---
title: "PHI403 Lecture 20 — Plural Methods, One Causation?"
type: source
tags: [philosophy-of-science, pluralism, feyerabend, longino, symptoms, primitivism]
authors: [Anjum, Rani Lill; Rocca, Elena]
year: 2023
venue: "PHI403 Causation in Science, NMBU"
kind: handout
raw_path: "raw/Philosophy of Science/PHI302 20 Plural Methods One Causation.pdf"
created: 2026-04-20
updated: 2026-04-20
key_claims:
  - Causation is ontologically one (monism / primitivism) but has many symptoms — difference-making, regularity, manipulability, probability-raising, energy transference.
  - No single symptom accompanies causation in every case, so methodological pluralism is required to triangulate it.
  - Generalises Feyerabend's and Longino's methodological pluralism — with plural methods, more causal knowledge can be captured.
  - When methods give conflicting verdicts, an evidence-ranking scheme is needed (preview of an alternative to the rigid EBM hierarchy).
---

# PHI403 Lecture 20 — Plural Methods, One Causation?

Course's capstone, presenting its positive programme: **ontological causal monism / primitivism + [[concepts/methodological-pluralism|methodological pluralism]]**.

- **Causal primitivism** — causation is one single, unanalysable thing; it cannot be reduced to correlation, counterfactual dependence, manipulation, or probability-raising.
- **Symptoms, not definitions** — each proposed theory of causation has isolated a *symptom* of causation, not causation itself. Symptoms: difference-making, regularity (though not constant conjunction), manipulability, probability-raising, energy transference.
- A symptom accompanies the phenomenon "more or less reliably" (crying is a symptom of sorrow, not identical with it). None of causation's symptoms is universally present.

**Evidential pluralism**: use multiple methods, each attuned to different symptoms, to identify causation. This is the course's version of Feyerabend's "against method" and Longino's pluralism — no single approach is complete.

**Default principle for method acceptance**: a method is good if it correctly identifies cases of causation (and non-causation) via its symptoms more often than it fails.

When methods conflict, we need an **evidence-ranking scheme** — but one that is context-sensitive, not a fixed hierarchy like EBM's.

## Connections
Back-link: [[sources/2023-anjum-rocca-phi403-causation-in-science]]. Concepts: [[concepts/causal-pluralism]] · [[concepts/methodological-pluralism]] · [[concepts/evidence-hierarchy]] · [[concepts/causation]] · [[concepts/dispositionalism]].