Reddit reviews Causality: Models, Reasoning, and Inference

yeah either that or this one

> Yes, that's the efficient causation. But final causatively, action begins with ideas. Recall the 4 kinds of causation identified by Aristotle. One of the errors determinists make is not recognizing final causation

Hmm... hadn't heard of that before. Interesting but I think I'd rather read Judea Pearl's book Causality than Aristotle's thoughts on Causality.

> I believe man is born as tabula rasa

I used to believe that, there's a lot of science that contradicts it, or at least limits how blank the slate is. But you don't need science to refute the general idea. If we're all born with no preconceived notions than how did thought itself emerge? Clearly our tools (culture) have written on our slate, often ways we aren't conscious of.

>Regardless, the valuing of society is not part of man's nature; rather, it's discovered and chosen.

Choice is another philosophically loaded concept. If you believe choice can occur on a subconscious level, then I don't disagree with you. But I believe people don't make significant choices unless their emotional state is worse than they think it should be.

>And while human are typically irrational and emotional thinkers in this point of time, I don't think that makes it their nature

It's their history. And my perspective is that history is a pretty good predictor of the future. Young people are often lead to believe that some great change is just around the corner, but that's rarely true.

>No they aren't causes, they are limiting factors of a cause.

Please define what a "limiting factor of a cause" is.

Hint: It's a cause. (If you search the term limiting factors, by the way, most sentences will say "limiting factors cause...")

Please see: here, or here. Your understanding is simply not there at all. There is no such thing as a "grand cause" for an outcome, and even the distinction between proximate and distal causes is arbitrary. I'd rather not get into this too much (it's a geek-out point for me) but suffice to say that arguing with a practicing statistical scientist about causal modeling over something so basic as what we're calling a cause will not get you very far. We call a "cause", plainly, anything which could hypothetically be intervened upon (even if not practicably able to do so) in order to induce a different outcome, at least by the most common definition.

>> would you seriously suggest that the prevalence of sidewalks/general walkability in a community is having an effect on self-control of the people within that neighborhood?

> What?

The point of this sentence: These are factors that are associated with reduced obesity in communities. Are you suggesting, then, that the only reason there's an observed association is because it has a direct impact on self-control? That having nice sidewalks makes these people "better people" that are better able to control their diets?

> lack of ability to govern calories in vs calories out.

So which is it, the calories in/out themselves (a view which actually isn't totally true, by the way, but that's another story and not particularly relevant) or self-control as a personal factor which then impacts calories in/out? You're sneaking both into one phrase. Many things can impact the calories in/out without necessarily changing self-control.

I'd half agree, half disagree, but let's not get into arguments about what studies can and can't show :-). (which reminds me that I still have to get through Causality for the next time this issue pops up).

> So we should stop asking whether science is epistemologically justified?

Science is epistemologically justified.