Ontology · Qualia · Salient · Philosophy and History of Science · Philosophy and Theoretical Science · Quantum Mechanics and Applications
Organisms, Agency, and Evolution
How the Laws of Physics Lie
Causation, Prediction, and Search
Because Without Cause
Investigations
The Direction of Time
I.—On the Notion of Cause
The explanatory nature of constraints
Biological functions are causes, not effects
Phenomenological Laws and Mechanistic Explanations
Causation
Are Mathematical Explanations Causal Explanations in Disguise
Conservation Laws in Scientific Explanations
What Does the World Look Like according to Superdeterminism
What Makes a Scientific Explanation Distinctively Mathematical
Quantum Mechanics in a Time-Asymmetric Universe
Explanation beyond causation? New directions in the philosophy of scientific explanation
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |