THE INTERVENTIONIST THEORY OF CAUSALITY AND ARISTOTLE’S CONCEPT OF CAUSE: AN ILLUMINATING METAPHOR FOR EPISTEMOLOGY

Abstract

My aim in this work is twofold. On the one hand I want to show that the interventionist account of causality is fully in line with philosophical tradition and recalls the intuition which leaded Aristotle to propose an analysis of natural becoming through the employment of the four causes and the isolation of portions of becoming through the correlation of potency and act; on the other hand, I will point out that the strong insight about natural becoming, which Aristotle and the interventionism share, sheds light on what causation is and on what its meaning and usefulness are. Moreover the discussion on the interventionist account and its metaphorical origin will allow me to find arguments against some classical anticausalist positions (e.g. Hume and Russell).