Lessons on Causality

What “in this sense” means is “in this meaningful sense”.

Here’s Russell’s paper for anyone interested:
hist-analytic.com/Russellcause.pdf

It’s free and it’s only 21 pages long.

This is what Russell says right at the start of the paper:

It’s obvious. I don’t have to provide evidence for something that is obvious.

I know this. This is called apparent randomness. What you don’t understand is that not all randomness is apparent.

Yes, they do.

No, it’s not an end, and no, you are not right.

I am talking about information theory. What I am telling you is that there are bit strings, i.e. sequence of 1’s and 0’s, that cannot be compressed. No amount of intelligence can help you compress them. You are the one who is not listening.

Whatever you say must be true. That’s an indesputable fact.

That must be the case.

I say it is neither.

In fact, I understand it far better than you do.

That’s not what I am saying.

There is no other way to “define existence”. That’s what you do not understand. You have an unrealistic understanding of intelligence. When we say “God does not exist” we do so because we do not see him. That’s how it works. That’s not solipsism. That’s simply how intelligence works.

I do not deny that there is such a thing as apparent randomness. What I deny is that all randomness is merely apparent. In other words, I am denying the denial of real randomness.

There are two types of apparent (a.k.a. subjective, epistemic) randomness.

The more superficial type of apparent randomness is due to lack of intelligence. The information that is being processed by the brain is not random. However, the brain processing it lacks the intelligence necessary in order to see this. The problem can be solved, in theory at least, by making the brain more intelligent.

The less superficial type of apparent randomness is due to lack of information. The information that is being processed by the brain is now truly random. No amount of intelligence can help you reveal the underlying order because there is no underlying order. The problem can only be solved by taking whatever steps have to be taken in order to find the missing piece of information. The number of steps that have to be taken – it must be noted – must be finite. Otherwise, if the number of steps is infinite, the claim that randomness, in this particular case, is merely due to lack of information can never be proven wrong. In other words, it becomes unquestionable – dogmatic.

When these two explanations are ruled out, what we’re left with is real (a.k.a. objective, ontic, true) randomness.

Unless you want to be a dogmatist. If you want to be a dogmatist, all you have to do is make a claim and then claim that that claim requires no evidence – that it is beyond evidence. Just declare that “all is order” and never ever bother with evidence.

How much time do we have to spend searching for the evidence of God before we can stop and judge whether He exists or not?
I am pretty sure many will say “keep searching until you find the evidence of God”.
But isn’t that a textbook example of dogmatism?
The claim that God exists can thereby never be proven wrong.
No amount of evidence can prove that God does not exist.
I am pretty sure that many will claim “just because you didn’t see God in thoses place where you looked for Him does not mean He is not located at one of those places in the universe that you did not check”.
Now we enter the territory of extreme skepticism: the future is under no obligation to mimic the past, so no number of observations can tell you what’s going to happen in the future.
Knowledge is impossible. Induction is a problem.
We need a solution or we have to stop making conclusions (which really means we need to stop thinking.)
It does not occur to these people that they are failing to understand what intelligence is.
That they have an idealistic understanding of it.
If we are bold enough to simply judge based on what evidence we have, which in pretty much all cases, I am sure, means concluding that God does not exist, then we risk facing the charge of solipsism.
How we DARE to make a claim as to what exists and what does not when there still remains a possibility that we are wrong!?
I admit. Just because I say “God does not exist” does not mean that at some point in the future I will, in response to new evidence, change my position to “God exists”.
I don’t deny this. But as it is, I have no choice but to say “God does not exist”.
With that, any charge of dogmatism goes out of the window. For my conclusions are not independent from evidence – they are strictly dependent on evidence.
It is EVIDENCE that determines what I am going to think.
You can take the above and modify it so that the word “God” is replaced by word “cause”.
It will still be correct.

Most people have no trouble understanding what a “headless monster” is. Even though none of us ever physically interacted with one. But once you mention a concept such as “uncaused event” people are immediately confused. Even though these two concepts have quite a bit in common. Headless monster is a monster without a head. It’s a monster that has no head and this means that we do not see its head – we do not see a head associated with this monster. That’s how we KNOW that any particular monster has no head – by not seeing it. Our resident smartass would scream “SOLIPSISM!” He will tell us that just because we do not see something does not mean that that something does not exist. In this particular case, he will tell us that just because we do not see a head does not mean that there is no head. How can we be ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN that this particular organism, this monster, has no head? For example, its head might simply be too small to be visible to the naked eye. We need to zoom in. Okay, we decide to give him a chance, so we use whatever means we have to get a closer look in order to test his claim. We do the experiment and we get a negative result: there is no head. Our smartass, however, is not willing to give up. He insists that the head might be even smaller than what we assumed so we need to zoom in further. Just to be sure. Okay, we give him another chance, we zoom in further, and once again, we get a negative result: there is no head. But the smartass won’t give up. He wants to keep zooming in. He’s never certain. He’s clearly afraid of being wrong. Like a paranoid person, or a hypochondriac, he is constantly worried about something – in his case, about being wrong. This is a paralyzing condition because without imposing a time-limit on your research (i.e. without establishing how long you’ll keep looking for evidence) you can never do anything else in your life other than do research. The effect is you spend more and more of your time doing research and less and less time taking action. All because you’re afraid of being a “solipsist”. As if there is such a thing as “absolute certainty”. It’s interesting that our smartass understands what a headless monster is but has trouble understanding what an uncaused event is. An uncaused event is simply some event A for which there is no some other event B which is causally related to it. In plain terms, it’s an event for which we see no cause. Words “cause” and “effect” are simply attributes we assign to those events that are in a specific relation (i.e. that have certain set of similarities and differences that represent what we call “causal relation”.) Our smartass thinks that the universe cannot function without such relations. Apparently, in his own little world, the universe is some kind of organism that must act in a certain way lest it die and disappear out of existence together with existence itself. Whatever that means. I am sure he “understands” what that means. If he thinks or feels he understands it, he must be understanding it.

Do I have to say that “uncaused event” is not the same as “self-caused event” or what is otherwise known as causa sui? The class of concepts that have the form self-[verb] are very tricky to deal with. On one hand, relations can exist only between two different things. A thing cannot be in relation with itself. It’s meaningless. On the other hand, self-relations, if not treated literally, can refer to relations between two different events that belong to the same category. For example, suicide is a form of self-relation – a self-destruction – that refers to one event from the category “self” destroying another event from the category “self” e.g. one’s brain destroying one’s body. I have no idea what self-causation can possibly mean. Either way, when I say “uncaused event” I mean any event that is literally not caused by any other event including itself (if that were somehow meaningful.) There is a breed of morons who think that if an event is not caused by some other event that it is caused by itself. This is just plain stupid. It betrays that they have no clue what casual relations are. And that they think that behind every event must be a cause. And that if there is no other event that is the cause of some event X that the event X is caused by itself.

Underlying order means that a pattern, phenomenon, natural law, like gravity, predates your human perspective.

The universe was around before you were born, and will be after you die, despite your infantile urges to believe that the universe begins and ends with you. It doesn’t. And despite your childish tantrums where you claim that you must see something before it can exist.

Underlying order means discovering and re-discovering all the laws of nature which precede human consciousness.

I’m still right. You’re still wrong.

Magnus, do you believe that you can get something from nothing?

It becomes a circle and this proves that it has infinite sides so I was completely wrong when I said it had none
You speak with great authority so I will pay more attention to you and hopefully not say anything stupid again

math.stackexchange.com/question … on-vs-infi

I am still not getting the logic of it. Can you not drag the hexagon at a certain point to make it infinitely larger but at the same time, it will not become a circle but an infinitely larger hexagon.

This is what I see when I look at it. I think it all just comes down to one’s perception.

You are not paying attention to what I am saying.

By “underlying order” I mean “order that is not immediately apparent”. Whatever piece of information your brain is analyzing there is a degree of order contained within it. The degree of order contained within the information does not become apparent until one employs intelligence. Intelligence DISCOVERS how much order there is in information. If there is very little order in the information that your brain is analyzing then there is simply very little order in the information that your brain is analyzing. No IQ can help you see a degree of order that is not contained within the information your brain is analyzing. That was my point.

I never said or implied that the universe begins and ends with me. This is something you made up. And you made it up because:

  1. you are too stupid to understand what I am saying
  2. you are too arrogant to admit that you are too stupid to understand what I am saying
  3. you are too desperate to prove me wrong

You need to stop projecting your psychology onto me.
You are the one with the childish tantrums.

If that makes you feel good about yourself, then fine, you are right and I am wrong.

But I will take the chance to show you how confident I am in most of what I’ve been saying in this thread by making a bold statement that with regard to this particular subject I show far more intelligence than you do.

You are quite simply an arrogant moron.
That’s what you are.

The concept of “objective existence” is meaningless. If you’re asking what is “objective existence” then you’re asking a meaningless question and that means a question that cannot be answered.
You have a chance to prove me wrong by DEFINING what “objective existence” means and that means explaining to me what it refers to.
Note that words must refer to what was previously experienced.
If they do not refer to something that was previously experienced, then they are MEANINGLESS.
In other words, they do not refer to anything.

It is US who determine what exists and what does not exist.
The only question is HOW.
There are many ways to determine what is true and what is not.
In other words, there are many different PATTERNS OF REASONING.
I agree that we can say that there is a division between SUBJECTIVE patterns of reasoning (that are based on personal preferences or are otherwise counter-factual) and OBJECTIVE patterns of reasoning (that are evidence-based.)
Evidence simply means personal experience.
When your conclusions are in alignment with your personal experience, then we say they are objective (or more precisely, reached through an objective pattern of reasoning.)
When your conclusions are in contradiction with your personal experience, then we say they are subjective (or more precisely, reached through a subjective pattern of reasoning.)

I don’t know what you’re looking for.
Maybe you’re looking for an “underlying order” too?
In other words, maybe you’re looking for a theory of everything i.e. theory that can explain all experience?

Do you agree that just because you are 100% certain that some event X will happen at some point T in the future does not mean that that event X will happen at that point T in the future?
Do you agree with Hume’s statement that “the future is under no obligation to mimic the past”?
For example, do you agree that just because 1,000,000,000 out of 1,000,000,000 swans you observed in the past were white does not mean that every swan in the future will also be white?
Forget swans. Do you agree that just because every event you experienced in the past had a cause does not mean that every event in the future will also have a cause?
But before that, do you agree that the concept of uncaused event makes sense? that it is not meaningless as some claim?
If you answer YES to all of these questions, then you’re clean. At least, more than UrWrongx1000.
If you answer NO, then we’re in trouble.

You really need to understand, and accept, that existence precedes human consciousness. Everything exists before you are aware of it. Awareness is late, a product of evolution, intelligence. The mind depends upon the body, a foundation. The body precedes the mind, builds upward to the mind.

Therefore no ‘observation’ is required, for existence and “objectivity”. When you put human observation as the predicate, that in order for something to exist that it must first be observed, then that is solipsism. You imply that events revolve around human consciousness when this is false. Human consciousness revolves around events.

A hurricane does not stop when you close your eyes to it.

If this matter is settled, then the topic can move forward. What is the cause of the hurricane? It is a large process of nature. There are many causes and many effects. To recognize the causes which lead to the formation and delivery of a hurricane, is science. Science studies causes. If you believe Bertrand Russel claims otherwise then present your case better and clearly. It’s very obvious, common sense really, that science studies causes. Otherwise how can meteorologists track and predict them so well? Isn’t it obvious that science catalogues data, information, events, and history, and then finds patterns within these events?

If a tidal wave always follows from an offshore earthquake, with 100% correspondence, then ought humanity start hypothesizing that offshore earthquakes cause coastal tidal waves?

We already have. And they do.

Go ahead and argue otherwise.

You can but you can also have the size remain static while the sides become infinite to make a circle

No it does not because it is objectively true that a circle has infinite sides so it has nothing to do with perception

The term objective existence is only meaningless in the sense that existence by definition is objective and so it does not have to be referred to as such for there
is no such thing as subjective existence. There is subjective interpretation of objective existence but that is not subjective existence but something else entirely Existence is simply all there is so can only be objective and nothing else

But do you …
… have an answer to me question?

Definition - “Existence” is that which has affect. If it has affect upon anything, it exists. If it has no affect upon anything, it doesn’t exist.

And “objective” merely means that it has affect whether I am cognizant of it or not. Whether I could prove if something is having affect doesn’t alter whether it is having affect. Whether I believe that something is having affect doesn’t alter whether it is having affect. And whether I even know the concept of it doesn’t alter whether it is having affect.

Some questions:

  1. Is there a motivational causation, as Husserls put it.
  2. What is the difference between the Performance (Butler) and the causation; are there myths of the given in causation, which vanishes with Performance?
  3. What are statistical regularities: abbreviations of causation? Or another model of reasoning?

That’s not what existence is. “Existence” is quite simply a word we assign to the group of assumptions that we consider to be correct. That’s all it is. For example, there are currently no trees within my field of view. Nonetheless, I think that at this very point in time there is a tree in my garden. In other words, I categorize this tree, which is nothing more than just an imagination in my head, as “existent”. You can say I am placing it in the group that is labelled “existence” instead of placing it in the group that is labelled “non-existence”. And I am doing so by employing induction which itself employs what of my personal experience remains in my memory. The choice to categorize this imagination as “existent” rather than as “non-existent” is not random – in this particular case. And it is certainly not “subjective” i.e. it is not a product of my desires. It is simply a product of induction. And the reason we do such categorizations is in order to determine which ideas will inform our actions and which won’t.

This is important because things can exist without being affected by something else and without affecting something else.

Affectance is just a fancy term for action. And causation.
It is closely related to inter-action which is its complex variant.

What does it mean for A to affect B?
At its core, what it means is that changing A changes B.
In statistics, this is known as correlation.
Affectance, causation, etc is just a specific type of correlation.
You can also say that it is a specific type of relation between objects of experience.
Yes, it is something that is contained within our experience.
So if you say that experience is subjective then you must say that affectance, causation, etc is also subjective.

Affectance is just a fancy term for action. And causation.
It is closely related to inter-action which is its complex variant.

What does it mean for A to affect B?
At its core, what it means is that changing A changes B.
In statistics, this is known as correlation.
Affectance, causation, etc is just a specific type of correlation.
You can also say that it is a specific type of relation between objects of experience.
Yes, it is something that is contained within our experience.
So if you say that experience is subjective then you must say that affectance, causation, etc is also subjective.
[/quote]
So affection is a term which states motivational causality. And causality is a Special case of correlation. We are motivated in the case of correlation and causation. For example: I choose this cake which is nearly the same as that from my grandmother. And: I am motivated to eat it,