Venetian Sea Levels, British Bread Prices, and the Principle of the Common Cause
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8399263 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Elliott Sober (0000-0003-3130-1263, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2001 |
| Volume | 52 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 331-346 |
| Publication date | 2001-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-0882 • E-ISSN: 1464-3537 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/bjps/52.2.331 |
| OpenAlex | W2055139712 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 41 |
| References cited | 8 |
When two causally independent processes each have a quantity that increases monotonically (either deterministically or in probabilistic expectation), the two quantities will be correlated, thus providing a counterexample to Reichenbach's principle of the common cause. Several philosophers have denied this, but I argue that their efforts to save the principle are unsuccessful. Still, one salvage attempt does suggest a weaker principle that avoids the initial counterexample. However, even this weakened principle is mistaken, as can be seen by exploring the concepts of homology and homoplasy used in evolutionary biology. I argue that the kernel of truth in the principle of the common cause is to be found by separating metaphysical and epistemological issues; as far as the epistemology is concerned, the Likelihood Principle is central.
Counterexample · Discrete mathematics · Epistemology · Mathematical economics · Metaphysics · Monotonic function · Probabilistic logic · Mathematics · Philosophy · Philosophy and History of Science
Running it up the flagpole to see if anyone salutes
Reichenbach’s cubical universe and the problem of the external world
Causal Instrumental Variables and Interventions
Interventions and Causal Inference
Empirical Evidence
Ockham's Razors
Statistical Inference as Severe Testing
From Metaphysics to Method
Making Time Stand Still
Causal Pluralism in Medicine and its Implications for Clinical Practice
Learning from Non-Causal Models
Bread prices and sea levels
Interventionism and Non-Causal Dependence Relations
Evidential Pluralism, Causal Pluralism, and an Integrative Theory of Causation
Inference to the Best Explanation, Bayesianism, and the Screening-Off Challenge
The Fate of Explanatory Reasoning in the Age of Big Data
Characterizing common cause closedness of quantum probability theories
Causation in the Social Sciences
The ontological status of shocks and trends in macroeconomics
Econometric methods and Reichenbach’s principle
An Empirical Critique of Two Versions of the Doomsday Argument – Gott's Line and Leslie's Wedge
Modeling causal processes
Green and grue causal variables
Can there be a Bayesian explanationism? On the prospects of a productive partnership
Causal inference and the metaphysics of causation
Modus Darwin redux
The inferences of common causes reduced to common origins
Evidence and explanation in Cicero's On Divination
How Explanation Guides Confirmation
A Pragmatist Theory of Evidence
Characterizing Common Cause Closed Probability Spaces
Prediction and Explanation in Historical Natural Science
Modularity and the Causal Markov Condition
Completion of the Causal Completability Problem
Indeterminism and the Causal Markov Condition
A Probabilistic Analysis of Causation
Screening-Off and Causal Incompleteness
The Chances of Choices
Nonstationary Time Series, Cointegration, and the Principle of the Common Cause
Evidence in Medicine and Evidence-Based Medicine
Introduction to the Epistemology of Causation
Causality
Why do we Sometimes get Nonsense-Correlations between Time-Series?--A Study in Sampling and the Nature of Time-Series
Sober's Principle of Common Cause and The Problem of Comparing Incomplete Hypotheses
How to Tell When Simpler, More Unified, or Less Ad Hoc Theories will Provide More Accurate Predictions
Conditioning and Intervening
Independence, Invariance and the Causal Markov Condition
| Unique citing works | 41 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,78 |
| Citation span | 2003 - 2026 (24) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 37 |