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As far as I'm inclined to agree, that causation can't be easily defined, I believe that your cycling argument is incorrect. Not only because of what the @dental

As far as I'm inclined to agree, that causation can't be easily defined, I believe that your cycling argument is incorrect. Not only because of what the @dentalperson wrote below (they are completely right that there is a crucial difference), but also because it doesn't follow the human intuition on causation. I understand the sentiment though. Causation should imply correlation at least on a "direct" level. Pressing the gas pedal correlates with the higher speed of the engine, not the vehicle speed. I believe the problem lies in our ability to detect the correlation. Sometimes, the correlation may go undetected (as in the case, when we ignore the engine speed in the vehicle example). I would be very happy to hear a stronger argument against "causation -> correlation" :)

OJFord 5y ago
> I believe that your cycling argument is incorrect. Not only because of what the @dentalperson wrote below (they are completely right that there is a crucial difference), but also because it doesn't follow the human intuition on causation. Well, I was looking for an example that didn't, because my position was 'why is that obviously causal', so I wanted something that seemed silly to suggest was causal, but is IMO equivalent. To clarify it a bit: Pedalling causes my core temperature to increase; which causes my body to regulate it by sweating; which causes me to desire a shower; which (may) cause me to decide to have a show; which will cause me to get wet. If we assume I always decide to have a shower when I desire one, then there's a complete chain of causal events, but it seems silly to say 'pedalling causes me to get wet'. But it's not just the chain that I find troubling; even in shorter examples other 'inputs' (like the decision here if we remove that assumption) make it seem unfair to call it causation to me. Maybe it's all just semantic, hinging entirely on how you define 'causation', and doesn't matter at all.

OJFord 5y ago

> I believe that your cycling argument is incorrect. Not only because of what the @dentalperson wrote below (they are completely right that there is a crucial difference), but also because it doesn't follow the human intuition on causation. Well, I was looking for an example that didn't, because my position was 'why is that obviously causal', so I wanted something that seemed silly to suggest was causal, but is IMO equivalent. To clarify it a bit: Pedalling causes my core temperature to increase; which causes my body to regulate it by sweating; which causes me to desire a shower; which (may) cause me to decide to have a show; which will cause me to get wet. If we assume I always decide to have a shower when I desire one, then there's a complete chain of causal events, but it seems silly to say 'pedalling causes me to get wet'. But it's not just the chain that I find troubling; even in shorter examples other 'inputs' (like the decision here if we remove that assumption) make it seem unfair to call it causation to me. Maybe it's all just semantic, hinging entirely on how you define 'causation', and doesn't matter at all.