PHIL 114 Quiz: Knowledge of General Causal Statements
Document Summary
In a certain sense, we can never directly observe causal connections. Causation and common sense: we should be careful about thinking certain observations are obvious, especially general causal statements about complex social phenomena. Causation and correlation: causal factors reversed: the correlation claim is true, but the causal connection, if there is one, goes in the opposite direction from that claimed in the conclusion, e. g. 1) being a member of the health club is positively correlated with being overweight among people in bulk"s town: being a member of the health club causes being overweight among people in bulk"s town. (1) It does not follow that joining the health club causes people to be overweight. Rather, most likely things work in just the opposite direction: being overweight may well lead people to join the health club: common cause: two correlated factors are correlated because they are both consequences of one common cause, e. g.
