Once we understand the causal connections, we are in a position to explain what has gone before, predict what will come in the future, and intervene to produce the outcomes we require.
The aim of this project is to bring together that abstract philosophical approach to causation with a more concrete understanding of the work actually undertaken by the practitioners of the sciences.
CauSci is based on a dispositional theory of causation, in which a cause is understood as event that disposes towards an effect or outcome.
Many philosophers have been attracted to a reductive view of nature in which everything is to be explained ultimately in terms of subatomic particles.
The four sciences selected therefore cover some of the most important divisions across human thinking: matter, life, mind and society.