---
title: Causation
type: concept
tags: [philosophy-of-science, causation, hub, ontology, epistemology]
sources: ["[[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-causation-in-science]]"]
created: 2026-04-20
updated: 2026-04-20
---

# Causation

Hub concept for the **Philosophy of Science** cluster. "Causation" names whatever it is for *A* to cause *B* — a question that is **ontological** (what causation *is*) and distinct from the **epistemological** question of how we come to *know* of causes ([[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-03-evidence-based-on-what]]).

Science is pervaded by causal claims — "increase", "prevent", "affect", "reduce", "enhance" — and applied science *presupposes* causation: there is no intervention without causal impact, no observation without a causal chain from object to sense, no policy recommendation without a causal theory ([[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-02-do-we-need-causation]]).

## Rival theories (the PHI403 tour)

The course introduces the main competing theories of causation as a family of positions, each of which motivates a different scientific method:

| Theory | Key idea | Motivates |
|---|---|---|
| [[concepts/regularity-theory-of-causation]] (Hume) | Causation = constant conjunction / correlation | Statistical / correlational studies |
| Difference-making (Lewis, counterfactual) | C causes E if E would not have occurred without C | Comparative / RCT studies |
| [[concepts/interventionist-theory-of-causation]] (Woodward) | Causes are manipulable handles | Experimental methods |
| [[concepts/dispositionalism]] (Anjum, Mumford, Cartwright) | Properties have tendencies/powers | Mechanistic / singular case studies |
| [[concepts/mechanisms-in-science|Mechanism theories]] | Causation = underlying productive mechanism | Mechanistic reasoning, process tracing |
| [[concepts/probabilistic-causation]] (Suppes, Mellor) | C raises the probability of E | Bayesian / frequentist statistics |

## Key distinctions used throughout the course
- **Ontology vs epistemology** — what causation *is* vs how we *discover* it; collapsing them is a frequent error ([[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-03-evidence-based-on-what]]).
- **Monism vs pluralism** — one theory of causation vs many. The course defends *ontological monism + methodological pluralism* ([[concepts/causal-pluralism]]).
- **Universal vs singular** — Humean covering-law causation vs dispositionalist single-case causation ([[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-11-is-more-data-better]]).
- **Determinism vs indeterminism vs dispositional tendency** — three modalities of the cause–effect link ([[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-09-from-regularities-to-tendencies]], [[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-14-big-bang]]).
- **Transitivity** — not every causal chain is transitive (sprinkler/fire case, [[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-lecture-14-big-bang]]).

## Why this matters for BPM

Causal claims appear wherever we move from **predicting** processes to **intervening** in them. Prescriptive process monitoring, agentic enactment, and self-modifying ABPSs all make causal claims ("if the agent reroutes the case, the SLA will be met"), so they inherit every philosophical bias of their chosen theory of causation. See [[concepts/causal-process-discovery]] for the process-mining-specific version and [[concepts/rct-limitations]] for the evidence-hierarchy critique relevant to PPM evaluation.

## Related
[[concepts/causal-pluralism]] · [[concepts/dispositionalism]] · [[concepts/mechanisms-in-science]] · [[concepts/probabilistic-causation]] · [[concepts/philosophical-bias]] · [[concepts/causal-process-discovery]]