Origins Talk on Tuesday!

Origins Talk on Tuesday!

SpaceTime Coordinates:  BSB 119 on March 25 @ 1:30 PM

Title:  What is an Origin Explanation? <abstract below>

Human:   Christophe Malaterre (Université du Québec à Montréal)

Refreshments will be provided.

A seminar session with the speaker will be arranged for earlier that day.

Please contact me if you would like to meet with the speaker.

Abstract:  Numerous phenomena prompt inquiries into their origins, spanning from the cosmos and life, to species, civilizations, and pandemics. Answering these questions entails offering origin explanations. Here, I explore the distinctive characteristics of origin explanations that distinguish them from other types of explanations. I explicate the concept of an origin phenomenon and suggest conceptualizing an origin explanation as a specific form of causal explanation—one that reveals a bottleneck in the causal network leading to an origin phenomenon. This approach highlights the specificity of origin explanations, pinpointing distinctive topological features within the causal structure of the world.