Abstract

This dissertation is concerned with causal relations which take what I call Davidsonian events as causal relata. It is also concerned with the individuation and description of Davidsonian events. ;In Chapter 1, I give an interpretation to Quine's notion of a principle of individuation. I then use it to assess Davidson's principle of event individuation and the positions of some of the critics and supporters of that principle. ;In Chapter 2, my main concern is to gain some understanding of Davidsonian events. To achieve this, I compare Kimian events with Davidsonian events. I also discuss a disagreement between Mill and Davidson about the notion of whole cause which I take to be a source of misunderstanding of Davidsonian events. ;In Chapter 2 I propose a new way to look at some of the definite descriptions of events. This proposal is then used to defend Davidson's identity claims such as Brutus' stabbing Caesar = Brutus' killing Caesar, against the alleged three types of problems which Thomson uses to attack Davidson's identity claims. It is also used to explain away an alleged puzzle which was first presented by Davidson. I then go on to show that not only Thalberg's component analysis of action is not needed in order to solve Davidson's alleged puzzle, it has some inherent difficulties of its own. ;The last chapter is devoted to the discussion of the notion of causally necessary condition. I start with a critical review of various definitions of this notion. I then focus on Mackie's discussion of the notion. It is then shown that both Mackie and Scriven take for granted the assumption that the causal ancestry of an individual event is not essential to that event. This assumption is then shown to be in conflict with some of Mackie's expressed ideas. It is also shown that Scriven's argument against defining causes in terms of necessary or sufficient conditions stands or falls with this assumption. It thus seems that a fresh look at causation is in order