Q&A: The Difference Between Teleological and Causal Explanations
The Difference Between Teleological and Causal Explanations
Question
Hello Rabbi.
Recently I read column 692 on the site, which deals with teleological explanations in physics as opposed to causal explanations. The column itself was excellent, but throughout the reading there was a question in the back of my mind that kept bothering me.
Is there really a difference between the kinds of explanations that can take a causal form and explanations that can take a teleological form?
Although I admit that there is a difference in the essence of teleological and causal explanations, I am not convinced that in practice one cannot be converted into the other. Let me explain:
The law of gravity is usually explained in a causal way: there is a “force,” and it is the “cause” of the “attraction” between a pair of bodies.
But couldn’t we also describe it this way: “Every body strives to draw closer to every other body”—that is, every body has the “purpose” of drawing closer to every other body.
(By the way, I should note that I was not able to carry out this process for explanations that were teleological to begin with. I assume this stems from my ignorance regarding teleological explanations, but it raises the possibility that perhaps the conversion always works only in one direction.)
Thanks, and with hope for rebuilding and salvation. Michael Menachem.
Answer
What you are basically arguing is that the difference between causal and teleological is only a matter of wording. I do not agree. The fact is that some explanations are understood as causal and others as teleological. Lagrangian mechanics is teleological, since the calculation looks for an optimal result and not a cause. So this is not a change in wording or in the form of expression, but in the scientific content. The fact that one can translate one into the other is not a fact about language, but about the scientific-mathematical content.
Discussion on Answer
I don’t understand what isn’t clear. You are claiming that the difference between the causal and the teleological is only semantic—a matter of wording. That is, that every teleological explanation can be described in causal language and vice versa. It’s just a change in formulation, like translating from one language to another. And I am arguing that this is not so. In my view, there are explanations that are teleological in essence, and no formulation will change that, and likewise for causal explanations. I only added that the fact that a causal theory can be translated into a teleological one (as in Lagrangian mechanics or Fermat’s principle in optics) is a mathematical fact, not an essential one. One should not conclude from this that everything is merely a linguistic matter.
Thank you very much.
Even though the Rabbi says it wasn’t clear to him what wasn’t understood, the second explanation is nevertheless much clearer to me.
Could the Rabbi please elaborate a bit, or at least phrase it differently? I didn’t exactly understand what you meant.
(To create some ironic distance from what I’m saying, I’ll note that as I write this I’m expecting the response to be “no,” but hoping otherwise.)