Causation continued

Future predictions are improved by the inclusion of TIE and CBR analyses. TIEs have been and continue to be used to establish causality based on the toxicity of sediment interstitial pore waters (Ankley and Schubauer-Berigan, 1995 Stronkhorst et al., 2003). However, because interstitial water testing may overestimate toxicity of non-persistent, readily water soluble substances (e.g., ammonia) and underestimate toxicity of persistent, poorly water soluble substances, the focus of TIEs is shifting to studies of whole sediments (Burgess et al., 2000, 2003 Ho et al., 2002). TIEs have been used as part of the SQT to determine causation (Hunt et al., 2001). The information provided regarding specific contaminants responsible for observed toxicity provides additional information for predictions related to changes in loadings of contaminants such as metals, which are not metabolized. 

The theory of ideologies, especially in some of its more extreme forms, raises several epistemological problems. Does the theory commit us to a denial of the autonomy and continuity of the history of ideas Is the demonstration of social causation of an idea sufficient to refute it Must the theory fall victim to its own thrust, as in the Liar paradox Or does Marxism somehow have a privileged position, because of its historical mission I shall discuss these questions mainly with reference to The German ideology, since only here do they receive a more systematic treatment, I should ve notice that the following remarks apply mainly to ideologies as world-views or comprehensive socio-economic theories, not to the everyday illusions of economic life. 

The standards for admissibility of expert testimony to prove causation clearly will continue to impact the future of toxic tort litigation. Therefore, an understanding of the Daubert decision and the continuing debate over the admissibility of expert scientific or medical testimony will benefit anyone dealing with toxic or environmental tort issues. 

As noted in previous editions of this chapter, the law of toxic torts continues to develop. Traditional legal rules continue to be strained and stretched. The tension created by the juxtaposition of scientific uncertainty and unsettled law continues to impact toxic tort litigants. The emerging interface of genetic and environmental forces creates new challenges for the proof of causation and injury, and further complicates emerging concepts of latency between exposure and either onset or manifestation of injury. 

Among academics, a debate continues about whether psychiatric disorders are caused by poverty (causation) or whether individuals with those disorders are socially and psychologically maladapted and therefore poor as a consequence (selection).66 It seems to me this debate is ridiculous, since given the fetal-impact-poverty cycle, both causation and selection must occur. 

Thus, there will be no closed lowest level to stop the seepage of causation of irreducible non-closed higher levels. Whether there is a step-by-step collapse or whether causation drains directly to the bottom, causal powers will continue to drain away until there is fullblown closure at some bottom level to stop the drainage. If there is no bottom closed level, then causation will continue to drain away endlessly, with the result that there is no causation anywhere. This is what Kim and Block refer to as drainage . 

Even if all philosophers decided to embrace some form of reductionism, the world around us would still continue to operate on the implicit assumption that irreducible higher-level properties are causal. But if we re looking for a theory of mind and a theory of mental causation that accurately describes how the mind interacts with the world around it, it is a virtue for this theory to accord with the way the world seems to actually work. The evidence is all around us that higher-level inductive inferences and causal explanations succeed. Reductionism has to try to somehow explain away or downplay this fact. Nonreductive materialism, on the other hand, expects this to be the case and can account for why higher-level inductive inferences and causal explanations work. 

Interpretation of the effects evoked by the explanatory variables on injury or mortality involves hypotheses about injury causation as well as the expected trend. Since impact speed is a dominant determinant for injury and fatality, any explanatory variable that is associated with impact speed could act as a surrogate for impact speed and thus as a confounder, i.e., be significant without having a causal relationship or mask the original effect size due to the association with impact speed. Potential associations were tested using Pearson and Spearman correlations for continuous variables and t-tests and Mann-Whitney-Tests for non-continuous (binary) variables. P-values refer to the hypotheses of a correlation (for continuous variables) or to differences between the two groups (for binary variables). 

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