Online research in philosophy

argues that the success of the backward causation hypothesis in quantum mechanics would provide strong support for a version of Reichenbach's account of the direction of causal processes, which takes the direction of causation to rest on the fork asymmetry. He also criticises my perspectival account of the direction of causation, which takes causal asymmetry to be a projection of our own temporal asymmetry as agents. In this reply I take issue with Dowe's argument at three main points: his claim that the backward causation hypothesis in QM is incompatible with my perspectival approach to the direction of causation; his defence of the fork asymmetry approach against a general criticism of mine based on the time-symmetry of microphysics; and his application of his preferred account of the direction of causal processes to the relevant cases in QM.

Lockeans, as well as their critics, have pointed out that the memory criterion is likely to mean that none of us were ever fetuses or even infants due to the lack of direct psychological connections between then and now. But what has been overlooked is that the memory criterion leads to either backward causation and a violation of Locke’s own very plausible principle that we can have only one origin, or backward causation and a number of overlapping people where we thought there was just one. I will argue that such problems cannot be avoided by replacing direct psychological connections with overlapping chains of connectedness—what has been called “psychological continuity.”.

Lockeans, as well as their critics, have pointed out that the memory criterion is likely to mean that none of us were ever fetuses or even infants due to the lack of direct psychological connections between then and now. But what has been overlooked is that the memory criterion leads to either backward causation and a violation of Locke’s own very plausible principle that we can have only one origin, or backward causation and a number of overlapping people where we thought there was just one. I will argue that such problems cannot be avoided by replacing direct psychological connections with overlapping chains of connectedness—what has been called “psychological continuity.”.

The recent operationalization of the famous Newcomb's game by Schmidt (1998) offers an interesting and thought-provoking look at the plausibility of backward causation in a Newtonian universe. Hereby we investigate two details of the Schmidt's scenario which may, at least in principle, invalidate his conclusion in two different domains: one dealing with the issue of Newtonian predictability in specific instance of human actions, and the other stemming from a possible strategy aimed at obviating the anthropically oriented view of backward causation as applied to a judicial and ethical problem posed by a version of the scenario. We conclude that the scenario is at least to be more complex than originally presented in order to remain viable. However, it points to a very deep and delicate question of compatibility of backward causation with the conventional ethical standards.

In this article it is presented the idea that quantum electrodynamics has to be seen as a theoretical upgrade of classical electrodynamics and the theory of relativity, that permits an extension of classical theory in the description of phenomena, that while being clearly related to the conceptual framework of the classical theory – the description of matter, radiation, and their interaction – cannot be properly addressed from the classical theory. In this way quantum electrodynamics would not be a fundamental theory, and principally, we could not consider classical electrodynamics as contained in the quantum theory and being recovered from it by some sort of limiting procedure.

In a recent issue of this journal, M. Frisch claims to have proven that classical electrodynamics is an inconsistent physical theory. We argue that he has applied classical electrodynamics inconsistently. Frisch also claims that all other classical theories of electromagnetic phenomena, when consistent and in some sense an approximation of classical electrodynamics, are haunted by “serious conceptual problems” that defy resolution. We argue that this claim is based on a partisan if not misleading presentation of theoretical research in classical electrodynamics.

Is it a "conceptual truth" or only a logically contingent fact that, in any given kind of case, an event x which asymmetrically causes ("produces") an event y likewise temporally precedes y or at least does not temporally succeed y? A bona fide physical example in which the cause retroproduces the effect would show that backward causation is no less conceptually possible than forward causation. And it has been claimed ([9], p. 151; [4], p. 41) that in Dirac's classical electrodynamics (relativistic and non-relativistic), the preacceleration of charged particles before any forces are applied to them furnishes a genuine case of retrocausation by later forces. An exposition of the pertinent physics furnishes the basis for arguing the following: Whereas the non-zero acceleration of a neutral NEWTONIAN mass particle is, of course, causally connected as such to the simultaneously applied non-zero force, the non-zero acceleration of a DIRACIAN charged particle is not causally connected at all as such to the applied forces. A fortiori, in Dirac's electrodynamics, the applied forces do not qualify asymmetrically as the causes of a non-zero acceleration as such; nor does a non-zero acceleration as such qualify as an effect produced by forces. This is shown by means of two considerations as follows: (1) In Dirac's theory, no functional dependence of the value of a non-zero acceleration on the weighted time-average of the forces is vouchsafed as a matter of physical LAW alone without any value of a constant of integration, just as no Newtonian law(s) alone can guarantee a functional dependence of the non-zero value of the velocity of a Newtonian mass particle on the applied forces. Instead, both functional dependencies alike are vouchsafed only with the crucial aid of some de facto boundary condition pertaining to either the past or to the furute, so that (2) Non-zero preaccelerations of Diracian charged particles can no more be causally attributed as such to the retrocausal action of later forces than non-zero "prevelocities" of Newtonian mass particles can be held to be caused as such by later applied forces. The retrocausal interpretation of Dirac's preaccelerations is just as invalid as the retrocausal interpretation of Newtonian prevelocities.

Dirac's classical electrodynamics countenances "preaccelerations" of charged particles at a time t as mathematical functions of external forces applied after the time t. These preaccelerations have been interpreted as evidence for physical retrocausation upon assuming that, in electrodynamics no less than in Newton's second law, external forces sustain an asymmetric causal relation to accelerations. And this retrocausal interpretation has just been defended against the critiques in (Grunbaum 1976), (Grunbaum and Janis, 1977 and 1978) by appeal to the formal assimilation of the electrodynamic laws of motion to Newton's second law. It is argued below that this latest defense of the retrocausal interpretation is even more ill-founded than the prior ones in the literature.

Sometimes also called retro causation. A common feature of our world seems to be that in all cases of causation, the cause and the effect are placed in time so that the cause precedes its effect temporally. Our normal understanding of causation assumes this feature to such a degree that we intuitively have great difficulty imagining things differently. The notion of backward causation, however, stands for the idea that the temporal order of cause and effect is a mere contingent feature and that there may be cases where the cause is causally prior to its effect but where the temporal order of the cause and effect is reversed with respect to normal causation, i.e. there may be cases where the effect temporally, but not causally, precedes its cause.