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This chapter seeks some resolution about what causal relata might actually be, amongst these four possibilities. The metaphysical resolution is that one of the fine-grained things, states of affairs, is the true relata of the causal relation. The relation most desirable for use in law is different: (coarse-grained) events are the relata on which legal liability should turn, recognizing that such relata will be constructions based on the true relata of the causal relation, which are states of affairs.

This chapter seeks to lay out a taxonomy of the sorts of things that may plausibly be thought to be related by causation, things like events, facts, states of affairs, objects, persons, tropes, properties, etc. It begins with the law's framing of this issue, both because there is wisdom in the law's simplified taxonomy of these possibilities and because the law is our ultimate interest here. The thesis of the chapter is that all plausible causal relata can be reduced either to coarse-grained things (events under the Davidsonian conception of them) or to relatively fine-grained things (either tropes, states of affairs, or facts).

This chapter clarifies the notion of an intervention and compares my version of this notion to the characterizations provided by other writers such as Glymour and Pearl. Very roughly, an intervention on a variable X with respect to a second variable Y is a special sort of causal process that changes the value of X in such a way that any change in the value of Y can occur only as a result of the change in Y. The chapter also discusses the relata of the causal relationship, causal realism, agency theories of causation, and the relationship between my account of causation and that of David Lewis.

If causing matters to degrees of blameworthiness, as was argued in chapter 5 that it does, then some idea of what causation is needs to be developed. This chapter is preliminary to a later book, Causation and Responsibility, on this topic. The chapter focuses on the discriminating power of the causal relation and on what theories of the causal relation are adequate in light of such apparent power. Sceptical and counterfactual theories are singled out for criticism in this dimension. Theories about the nature of the things related by the causal relation are also subjected to this test of adequacy. The idea that events are the only causal relata is rejected, while the idea that states (but not objects) is accepted. A variety of more promising theories of the causal relation are briefly considered.

This chapter proposes that the apparent insolubility of the problem of mental causation stems, in part, from the fact that the debate has not always been framed with sufficient ontological precision and that basing it in a plausible ontological framework will constitute a significant step towards its resolution. It is suggested that the ontological issues that are of relevance to the mental causation debate fall into three interrelated groups. The first concerns the nature of the causal relata. The second concerns the nature of a property. The third concerns the nature of the causal relation.

This chapter provides a review of the main contemporary non-Aristotelian or non–disposition-based theories of causation—Humean theories in a broad sense, but including nonreductionist accounts. Focus is primarily on theories of the nature of the causal relation, but theories of the nature of the causal relata are also considered. This chapter begins with regularity theories, including a Humean formulation and significant revisions from Davidson and Mackie. In subsequent sections, counterfactual theories, probability theories, process theories, manipulability theories, singularist theories and antireductionist theories are discussed. Emphasis is placed on problem cases, including those involving preemption, joint effects, and indeterministic causation. At the end of this chaper is a review of contemporary theories of the causal relata, including accounts that take causes and effects to be a events or facts.

This chapter focuses primarily on Moore’s views concerning the relata of causal connection. Such views are critical, for, as Moore would likely admit, the plausibility of some of the main contenders for a successful analysis of causation depends critically on what the relata of causal connection are. Moore emphasizes repeatedly his conviction that “nothing comes from nothing; nothing ever could.” By contrast, the claim is defended that there are negative facts, that one can be directly aware of some such facts, and that there is no reason not to recognize them as among the relata of causal connection. The issue critically depends on the plausibility of what is sometimes called a generality theory of causation.

This chapter focuses on an assumption implicitly made by most recent attempts to solve the exclusion problem for mental causation, that mental (and so multiply realized) properties are ‘distinct existences’ from their alleged effects. Without that assumption, no such solution can work, since we have excellent grounds for thinking that there is no causation between entities that are not distinct from one another. But, assuming functionalism—which, after all, constitutes the grounds for thinking that mental properties are multiply realized in the first place—mental properties are not distinct from the effects to which they are alleged to bear causal relevance, since functional properties are defined in terms of the causal roles of their realizers. The chapter argues, however, that the natural consequence—epiphenomenalism with respect to mental properties—is not as problematic as many philosophers tend to assume.