Hi Andre, > Andre: > Hi Steve, by framing the above examples as questions you are leaving the > possible answers open. The question of "A causing B" is still open. That is > not the issue under discussion. Your answer therefore does not address my > concern. The problem is the meaningfulness/usefulness of the statement: > > Smoking causes lung cancer. > > SOM causes philosophical platypuses. > > Richness causes dirty plugs in the motorcycle. > > Platt caused a lot of misunderstanding of the MOQ over the years. > > Remembering that the word 'cause' implies absolute certainty, isn't there > anything problematic about these statements from a MOQ perspective, > pragmatically and metaphysically?
Steve: I don't intend to imply certainty in my use of "cause." In the lung cancer example, it is clear that ordinary usage doesn't necessity that we always mean certainty when we use "cause," so I see no problem with dropping that notion from causality viewed pragmatically while continuing to use the word. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
