Yohe found these tests to be a compelling demonstration of causation, even though the data sets were smaller.
If it is firmly concluded that something is causal, it must also be firmly concluded that a means for that causation exists, even if it is not named.
Evidential decision theory has weaker metaphysical assumptions than has causal decision theory, even if causation has impeccable metaphysical credentials.
(Even if backwards causation is logically possible, it is not within our power).
43 So even if reverse causation seems improbable in our study because of mid-life baseline measurements and a long follow-up period, and even with adjustment for several relevant mid-life variables, it could always be argued that some other unknown factor produced a spurious relation between marital status and impairment later in life.
Others (Broad 1952, Taylor 1960, van Inwagen 2000, Mele 2006) have argued that even if agent-causation is possible, it would not solve the problem of transforming an undetermined event into one which is in our control in the way that our free choices must be.
The verification of this causation would have important clinical implications: even if myocardial ischemia is not caused by high plasma lipid, the plasma lipid should also be monitored closely in case that the symptom was aggravated by lipid metabolism disorders.
A related point is that even if manipulability accounts of causation are non-reductive, they can conflict with other accounts of causation, leading to different causal judgments in particular cases.
There are studies linking long-term marijuana use to impaired cognition, mental-health problems and dependency, even if the line of causation is not always clear.
More generally, even if a manipulationist account of causation does not yield a reduction but instead simply connects "causation" (or better, various more specific causal concepts) with other concepts within the same circle, we still face many non-trivial choices about how the concepts on this circle are to be elucidated and connected up with one another.
In any event, even if there is no reduction of causation to probability, a theory detailing the systematic connections between causation and probability would still be of considerable interest.
