A Powerful Universe—Levels of Powers. Dispositions and Their Applications in Science, Economics, and Theology

Abstract

One of the recurrent themes in the debate on the scientific status of theology is the discipline’s ability to provide causal explanations. For a long time, the scientific and philosophical understanding of causation was dominated by the Humean model of causal explanation, which led to a strict separation between the natural sciences and the social sciences or humanities (including theology). The paper presents the dispositional conception of causation as an alternative: Dispositional causal powers do not only provide a metaphysically robust account for physical causation, they can also cope with human and divine agency. The paper demonstrates this thesis through an analysis of two economic experiments (Schelling’s checkerboard model on segregation and the dictator game). It is shown that the causal dispositions in these experiments are no less fundamental than dispositions in elementary particle physics. Therefore, we can assume that dispositional metaphysics provides a notion of causation and causal explanation which links natural science with the social sciences and also theology.