Double prevention in the counterfactual theory of causation: Melogno vs. Hall

HERNÁN MIGUEL; LEANDRO GIRI

Buenos Aires

Congreso; 17th Congress on Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science and Technology (CLMPST, 2023): Science and Values in an Uncertain World; 2023

Division of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science and Technology of the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science and Technology

We begin with Ned Hall's paper "Two Concepts of Causation" (2004), where the author basically sets out to critique the counterfactual theory of causation proposed by David Lewis (1973, 1986, 2004). Hall's central argument is that counterfactual analysis needs three conditions (transitivity, locality and the intrinsic character of causal relations) to account for cases of overdetermination, while it needs to deny them to account for cases of double prevention. In particular, Hall points to the existence of a tension between dependence and the three conditions in cases of double prevention.Then, Pablo Melogno (2011) presented an in-depth analysis of his arguments, claiming that the proposed tension between the concept of dependence and the locality thesis is not such, but is the effect of the key example of double prevention proposed by the author being spurious for omitting essential details to complete the causal chain. In particular, Melogno established as the central core of Hall's argument a naïve notion of "physical interaction", which suggests a fertile path to reinforce the counterfactual analysis: to analyse in depth the role that physical interaction plays in this kind of approach, affecting what is meant by "locality". We propose to follow this path here.