Transcript CAUSAL EXPLANATIONS I - Tarleton State University

CAUSAL EXPLANATIONS I
• Causal explanations involve cause and effect
– Single events from the past or sequences
of events from the past are explained by
citing other events
– The event to be explained is the “effect”
and the other events included in the
explanation are “causes”
– Causes generally occur prior to the effect
– Causal explanations assert that the effect
occurred because of the prior occurrence
of the cause
– For every effect, there are an indefinite
number of causes
CAUSAL EXPLANTIONS II
• Usually expressed in terms of probability
– Historians can never assert that an effect
will always happen but only that it will
probably happen
– Historians therefore seldom use the term
“cause” but instead employ terms like
“influence,” “may cause,” etc.
– Use equivocal terms to express the degree
of uncertainty embedded in their causal
explanation
DIFFICULTIES
• Logically demonstrating that the occurrence
of an event caused a later event to happen is
a process fraught with all kinds of dangers
• The biggest danger revolves around the
issue of connections
– Just because Event A occurred before
Event B, why does it necessarily follow
that A caused B to occur?
ESTABLISHING A CAUSAL
RELATONSHIP 1
• There must be a correlation between
the two events
– A correlation is the degree to which
the occurrence of one event is
associated with the occurrence of
another event
• It is the degree of interactivity
between two or more events
ESTABLISHING A CAUSAL
RELATIONSHIP 2
• There must be a proper temporal
relationship in the occurrence of
events
–The cause must occur before the
effect
ESTABLISHING A CAUSAL
RELATIONSHIP 3
• There must be some sort of theoretical
generalization to connect the two
events
• Theoretical generalizations are almost
always implicit rather than explicit in
causal explanations
– But they are nonetheless an essential part
of every logically valid causal explanation
LOGICAL FALLACY #1
• Mistaking correlation for Cause (cum hoc,
propter hoc)
– Correlation by itself can never establish
cause
– It can disestablish a cause but a
correlation can occur without a cause
– Correlation is only a necessary component
of a causal explanation
• It is not sufficient in itself to explain
cause
LOGICAL FALLACY #2
• Putting effect before the cause (pro hoc,
propter hoc)
– The effect must always follow the cause
and it must be separated by an interval of
time (even if it is very short)
– Cause and effect cannot happen at exactly
the same time
– Example: David Potter’s People of Plenty
LOGICAL FALLACY #3
• Reductionism
– When a historian reduces complexity or
diversity to uniformity in a causal
explanation
– Most common form is the confusion of a
probable or possible cause with the prime
cause
• Mistakes one event in a chain of
causative factors as the main cause of
an effect
LOGICAL FALLACY #4
• Indiscriminate Pluralism
– Occurs when a number of causal factors
are put forward to explain an event but
they are neither carefully defined nor
weighted
• Just thrown at the reader and the result
is hopeless confusion
– Example: Bernard Knollenberg, Origins of
the American Revolution (1961)
LOGICAL FALLACY #5
• The Fallacy of Identity
– The assumption that a cause must
resemble its effect
– One common form of this fallacy is “tunnel
history”
• Assumes that economic effects must
have economic causes or that the
causes of religious phenomena must be
religious—and so forth
LOGICAL FALLACY #6
• The Fallacy of Responsibility as a Cause
– Merges two different questions and
demands a single answer
• “Why did it happen?” with “Who is to
blame?”
– Historians must always be careful not to
allow their moral inclination to blame
someone for an event to confuse their
empirical attempt to identify the cause of
the event
LOGICAL FALLACY #7
• Fallacy of Mechanistic Cause
– Break down the components of a causal
complex (ie., isolate the various causes for
an event) and analyze them independently
from each other
– Problem with this is that, most of time,
various causes interact with each other to
produce an event
• Independently, they might not be that
important but when they interact with
other factors their importance becomes
manifest
OBJECTIVITY
• As it traditionally conceived,
objectivity requires scholars to
ignore personal bias to the
greatest extent possible in order to
describe the subject under
consideration as accurately as
possible.
–Two basic positions regarding
this issue
FIRST POSITION
• Holds historians to the standards of the natural
sciences by insisting that any other option would
result in a reduction of rigor and believability
– Historians have to adopt the concept of
repeatability from the natural sciences
• In a natural science context, this means that
anyone carrying out an experiment in the same
way and under the same conditions ought to
arrive at the same findings and conclusions
• For historians, this means that anyone
studying the same set of evidence will come up
with the same conclusions about it
PROBLEM
• Repeatability has less bearing for a
historians than for a natural scientist
– They have difficulty arriving at solid
agreements and confirming one
another’s findings
• Critics see this as a weakness
while historians see it as a sign of
intellectual vitality
SECOND POSITION
• Some historians argue that the measure of
objectivity in history will always differ from that of
the natural sciences
– Historians study human subjects charged with
emotion and passion
• Individual historians cannot always achieve
detachment or indifference
– Historians display bias through the mere choice
of a subject for study and then compound the
problem by looking at this subject through a lens
derived from culture, class, race, gender, religion,
etc.
HYPOCRISY
• Similar hazards regarding objectivity actually
exist in the natural sciences too
– Natural scientists also often choose a
subject for investigation based on a bias
acquired from life experience
– They also draw conclusions bases on lessthan-total knowledge
• The major epistemological difference
between the natural sciences and history is
that natural scientists generally refuse to
acknowledge these problems
CARL BECKER SAYS:
• “In truth the actual past is quite gone;
and the world of history is an intangible
world, recreated in our minds.”
• In contrast to the natural sciences, no actual
object ever comes under observation in
history. Instead, using the remnants of the
past, historians reconstruct history,
employing statements of probability, not
certainty, and subject always to the
limitations of a point of view
POINT OF VIEW
• Point of view renders historical narratives
intelligible
– Without them, historical artifacts make no
sense and historical narratives would
follow no coherent line of development
• Different versions of the same events by
historians do not necessarily result in
intellectual incompatibility or error
– Divergent renditions may result in larger
complementary forms of understanding in
which one enriches and animates the other
PAUL K. CONKIN SAYS:
• Different standards of objectivity must apply
to history
– Historians must adhere to their own rules
of fairness, reason, and logic while
constructing their stories about the human
past
– They must support their claims with some
kind of actual evidence as the basis for
plausible and valid inferences
• To the extent that they comply with
these methods, historians will fulfill the
requirements of objectivity
A WARNING
• “Historical Revisionism” is a good example
of what happens when historians abandon
their reliance on evidence and simply let
their biases take control
– Argues that the Holocaust never happened
• That it was a gigantic hoax perpetuated
by Zionists in support of the state of
Israel
• They dress their “findings” up with the
appearance of scholarly apparatus in
order to make their untruths seem
believable
CONCLUSION
• Historian Deborah Lipstadt argues that the
lies of historical revisionism are the work of
an unsavory group of pseudoscholars with
pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic biases
– The reality of the Holocaust is not
debatable
• Abundant evidence exists to
demonstrate that it happened
• Historical Revisionists ignore this
evidence and therefore lie to promote
their racist agendas