occasionalism

Occasionalism is a philosophical theory about causation which says that created substances cannot be efficient causes of events. Instead, all events are taken to be caused directly by God Himself. (A related theory, which has been called 'occasional causation', also denies a link of efficient causation between mundane events, but may differ as to the identity of the true cause that replaces them). The theory states that the illusion of efficient causation between mundane events arises out of a constant conjunction that God had instituted, such that every instance where the cause is present will constitute an 'occasion' for the effect to occur as an expression of the aforementioned power. This 'occasioning' relation, however, fell short of efficient causation. It was not that the first event caused God to cause the second event: rather, God first caused one and then caused the other, but He chose to regulate such behaviour in accordance with general laws of nature.
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(n.)
The system of occasional causes; -- a name given to certain theories of the Cartesian school of philosophers, as to the intervention of the First Cause, by which they account for the apparent reciprocal action of the soul and the body.
  

A view popularized by Nicholas Malbranche whereby: (1) the mental and the material comprise two different kinds of substance; (2) neither has any direct causal effect on the other and; (3) all seeming interactions between the two are due to the continual intervention by God who brings about a change in one on the occasion of a change in the other. See dualism, doctrine of preestablished harmony, parallelism.
<Discussion> <References> Pete Mandik

occasionalism /ə'keiʤənlizm/
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