Jim Bogen
Fellow, Center for Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh

"Mechanistic Explanation: What's Generalization Got to Do with It?"

Abstract: Mechanists reject the idea we understand how an effect was caused when we can derive its canonical description from laws or generalizations, or when we can recognize it as an instance of an actual or counterfactual regularity. But they can’t deny that in investigating causes and elaborating causal explanations, scientists think a lot about regularities and appeal to many kinds of generalizations. Nor can they deny that scientists call some of the generalizations they employ laws. How can mechanists accommodate this to their own account of causal explanations?