A New Metaphysics
A New Metaphysics
I am about to propose a new metaphysics—a new metaphysical system. I say “new” with some trepidation, there being nothing new under the sun; but I am confident that nothing like this has ever been formulated before, or not in any tradition with which I am familiar—though there are faint echoes of it in Aristotle (it is quite anti-Platonic).[1] I will begin by stating the theory as baldly, indeed stridently, as possible, so that no one is in any doubt about the pretensions of the theory. Then we can move to more careful formulation and motivation. I call the theory “logical causalism”, though “causal logicism” would also do; this may be abbreviated to “causalism”, as “logical positivism” was abbreviated to “positivism”. There are two main claims. The first is that logical entailment is a type of causation: premises have the causal power to produce conclusions. Entailment is (causally) generative, productive, consequential—a type of force, active and effectual. Logical consequence is a type of causal consequence, not something altogether different from ordinary causal consequence (bridges collapsing etc.) The second claim is that causation is a logical relation: it has a logical structure, a logical form, a logical essence. It is logically constituted. It works by combining a major premise and a minor premise—the former being a law of nature, the latter a particular fact. For example: all matches cause fires when struck (in suitable conditions); this match was struck; therefore, this match caused a fire. The conclusion is deducible from the premises and may be inferred from them. The antecedent facts (general and particular) logically imply the consequent fact. It is as if the match reasons thus: “I am a match and I was struck; all struck matches cause fires; therefore, I will cause a fire”. It doesn’t really reason this way, of course, but the causal sequence consists of a pair of facts that entail the final state of that sequence. Causation is a kind of logical procedure: it leads from premises to a conclusion—from cause to effect. It is as if the world is engaging in logical reasoning. The process is logical because it embeds a logical necessity—given the antecedent facts a certain fact must result. There is a logic to causation; it isn’t just random or brute or “one damn thing after another”. It is intelligible, as much as modus ponens is. Putting these two claims together, we can say that logic is causal and causation is logical. Deduction (or induction) is based on a causal power—the power to produce conclusions; and causal reasoning is based on a logical structure—the structure of a general law and a particular fact combining to produce a certain result.
Now the metaphysical picture is as follows: the entire world (reality) consists of logic and causality. The two are essentially identical and they run through everything—the mental, physical, mathematical, and moral. The mental is subject to causation and hence the logic inherent in it; ditto the physical.[2] The mathematical concerns facts that have causal explanations: e.g., the number 4 is even because it is divisible by 2 and all numbers divisible by 2 are even. The latter two facts causally explain the former fact—they give rise to that fact; make it the fact it is. Mathematical facts have the power to produce other mathematical facts (a proof seeks to uncover these facts). The fact that a triangle has three sides is causally connected to the fact that it has three angles: the two facts lead to each other, generate each other, are the reason for each other. In the case of morality, we can say that according to utilitarianism an action is good if and only if it is caused to be so by maximizing utility: this is what explains or grounds the goodness of the act. The deontologist will give a different explanation of what makes an act good (it’s good because it falls under moral rules). Causation extends beyond what we have come to call efficient causation modelled on a limited class of cases, as when a sculptor shapes a statue. Causation tracks reasons-why; the reason why something is the case is properly described as the cause of it (see below). The world does not divide into a causal part and non-causal part (as Aristotle recognized); it is shot through with causality in every nook and cranny. Everything has a reason for being—and that includes logic itself. The cause of the validity of an argument is that it instantiates certain logical laws; these laws cause (explain, ground) the validity of the argument. The only uncaused things are things that exist without reason—the basic facts of the universe. It isn’t that logic only exists in the realm of language and thought, and causation only exists in the changing world of matter and mind; logic and causation jointly penetrate everywhere. Thus, logical causalism is a monistic metaphysics: all reality is unified around its two pillars. Existence is coterminous with logic and causation—existence is logico-causal. The only things that escape them are non-existent: the nonexistent has no causal power and it need not obey any logic (it can be nonsensical). Every real existent thing has logic and causality woven into it. We thus have mental causation, physical causation, mathematical causation, and moral causation—as well as logic of these types. Everything obeys the laws of logic, and everything is subject to causation. We may not understand causation that well (see Hume), but we know it is everywhere. And logic and causation work together, not being separable in their essence.
I mentioned Aristotle: he too had a very expansive conception of causation. His four types of cause reach into everything—the mental, the physical, the mathematical, the moral. But I am not aware that he ever thought of the syllogism as causally grounded: he didn’t add logical causation to his list of causes. Still, I think he was right to use the concept of cause in a highly inclusive manner. We need a concept of cause (causal explanation) commensurate with our concept of a reason, and that concept is everywhere. The natural (metaphysical) kind Cause is as broad as reality itself; it is as broad as the concept of an object or a property or the concept of a concept. It enables us to unify all the heterogeneity of the universe. We actually need it to unify Aristotle’s four causes: what do material causes, formal causes, final causes, and efficient cause all have in common? They are all causes, of course—productive, generative, reason-providing. And what ties them all together instead of leaving them in a jumble? Logic, naturally: it is only logical for nature to harmonize the four causes into a coherent package. You can’t have the final cause of a table being to hold things up and the material cause being composed of air or fire. Something has to explain the harmony of the four causes, and that will be a logical cause. Aristotle could have chosen to regard logical consequence as a species of causation, but evidently he didn’t (he seems rather Platonic about logic). In any case, such a view is not part of the tradition stemming from Aristotle. The obsession with so-called efficient causation (the label itself is hardly pellucid—aren’t all his causes equally efficient?) in post-Hume philosophy precluded recognition of a broader notion of causation. In its classical meaning it referred to causation by a separate agent on the body in question, as in a sculptor shaping a statue, which clearly covers only a subclass of cases—it says nothing about the intrinsic causal power of a tree to grow, for example. Nor does ordinary language provide any warrant for enforcing such a narrow conception of causation upon us. And once we widen the concept in the natural direction, we can see our way clear to accepting a causation-based metaphysics. Logic has traditionally been supposed to apply universally, but has not been supposed to be causal itself; I am adding that wrinkle. First, we must pull logic away from language and mind, placing it in the objective world; then, we must subsume it under a causal umbrella, thus producing a monistic logico-causal metaphysics. The world is all that is the case logically and causally.[3]
It is fair to say that causation used to be under a cloud in analytical philosophy. Hume was thought (wrongly) to have undermined the coherence of the concept, and logical positivism fought shy of it for lack of verificationist approval. But that changed sometime in the 1960s when causal theories became all the rage. All well and good, but efficient causation was the preferred causal concept, though not much scrutinized (is all causation really from other bodies?). I am recommending casting off the suspicion more radically (along with the empiricism that leads to it): causality is ubiquitous, protean, and indispensable. Logic, too, has cast off earlier inhibitions, allowing in the modal, epistemic, practical, deontic, etc. It has become a lot less anal. True, causation is somewhat mysterious, especially to the empiricist (anal) mind, but that shouldn’t stop us from using it to bring order to an otherwise chaotic universe. Mysterian logical causalism is not to be ruled out of court a priori. Indeed, there is nothing to stop us being naturalist mysterian logical causalists.[4]
[1] For some background, see my “Causal and Logical Relations”.
[2] Classical mechanics has a logical flavor to it, being largely a priori; and psychology (folk and scientific) is inextricably bound up with logic because the role of rationality in mental life.
[3] That would include God, if he were to exist—he is clearly the logical and causal being par excellence.
[4] Seriously, did anyone ever truly believe that an all-encompassing metaphysics would be free of mysterious elements? Do you think the ultimate truth about the whole universe would be transparently given to the human mind (brain) at this precise moment of evolutionary history? Is Berkely’s metaphysics mystery-free, or Leibniz’s, or Descartes’? Is a totally physics-based metaphysics devoid of mystery? Hardly.
Intriguing, looking forward to further elaborations! In the mean time, I have an obvious question you have already considered I’m sure. If indeed “The world is all that is the case logically and causally”, what’s the destiny of the usual suspects creeping into our discourse from the realm of unreal such as “nothing”, “golden mountain”, “round square”, “Unicorn” (are they collectively called Meinongian?)?
The context of the question is that the paper informally presents logic and causality as (always?) interrelated, but it does not feel so in such instances as above.
Nonexistent objects are not part of the (real) world, but could be part of the fictional world. I don’t think they can have causal powers and are not subject to logical rules.
There is a fictional world. It is natural to ask what is its ontological status. Off the top of my head fiction consists of words, images, emotions and thoughts and events from everyday life. Maybe that’s what a foundationalist like Hobbes might say. Descartes says all dreams have to have some reality to them, having material from the real world, so why not fiction?
All those things exist but fictional characters don’t.
But even though fiction is parasitic on real domains it is a way of talking about psychology and life and to do things with words. So it has some kind of ontological reality.
You wrote a study on Shakespeare- so I don’t need to press my point.
Of course it does, but it is generally agreed that it also concerns fictional (nonexistent) entities.
Very cool, interesting, informative ideas…i just read Galen Strawson’s plea for identity metaphysics in his recent book «Stuff, Quality, structure: The whole go»…and these thoughts about logical causalism/causal logicism is sort of in this same (identity metaphysics) spirit…??..
I am seriously fumbling in the dark when it comes to logic and metaphysics and these sorts of things (have mercy whoever reads this, i’m just an amateur thinker doing philosophy in my spare time😅), but i have some thoughts:
It seems correct to say that i realise that, for example, red is a secondary quality by reasoning something like:
Red is a colour
Colour is a secondary quality
Therefore
Red is a secondary quality
Included as a premise is also the law of transitivity, i guess (for all A, B and C: if A is B, and B is C, then A is C)….
But is it possible to realize, intuit, grasp or prehend that red is a secondary quality directly…without taking these intermediate steps that are the premises?….in me just intuiting redness…i «see» the essense of «secondary qualityness» in it…without first then «seeing» that redness also include colouredness….??…just as i directly grasp that red is a colour, maybe, i just also directly grasp that red is a secondary quality…??…
or is this just a self – deception…if i realize or grasp that red is a secondary quality i am, at least unconsciously, going through the logical steps which is the reasoning laid out above…??…i cannot grasp that red is a secondary quality without grasping that «red is a colour», «colour is a secondary quality», and since «For all A, B, C: if A is B, B is C, then A is C»…yes, then i grasp or intuit that «red is a secondary quality»….this second option seems «logical» at least…includes logic…which the directly and abruptly grasping does not….
I am not sure where i am going with these thoughts…but one alternative is that it is possible to do such an directly grasping….but that this is then not something one would call something logical….but one can also then disclose that logical structure that determines that red is a secondary property…it is there…and determines (and causes according to logical causalism) that red is a secondary quality…but even so, it is possible to just bypass this logical fact and grasp that red is a secondary quality directly….another alternative is that this is not possible…in realizing that red is a secondary quality you always go by the way of the reasoning…some things one intuits directly (maybe, for example, the law of transitivity, and that red is a colour?)…but that red is a secondary quality is never one of them…that is impossible…
But if we transfer these thoughts and options to the framework of logical causalism/causal logicism…with it’s assumption of logical realism…i guess the objective counterpart to directly intuiting that red is a secondary quality is the fact of red being a secondary quality is not determined or caused by the facts which is «red is a colour», «colour is a secondary quality», and so on….that this fact is just non – caused or determined…and one can then take this a step further and say that everything is like this…everything is just as it is…without any reason or cause….everything is just a basic fact…??..well, then this incredible position is of course very opposite to logical causalism/causal logicism…right?….
But anyways, i guess you could maintain the theses that one could directly grasp «red is a secondary quality»…even though there is the reasons or causes for this fact or conclusion….??🤔…sorry, i am not sure if these thoughts make sense, he, he….
I think you can grasp that red is subjective without deducing this from other facts. But other facts do entail it, which we may or may not know.
Yeah, that seems like the most reasonable position…i wondered also if this question could be answered empirically, and remembered the fascinating speculation in your paper «The science of philosophy» about doing conceptual analysis by discovering the neural correlates of concepts, and thereby finding out, with the help of brain scanning, what other concepts a given concept embeds. Maybe you could do something similar with regards to what constitutes the grasping of «A is C»…the neuronal activity will disclose if this always goes via a reasoning process or not…anyways, this raises a lot of different questions…questions about the realtionship between how the underlying brain structure of concepts, and reasoning, is actually organized, and the exact relationship between something like determinates and determinables..etc…??..will need to think about this some more…
Yes, the same method could in principle be applied.
You bring up Aristotle. Is your metaphysics compatible with Stoicism. Their ethics is very popular but their metaphysics is dated. Their idea of there being things up to us and not up to us and a logos and their dual emphasis on both logic and causality have the air of compatibility with your metaphysics.
I’m sure they are compatible.
By speaking of classical mechanics it is only natural to see your metaphysics in light of quantum mechanics and relativity.
My impression from when I took an introductory college course is that relativity is like Parmenides and Quantum Physics defies logic in many ways almost like a mystical Pythagorean cultural artifact.
In ethics evil and fiction p.50 _55 you have argued and concluded that moral properties ( and logical properties ) are causally inert .
but in this paper you say contrary to that . isn,t that the case ?
It is the case. Like everyone else, I believed that moral, logical, and mathematical properties are causally inert; but I recently came to the view that we were all operating with a narrow conception of causality. On a broader conception, all these may be counted as causal.
That is , you mean mental causality , not physical one ? all of them are mental , not physical .
Then, you have accept mental causality ?
I accept both mental and physical causality, as well as logical causality.
Aristotle never ventured beyond viewing logic as a tool, did he? That’s the meaning of ‘organon’ they say. It was not a tool for creating new knowledge unlike say the kinds of proof Euclid is famous for
Logic moved on a lot from there.
Here’s what I don’t get: causality and logic add up in different ways. This is apparent in cases of multiple or partial causlity. If ‘a’, ‘b’ and ‘c;’ cause ‘d’ and ‘e’ that makes more sense in a causal than a logical framework. I’m not quite a philosopher, so I don’t trist my intuitions as do you trust yours. Casuality can be multiple, and partial, (I imagine) but can logic? Please forgive me if I fail to offer specific examples- this is what puzzles me about your system neat and cool as it is
Logic is nearly always multiple because you need more than one premise to reach a conclusion: All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal.
Here is my gripe with your system: causality is temporal (though Zeno might raise objections); while logic is atemporal. I gather your new expansive way of conceptualizing both logic and causality addresses my concern, though you’re not explicit about it.
Or I can be totally wrong.
You handsomely beg the question: some causal relations are temporal but not all. The explanatory “because” is not always temporal; it can cover logical relations. Reasons do not always precede what they are reasons for.
Explain to me are logic and causality the same the way 2 +2 + 4? They are not literally identical but can be transformed into one another. like ice can be made into water? Also, on the matter of logic: do people in everyday life reason differently after the replacement of Aristotelian logic by Boolean logic?
You just have to remember Aristotle’s four causes. People reason the same way (modern logic is derived from Frege and Russell). We also now have tense logic, modal logic, deontic logic, etc.
But does logic leak down to the practical man, the reader of the Wall Street Journal, or just the educated layman?
Logic might, in the sense of the theoretical study of valid reasoning, but not so much in the sense of the ability to reason. Men logically reasoned before Aristotle invented logic, but he told them what they were doing.
This is genius
Yeah.