I answered "undecided," but only because there's no "something else" option. I'm decided about my view, but it doesn't amount to Hume being quite right or wrong.

First, and I may have had this conversation with you, "necessary connection" is sometimes parsed as saying something about possible worlds. I don't agree that that's the right avenue to take here. If a billiard ball hits another, and the ball that was struck goes off with a particular velocity after being struck, all that matters is whether in the actual world, given things just as they turned out to be (so no counterfactuals need apply), there was a necessary connection between the first and second ball--that is, only in that actual world, with no counterfactual conditions, the second ball's velocity had to be as it is after being struck by the first ball, or in other words, the second ball's velocity wasn't random, acausal, sui generis.

Aside from that, we could be saying that sans omniscience, we don't actually know re the actual world, no counterfactuals, whether the second ball's velocity was random, acausal, etc. The problem with that is that it's a certainty concern, and I think that certainty concerns are misconceived, especially when it comes to empirical matters.

So yes, causality is real, we can know causality, but no, we don't have certainty for that, we can't know any causality for all possible worlds.

What would you say is the cause of the second billiard ball moving?

The first ball striking it.

Would you say that cause must be instantaneous? Or can cause be sometimes continuous? (You might see here that "cause" has to be defined with some precision with respect to context.)

How would you describe the distinction there, exactly?

I'm thinking that "cause" has a bunch of definitions that depend on context. You even get to provide your own.

If I push a car from here to there, you might say with all justification that I caused the car to go from here to there. Or if someone gave me money to push the car, you might say he caused it. A physicist might not accept either of these for his own purposes. It seems to me that precision requires the scientist's cause to be understood as acting in the instant. If it takes more than an instant, then there are many causes, maybe as many as there are instants. I am under the impression that science doesn't really use or rely on the concept of cause so much as on "fields," even as they might use the word "cause" for informal conversation.

The first ball striking it. — Terrapin Station

And what caused the first ball to strike it?

I didn't stipulate that, so <shrug>

It could have been hitting it with a cue, or another ball hitting or, or maybe the table was tilted, or whatever.

So the first ball hitting it is only a part of a chain of causation that ultimately traces back to the big bang. In which case the first ball hitting it is not the cause but the explanation of why the second ball moved.

I'm not actually a determinist--I think that some phenomena could be random, but aside from that, if we're talking about a long causal chain, only the first step would be a cause because? I have no idea what the reasoning for that is supposed to be.

I think that when we talk about causation we are talking about some force existing in objects not just 'a cause' but 'the cause'. The one and only thing that makes it so that the second ball 'must' move, the first ball hitting it is only sufficient but not necessary.

"A" versus "the" isn't at all a clear semantic distinction to me, aside from the context where we're talking about an event that may have had multiple causes rather than just one. It certainly doesn't suggest anything like "only the first event in a long chain" to me.

The second sentence doesn't really make sense to me, either. Why wouldn't the first ball be necessary?

So the first ball hitting it is only a part of a chain of causation that ultimately traces back to the big bang. In which case the first ball hitting it is not the cause but the explanation of why the second ball moved. — Jamesk

How is it an explanation if you witnessed one ball hitting another. You'd only find an explanation useful if you didn't witness it.

Is your idea just an explanation for the existence of your post?

Every effect is also the cause of something else and causes are effects of other causes. It becomes incoherent to use terms like cause and effect. There is just causation, or maybe a better term is "relationships".

aside from the context where we're talking about an event that may have had multiple causes rather than just one. — Terrapin Station

Exactly the point, multiple causes. Where is 'the cause'?

There is just causation, or maybe a better term is "relationships". — Harry Hindu

Hume says it is constant conjunction. The mental relationship that happens when you see something always happening in the same way.

yes, and yes about experience.

Could you please elaborate?

Hume says it is constant conjunction. The mental relationship that happens when you see something always happening in the same way. — Jamesk

That is called "recognition".

I love it when philosophers try to make up these complex-sounding words and phrases for something that we already have a simple term for what they are talking about.

And why do philosophers feel the need to reference long-dead philosophers as if these long-dead philosophers had access to something we don't. It's actually the other way around. We have access to modern scientific knowledge that they didn't.

You philosophers always ignore the hard questions that are asked (It's because philosophy never answers questions. It asks therm. Science answers them). There was more to my post than what you replied to.

I mean multiple simultaneous causes, not sequential.

So are you saying that causation is multiple simultaneous causes? How does that work if the cause must come before the effect?

In other words, two billiard balls can strike a third at the same time.

Not sure how to vote since I agree with Hume in his own context of time and culture but also find his views in many ways outdated.

At any rate, I think it would be proper to first settle on an understanding of what causation is which adequately encompasses all of modern (and ancient) understandings of what it holds the potential to be. This prior to appraising whether or not it is real—and in which ways it might so be.

To give a maybe incomplete list, there’s Aristotle’s four types, there’s the logically conceivable retro-causation, and there are bottom-up and top-down forms of causation (neither of which occur in relation to duration: they each occur at the same instant of time addressed). So yes, Hume’s definition of causation is a bit outdated by modern standards, at least imo.

To my mind, though, all these conceivable forms of causation can be adequately defined via the notion of dependency; hence: When the presence of (set of givens) A (be they entities or processes) is existentially dependent on the presence of (set of givens) B (be these entities or processes), B is the cause to A as effect.

Yes, I’d very much like this curt definition of causation to be questioned for potential flaws; it would help me in better discerning where its deficiencies might be (if any; crossing my fingers here).

Still, tentatively granting this definition of causation, I then would be of the opinion that causation then necessarily exists. Deciphering the details of what causes what being a different matter altogether.

but surely you see that there is a chain of events?

Sure, but that wasn't what I was referring to above re multiple (simultaneous) causes being the only situation where I can see an "a" versus "the" distinction amounting to anything.

Aristotle s causes are a bit different. Hume doesn't deny causation as a concept he just denies we can know anything more about it that constant conjunction.

So what in your opinion is causation?

Yes, and in so doing he is limiting himself to efficient causation pertaining to the physically objective world. This being in keeping with the definition of causation he provides. He, for example, addresses billiard balls hitting each other; not the fact that in most instances they are inert in the absence of some human subjects choosing to hit them with a stick.

If this thread is strictly about Hume’s notions of causation, I’ll likely abstain. No biggie.

The immediately temporarily antecedent action(s) or event(s) that produce a particular subsequent event.

If this thread is strictly about Hume’s notions of causation, I’ll likely abstain. No biggie. — javra

I am working on Hume's two definitions of causation so I would prefer not to leave Hume out of it completely.

The immediately temporarily antecedent action(s) or event(s) that produce a particular subsequent event. — Terrapin Station

Why only the immediate ones?