How and Why: A Layman's Look at Causation and Reality

HOW

AND

WHY

A Layman’s Look at Causation and Reality

Michael B. Trimble

Copyright © 2000 by Michael B. Trimble.

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CONTENTS

PREFACE

IN THE BEGINNING …

CAUSATION

CAUSATION:

HOW AND WHY

CONTRASTING THEORIES

A PRAGMATIST’S CHOICE

CONTINGENT RELATIONS

IDENTITY AND REALITY

THE ONTOLOGY OF CAUSATION

INDIVIDUALITY, PURPOSE & INTENT

AN OUTLINE OF IDENTITY

CAUSATION, IDENTITY AND REALITY

CREATION AND THE PRINCIPLE OF ONTOLOGICAL PREFERENCE

THE ORIGINS OF TIME

… AND SPACE

FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON

A PRINCIPLE OF UNCERTAINTY

CHOICE

… AND SOLIPSISM

TO PAULA

PREFACE

While this is a book dealing with the relationship between causation and reality, it originated in an attempt to answer a number of questions raised in a discussion of ethics. In particular, how can an ethical or moral principle guide an individual’s behavior in a world of physical extension? Assuming we can agree on what is right and what is wrong, how can that behavioral blueprint find expression in a reality of flesh and blood? How can the intent to ‘do the right thing’ cause me to act in an ethically acceptable manner? Unless I can actually translate my behavioral intentions into my overt behavior, what value can be found in attempting to discern right from wrong? Can intentions cause overt actions, and if so, how do they carry out this task and why are they able to do so?

In attempting to determine what a cause is and how it functions, we are attempting to describe the functional aspects of reality, dealing with what reality is by addressing the question of how reality functions. In wrestling with with ‘how’, it becomes apparent that an answer to ‘why’ will also be needed. If we discover that ‘a’ causes ‘b’, we want to know why ‘a’ has that capacity while ‘c’ and ‘d’ apparently do not. In answering ‘why’, we are attempting to validate our chosen explanatory paradigm, which in turn we use to explain why ‘a’ has the ability ‘to be the cause of ‘b’’. It is the answer to ‘why’ that will help to explain how the intention to act in an ethically acceptable manner finds expression in my own behavior.

To complete this answer, we need to know what sorts of phenomena are capable of participating in a causal relationship between so-called causes and their effects. Can an intention direct an overt response? Is the ability ‘to cause’ limited to some sorts of phenomena? Is the ability ‘to cause’ a viable criteria with which to define the parameters of reality? This book is an attempt to answer these last three questions, an answer that may someday be useful in dealing with the ethical issues that set this inquiry in motion.

IN THE BEGINNING …

Along with a great many others, I enjoy reading and re-reading the exploits of Sherlock Holmes, delighting in a relationship between the printed page and my imagination that presents me with a captivating cast of characters moving through locales and adventures that are both vivid and entertaining. And yet, when compared to my daily routines, the activities of Holmes and Watson, while arguably more interesting and worthy of being passed along to the next generation of readers, are commonly labeled as being make believe, fiction, in some fundamental sense ‘unreal’. I can describe Holmes rooms at 221B Baker Street, make meaningful references to his behavior, even argue over the significance of the dog that didn’t bark in the night, yet common wisdom would tell me that I am not dealing with reality. Unfortunately, common wisdom is less precise in telling me what I am discussing when addressing the subject of Sherlock Holmes. What does it mean to ‘be real’ and what distinguishes the real from the unreal? What does it mean to suggest that a man known to millions, Sherlock Holmes, does not and never has existed whereas an individual known only to a small group of friends and family , such as myself, does exist?

I accept the me I am familiar with as being real. Is my confidence in my existence a product of valid analysis, social convention or an unwillingness to ponder how I could be both unreal and self-aware simultaneously? Awareness, in this case an awareness of self that I have no recollection of ever being without, provides the evidence that I accept as proof that I exist, that I am real. That same awareness of self seems to coexist with an awareness of ‘others’, such as friends and family, whose existence I tend to accept with the same confidence. Perceptions of what is often referred to as ‘extended reality’ seem to elicit the conclusion that what I can see, taste, touch, feel and hear is real. However, I also find amidst this awareness of self and ‘extended others’ an awareness of Sherlock Holmes and it is difficult for me to understand how Holmes could be both unreal in some fundamentally significant fashion while simultaneously ‘existing’ as an enduring object of my interest. This apparent paradox would suggest that my understanding of what it means to ‘be real’ suffers from a lack of articulated attributes that can define the traits and enumerate the content of reality.

From my own perspective, both Sherlock Holmes and the chair I am at this moment sitting in are real because I have an acknowledged relationship with both that I can perceive, recognize and identify with ease. With this in mind, I would like to suggest that reality is affirmed but not necessarily defined in the relationship of observation that links an observer to the observed, in the relationship of responding that affiliates a respondent with a stimulus. The act of affirmation is expressed as an observer’s observation or a respondent’s response. In my own case, similar acts of affirmation find expression as the observations or responses that constitute my awareness of myself, my chair and Sherlock Holmes. As I endeavor to define the content of those relationships, the distinctions I draw between myself, Holmes and my chair are admittedly subjective. With this in mind, I am led to infer that while the relationships of affirmation of which I am aware constitute some realm of reality to which I am privy, they remain elements of my behavior which serves to sustain my existence but cannot guarantee that same sustaining support to the objects apparently under observation or the eliciting stimuli with which they are affiliated. The subjectivity of my own awareness is a reality of self into which the suggestion of ‘others’ encroaches and subsequently leads me to ask ‘how’ and ‘why’ as part of my effort to define what those ‘others’ signify. Is my awareness the only realm of reality? Do the observations and responses to alleged ‘others’ such as Holmes and my chair, relationships of affirmation of which I am aware, affirm by virtue of my awareness of their presence the existence of a reality of ‘others’? Is there a discernible reason or cause that can both explain their presence amidst my awareness while simultaneously affirming their reality as ‘things-unto-themselves’?

My own view of what is and is not real cannot be traced to a thorough analysis of all possible options. Rather than representing a concerted effort to understand the essence of reality, my view has evolved as an acquisitive catalog of useful information that enables me to sustain my own existence. When I analyze that catalog, its format resembles the relationship of affirmation that I have labeled as an awareness of self, an awareness that personifies Descartes’ ‘I think therefore I am’, while its content has grown to include an awareness of ‘others’ including my chair and Sherlock Holmes as phenomenon I distinguish from myself. This awareness of distinguishing between me and ‘others’ could be expressed in the observation that ‘I think I am neither the chair nor the Sherlock Holmes that I am at this moment contemplating’, an observation which places the reality of ‘others’ on an equal footing with the reality I attribute to myself. It is my perception of the allegedly ‘unreal’ Sherlock Holmes coexisting amidst the same awareness within which I encounter both my alleged chair and what I am confident is myself that provides that equal footing. As my awareness itself is a compendium of observations and responses, each of which expresses a relationship of affirmation without providing a means with which to readily identify what is being affirmed, I tend to extend the attribute of ‘being real’ to one and all. The common wisdom that suggests there is a distinction between the ‘real’ and the ‘unreal’ that populate my awareness cannot expect to derive its ontological standard from the catalog of my awareness within which both Holmes and my chair, while easily distinguished from one another, are accepted as real.

This would suggest that what separates the real from the unreal, if such a differentiation can be meaningfully made, is a process or standard that is not readily apparent within the context of my own awareness and its constituent relationships of affirmation. If not within the context of my own awareness, where does the premise that there is, or might be, a distinction between the real and the unreal originate? In distinguishing between myself and ‘others’, is this reflective of a distinction between the real and the unreal? The solipsist would probably think so, but I do not. My awareness of self and my awareness of ‘others’ combine to create a common venue, a single reality in which all participants are created equal as expressions of my behavior. From this perspective, if I am real, so is Holmes. Is my frequent inability to clearly identify what these ‘others’ might be an indication that they are unreal? It seems more plausible to suggest that my ability or inability to identify ‘others’ is reflective of my own inadequacies rather than being a standard that sorts the real from the unreal. To address my inadequacies in this area, I might begin by asking what are those ‘others’, be it my brother or sister, my chair or Sherlock Holmes, that don’t appear to be me but none the less draw and hold my attention and why do I distinguish between myself and these ‘others’? In discovering an answer to ‘why?’, will that answer reveal a means to determine what distinguishes the real from the unreal? Will that answer reveal whether such a distinction exists? From the foregoing thoughts, it seems plausible to conclude that I do share some form of reality with both Holmes and my chair but cannot determine with certainty if: 1) there is a realm of reality beyond my awareness from which Holmes and my chair spring, and 2) if such a reality exists, would I find a home there with both Holmes and my chair? And the questionable distinction between the real and the unreal? If such a distinction can be established, its application is not readily apparent within the reality of which I am aware.

The reality with which I am familiar is inseparable from the awareness I associate with my own existence. I use the term awareness rather than the term consciousness to stress what I consider to be a key element that characterizes our relationship with reality. That element is the relationship between a response and a stimulus, an observer and the ‘observed’, the relationship of affirmation. It seems to me that human awareness, which can be either conscious or sub-conscious, is always a relationship between an individual respondent and some stimulus. Awareness is an individual’s response to a stimulus, the affirming relationship that creates reality as it unfolds. And it is amidst that affirming occurrence that I first encounter reality as an awareness of ‘presence’, the reality of my neo-natal self existing as a state of receptive potential embodied in the immature expression of a capacity to respond. After all, my first attempts at perception, recognition and identification are quite crude given that I initially have no experience to fall back on. My initial awareness is little more than a perception that I have recognized and identified as a state of being, ie., me. What that might entail beyond a simple recognition of ‘presence’ I do not know and will spend a lifetime trying to figure it out. Awareness rests upon the ability to perceive, recognize and identify which together enable me to establish relationships between stimuli and responses. They are indispensable tools that characterize the capacity to generate the receptive potential that awareness personifies. Awareness is not a static state but an active process that melds the ability to perceive and identify with a capacity to compile and format those perceptions and identifications. In my case, being real and being aware go hand in hand and what I am aware of I refer to as reality.

* * *

As familiarity with that initial awareness of ‘presence’ grows, my first encounters with a sense of self is supplemented with the suspicion that I may not be alone. I would like to suggest that my awareness of ‘others’ is my behavioral response to a stimulus or stimuli of uncertain origins. I am my awareness, but somehow, there are aspects to this awareness that seem to be incompatible with my evolving sense of self. As I come to know myself, those incompatibilities expand in both number and magnitude. I feel confident in asserting I am neither a chair nor Sherlock Holmes and I feel equally confident in asserting that they are, in some manner, as real as I am. Does the same process or mechanism with which I confront myself lead me to a confrontation with ‘others’, a process premised upon the relationship between observer and observed? As potential stimuli that elicit a response, can their reality as entities distinct from myself be affirmed with the same confidence I feel in asserting the reality of my own existence? Is Sherlock Holmes demonstrably ‘as real’ as my chair, as real as my awareness of ‘self’? If an awareness of reality is based upon the relationships a capacity to perceive, recognize and identify engender and if the reality of which I am aware is created in the behavior that embodies those activities, it would seem that my awareness of what might be real is little more than a reflection of reality as my behavior contributes to its content. What we really want to know is whether or not my chair and Mr. Holmes are real in and of themselves, regardless of my presence to acknowledge their reality.

To determine whether or not the reality of both my chair and Sherlock Holmes have an existence independent of my own awareness, I will need to determine what a reality of that sort would entail. If I begin my inquiry where my grasp on reality begins, with my awareness of both ‘self’ and alleged ‘others’, what can I discern from this subjective reality that can suggest both how and why a reality independent of my awareness could plausibly exist? If ‘being real’, which for me begins with awareness, is indeed a behavioral expression based upon the activity of relating stimuli to responses, what establishes membership within the domain of my known reality is not a static compilation of qualitative and quantitative traits, but a demonstrated capacity to participate in that activity. Do ‘others’ participate in this activity of ‘being real’? If our awareness is an expression of ‘being real’, can I distill from that expression an identifiable mechanism or operational protocol that animates my awareness and in so doing creates and sustains reality? If such a mechanism can be identified, can it be successfully employed in discovering how a reality beyond my awareness might exist, how my awareness might itself participate in that reality, and why that reality and its host of individual participants is a more plausible realm of the real than the decidedly narrow confines of my own awareness?

* * *

The sensory experiences we associate with our five familiar senses contribute to an awareness of ‘presence’, a contribution that helps to shape our relationship with reality. For each of us as individuals, what our senses convey and our awareness affirms is bound up in the subjective creation of a respondent to some stimulus, a respondent’s interpretive awareness that suggests that reality is something we can and do encounter. Based upon the suggestions of our five senses, it is a reality we can see, hear, taste, touch and smell. This is the familiar reality of which we all seem to share a similar awareness. But is it a reality in its own right, a reality that exists beyond those narrow confines that characterize my own awareness?

It is from my own awareness that I distill the notion that ‘being real’ is a process of reaction, that I am myself a participant in an interactive universe of ‘others’. With this proactive view of reality in mind, we can define our own awareness as being a response on our part to a stimulus, a behavioral expression born of a relationship between an observer and the observed that can then become a potential stimulus in its own right. It is the occurrence of the response that initiates the role of stimulus, that establishes the existence of a causal relationship. As the act of a respondent to a stimulus, our awareness embodies a causal relationship in which our response, or ‘effect’, designates potential candidates as its apparent ‘cause’, a posteriori, and in so doing acknowledges the probable presence of an eliciting phenomenon playing the role of stimulus amidst a collection of potential candidates that together comprise what we have come to label as reality.

It is how we respond to what we perceive, the manner in which our responses shape our interpretation of those perceptions that constitute our vision of reality, our awareness of ‘what is’. We study our response, our awareness, and hope to trace it to its source(s) and in so doing discover the origin and nature of reality itself. Are those candidates our response suggests might be the stimulus eliciting that response manifestations of our own creation, or others with whom we coexist? Further inquiry might enable us to name one or more candidates as the most likely stimuli to our state of awareness, but given that we have only our behavioral response, or ‘effect’, as direct evidence of a potential causal relationship, we can only link our response to potential stimuli in a probabilistic manner. We find that our response plays an active, even directive role in consummating the reality born of a causal relationship, but cannot serve as a source of certainty. And it is this absence of certainty that clouds the identity of the stimuli to which we appear to respond. Are they behavioral manifestations of ‘others’, or elements of my own behavior that I am having a great deal of difficulty in accepting as aspects of me?

Causal relationships are the basis of what we know and how we know it, the foundation of explanation. They animate that ‘awareness of presence’ that suggests the existence of some potential object or event while creating our own contribution to the reality our senses appear to encounter and our awareness envelopes. The ‘hows’ and the ‘whys’ of such relationships are the foundation upon which identifications are made, a causal foundation. They foster and shape the form and content of what is real as well as the manner in which we identify, manipulate and exploit that reality. Causes explain ‘how’ and ‘why’. Indeed, they are ‘how’ and ‘why for each observation we perceive and each response we express. In the absence of a response, there is no ‘how’ or ‘why’ to consider, no cause to seek. If we find ourselves asking ‘how’ and ‘why’, then there is some phenomenon towards which our inquiries are directed that elicits our curiosity. Causes explain ‘how’ and ‘why’ which are critical components in our ability to understand ‘what’. Therefore, it seems reasonable to assume that if we know ‘how’ and ‘why’ something is real, we should be able to grasp what it means to ‘be real’ as it pertains to my chair, Sherlock Holmes and myself.

* * *

If our introduction to reality originates in a relationship between an observer and the observed, between a stimulus and a response, what can we learn about the nature of ‘being real’ if we ask (and discover answers) to how and why we perceive reality in this manner? What, if anything, distinguishes reality per se from our perception of it? What is it that is created in the wake of these relationships and which, as a respondent’s behavior, make their own contributions to the content of reality? For the observer, it is an observation that acknowledges the presence of the observed. For the respondent, it is a response that acknowledges the presence of a stimulus. In each instance, what is created is a behavioral response on the part of some entity or agent that is linked, I would suggest in a causal (explanatory) manner, to some stimulus that elicits but does not determine nor direct an agent’s response. Stimuli do not cause a response; they prompt or elicit but have no causal authority in the creation of the response. The respondent is the causal agent of which we ask ‘How did you respond’ and ‘Why did you respond in that manner?’ Reality per se is therefore either the ongoing history of my behavior as the solipsist would have us believe, or it is a domain of interaction shared with ‘others’, all of whom join in as active participants in the process of ‘being real’ as they respond to what they perceive as being ‘eliciting stimuli’.

If reality originates in a behavioral response, the ability ‘to cause’, if it is real, must reside within that response. What causal paradigm or model can we use to explain ‘how’ and ‘why’ stimuli might elicit but only respondents can instigate a causal relationship out of which a response, and thus reality, emerges? If the act of responding is the behavioral equivalent of creation, how do we characterize a causal agency that generates causal relationships in which the apparent ‘effects’ which we accept as real actively designate their probable, causal origins? Can we fashion a causal model with which the behavior of the moment, the act of responding, can embody that causal agency and can we employ the causal relationships established by that agency to identify the characteristics that describe how and why that particular agency functions? If we turn the traditional view of causation on its head, can we still have a viable and effective means with which to predict what might be, to explain and possibly replicate what has been, and exploit ‘what is’ by manipulating the behavior of our surroundings?

* * *

If we strip the stimulus of a causal capacity to initiate the process of response and invest that capacity in the act of responding, we lose the traditional causal paradigm in which a cause precedes its effects in both time and space, a condition of antecedence we have formalized in the causal model ‘if a then b’. How can I conceive of something ‘real’ originating in the absence of discernible antecedents having some manner of ‘directive’ authority that could potentially serve as the ‘cause’ for that beginning? How can the respondent, in the act of responding, be the causal agency that initiates a causal relationship? If we jettison from our causal model a commitment to causal antecedence as a pre-requisite for the establishment of causal relationships from which ‘what is’ is brought forth, if we prefer not to align the capacity ‘to cause’ with the state of existing ‘prior to’, will the apparent spontaneity of random ‘beginnings’ provide viable answers to our asking ‘how’ is this possible and ‘why’ has it come about? While these questions applied to the origin of reality as the amalgamation of all that ‘is’ may seem to have no ready answers, these same questions applied to what we experience everyday as individuals do uncover what appear to be both viable and useful answers. Chief among those answers is a causal model whose functional efficacy is firmly rooted in the present, the reality we can touch, taste, see, hear and smell.

If causal relationships do exist within the domain of our capacity to perceive and interpret our perceptions, they originate in ‘what is’, not in ‘what was’ or ‘what will be’. I cannot touch nor taste what has been or what will be, only what is here and now. If we ask, ‘how can reality come into being without a causal or creative antecedent?’, we can answer ‘it does so as a creation instigated by a respondent in response to some apparent stimulus.’ That reaction, as it occurs, embodies ‘what is’ here and now, the reality of the present that carries with it the answers to how it has come about and why. If the present encompasses what is real, then our attempt to understand reality must be based upon what that present can tell us. If causal relationships exist with the capacity to explain ‘how’ and ‘why’, their existence originates in the present. Therefore, if we devise a causal model with which to explain the ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of what we as individuals perceive to be reality, we are likely to find ourselves employing a causal model with which what we currently observe can be speculatively related to previously witnessed occurrences, occurrences which can potentially serve as the stimuli to which our current behavior can be causally related. If the employment of our causal model proves to be an effective means with which to answer the ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of an individual’s existence, why should the origin of reality as a whole be any different?

What if reality is nothing more than the behavior of individual entities functioning independently of one another, dependent upon no universal ‘first mover’ for their creation and subsequent contributions to what we observe and refer to as reality? What if the existence of each entity depended solely upon its ability to generate its own behavior, an ability that persists for the lifetime of each entity and then vanishes with an entity’s demise? What if a viable and testable causal model can be shown to