. I cannot see how the idea of formal constraints as being causally efficacious makes sense, because the idea of causal efficacy just is the idea of efficient causality, and to say that formal causality is efficient would be to dissolve the distinction between efficient and formal causality. I don't believe we even have a coherent notion of formal causation, as we at least do of efficient causation. — John

I suggest that this is because our thinking has become so 'concretised' as a consequence of cultural conditioning. Formal causation is not efficient in the sense of water causing iron to rust, but that kind of causal relationship is mostly what is sought by scientific analysis nowadays.

Case in point. Dawkins was in a TV debate with a Catholic bishop on Q&A. An audience member's question lead to a brief discussion of the question of 'why evolution occurred' in the first place. Dawkins said it was a nonsense question, 'you're playing with the word "why" there'. He said, we (scientists) can give a reason in the sense of 'antecedent factors', but that it's useless seeking a reason in any other terms. There is no 'why'. So the idea of 'reason' in the formal sense, i.e the reason why something comes to be has been completely extirpated from his outlook. Never mind the traditional sense that philosophy itself is wondering why things are as they are, or why there is something, rather than nothing.

So, where can something like a formal or final cause be seen? Well, if you said that evolution was directed by an end of some kind - perhaps by attaining self-awareness, rather than simply assuming forms that can replicate endlessly for no purpose. That would be a teleological view of evolution, But, of course, such views are generally deprecated nowadays as being archaic, romantic, superseded or whatever. But that again might just be a consequence of the prevailing cultural attitude.

And that's why I keep returning to the medieval debates between scholastic realism and nominalism. It was scholastic reailsm that preserved the connection between formal and final causes and material and efficient causes.

It is commonly said that modern science neglects formal causes but attends to efficient and material causes; but classically understood, efficient and material causes cannot function or even be conceived without formal causes, for it is form which informs matter, giving concrete objects their power to act on other objects. The loss of formal causality is thus in a sense the loss of efficient and material causality as well—an implication that is not quite fully realized until we see it brilliantly explored in the philosophy of David Hume. ...

In the realist framework, the intrinsic connection between causes and effects was particularly important for explaining how the mind knows the world; concepts formed by the mind, insofar as they are causally connected to things which are the foundation of those concepts, necessarily retain some intrinsic connection to those things. While we can be mistaken in particular judgments, we can be assured of the basic soundness of the mind’s power, thanks to the intrinsic connection between concept and object.

...Characterized by forms, reality had an intrinsic intelligibility, not just in each of its parts but as a whole. With forms as causes, there are interconnections between different parts of an intelligible world, indeed there are overlapping matrices of intelligibility in the world, making possible an ascent from the more particular, posterior, and mundane to the more universal, primary, and noble.

http://anamnesisjournal.com/2014/12/whats-wrong-ockham-reassessing-role-nominalism-dissolution-west/

The reason we don't notice all this, is because we're sorrounded by it; we don't notice it any more than a fish notices water.

Yes, but notice that I am not arguing against formal causality, or even final causality; I am just pointing out that if they are actual, then they cannot be merely abstract entities. We conceive of our conceptions of them as being abstract, is all, so those conceptions, if anything at all is 'really' abstract, are the only abstract 'entities'.

The reason we don't notice all this, is because we're sorrounded by it; we don't notice it any more than a fish notices water. — Wayfarer

The problem I see is that if we cannot "notice it", then how could we ever know it is the case?

Final cause isn't an empirical question, even though it masquerades as one. It's the misapplication of reasoning about causality to logic.

The "why" question is asking: "What is so that I may mean or have logical significance?" It's an attempt to describe a force which causes us to have one logical meaning or another. A lot of people want to treat our significance in ideas as if it were a predetermined outcome of a force of reality.

In our heads, it's​ way of eliminating what we fear. If I'm predetermined (by final cause) to follow God, then there is literally no possibility I will find myself without meaning or as a heathen who abandons the tradition of God.

So final cause has an identity crisis. On the one hand, it wants to be causal, to predetermine the world has one meaning rather than another, but because it deals with the infinites of logic and meaning, being any sort of causal state which changes is closed to it: it's proponents are left gesturing at a "mysterious force" without any wordly definition because the final cause is really only in their imagination.

So final cause has an identity crisis. On the one hand, it wants to be causal, to predetermine the world has one meaning rather than another, but because it deals with the infinites of logic and meaning, being any sort of causal state which changes is closed to it: it's proponents are left gesturing at a "mysterious force" without any wordly definition because the final cause is really only in their imagination. — TheWillowOfDarkness

It's possible that the final cause ('final cause' here understood in the sense of 'first cause' or 'ultimate cause', not in any teleological sense) may be more than merely imaginary, but if it is then it must also be 'something' more than merely abstract; that is all I have been concerned with arguing. I don't find your negative assertions about it any more convincing than the positive assertions of others.

The actual philosophical issue (as opposed to just terminological) is whether or not the Pythagorean Theorem is causally efficacious. You say it is, but others say it isn't. Instead they'd say that you used your hands to lay out a square foundation, and that the movement of your hands was causally influenced by electrical activity in the brain. The Pythagorean Theorem isn't to be equated (or so some say) with any of the physical processes that actually caused your body to move the way it did, and so isn't the cause of the building being square. — Michael

There is no doubt that I used my hands to lay out the foundation, so my hands are the cause of the foundation. But I did not lay the foundation in any random shape, I made it square. The question is what caused the foundation to be square, not what caused the foundation. It's a different question to ask what caused X to be X, from asking what caused X. Each is a different question of causation.

There's a very simple answer, and that is that the Pythagorean theorem is the cause of the foundation being square. As you say, some people might deny this, but then what is the cause of the squareness of the building, if not the Pythagorean Theorem? Why deny the obvious?

I've not begged the question, and, speaking of the article, you may note that it says "According to the most widely accepted versions of the Way of Negation: An object is abstract (if and) only if it is causally inefficacious." But, I suppose that point is moot now. Cheers. — Arkady

The "Way of Negation" is specifically Frege's way. Why restrict yourself to Frege's way when there are scores of other philosophers? Honestly, I often find SEP to be very narrow and misleading. I would not consider it a very good authority.

the Pythagorean theorem is the cause of the foundation being square — Metaphysician Undercover

We intended to build the foundation 4 square according to the Pythagorean theorem, and we built it in the dark (we didn't have a permit). When the sun came up we discovered the the foundation has 7 irregular sides. Clearly the theorem was not up to the task.

Are you sure it wasn't your mathematical skills that weren't up to the task? Maybe a little too much liquid incentives to the volunteers?