Alison Gopnik - What is Causation?

In a "billiard-ball world" of Newtonian science, causation was obvious—things had to touch each other in space and a cause always had to precede an effect. But quantum mechanics destroys such notions. What then is causation? Moreover, must causes always be physical? Is "mental causation" a coherent concept? What about "top-down causation"?

[WilliamDye-willdye]

Philosophy and law often become a struggle to define words more precisely, a task which can be frustratingly subjective. What repeatable experiment can disprove someone's definition of a word? This video is an excellent reminder that the field of child development can provide valuable insights, and at least some degree of objective measurements.

For example, suppose I'm a judge who interprets the word "payment" in a way that you did not expect. If repeatable experiments show that even children do not agree with me, then at the very least the evidence should compel me to provide a strong justification for effectively redefining that word.

[jamesruscheinski]

Does causation in classic physical reality require local communication, such as from a force? Causation in non-physical reality may not need local communication of force

[jamesruscheinski]

Human mind can perceive and program causation?

[jamesruscheinski]

What does probability mean for causation?

[jamesruscheinski]

Causation is not reduced to physical explanation?

[georgesquenot]

That is interesting but it does not really discuss what causation is (or might be).

[TH-nxvf]

Would you be willing to change your mind about the best way of understanding reality? What if the best way of understanding reality isn't through labeling apparently separate parts and creating vast systems of thought describing the relations between those labels? This can only work if reality is basically finite, but if it is infinite then you need to fine another way.

[russhamer]

Allison, isn't the childs application of "interventionism" in their acqusiton of, refinement of their concept of casuation another way of saying that theey are, inherently (loaded word, I realize) "little scientists"? This is the approach one must take - i.e., experimentation - in order to disambiguate "correlation-in-casual-chain" vs correlation "by accident". And it is so interesting to me to hear you say that children do this, even 2 year olds, essenitally naturally and universally. I have thought this for many years, but have not done the clever research you are explaining here. My field is visual development, but I am very atuned to and interested in these more complex questions about cognitive developmement and how our young brains acquire knowledge about the world. If the toddlers do not "figure out " the real causal chain vs correlation-without-causality when viewing correlated event by themselves, but seem to be able to "put is together" when an person does the manipulations (as in you blue block red block example), I am wondering if this suggests that they include you (the person) as the pime-mover in the perceived causal chain. In the Baysean model, the "given" part would include "given blue block present AND Dr. Gopnik present".

[FAAMS]

No talk about Time being a fundamental property or not. Insufficient for the crux of the topic...In a block Universe all frames of time, Past, Present, and Future coexist. In this case, we have Perfect Correlation which is in all aspects identical to Causality for all practical purposes but there is no actual cause and effect. The point is that there is a difference between simple correlation and Universal perfect correlation such as the one we see in the Laws of Physics. If the block Universe hypothesis is true we still have to explain the regularity in the Laws of Physics through this new coinage that I just call Perfect Correlation! The idea is also useful for cyclic models on the "origins" of the Universe.

[mostlytranslucent]

She calls herself a Gopnik, but I don't see any Adidas (seriously tho, great channel)

[xspotbox]

First thing people experience are dreams, not reality. Dreams are always causal, they either morph into a consistent version of imaginary events or are persistently irrational, so dreamer must make sense of why his brain impose those limits on him. This natural skills are helping us understand known and unknown facts abut reality simultaneously and place us inside this weird bubble.

[jamesruscheinski]

is conscious awareness correlative but not causative?

[Zagg]

There are some things that we just can’t change our minds about. They’re called categories.

[LudwigSauerteig]

Tolerance in "physics" is the heisenberg matrix a probabelistic schema, funny aspect of it is all outside this matrix isen't tolerable. Physic is it relativ absolut or absolut relativ ?

[totalfreedom]

*_Nothing_* beats the greatest brainchild of the human brain—the scientific method, whose solid yet pliable backbone is the fusing of constructive criticism, rigorous skepticism, a vivid imagination, and above all the consuming curiosity of a child. 💕 ☮ 🌎 🌌

[davidtate]

The Budda talked a lot about.causation.then the effect.