Causes and coincidences /

The claim that coincidences have no cause and have no explanation is used by Owens (Cambridge Univ.) to wend a way through the perplexing muddles of necessary and sufficient condition causal analyses. Indeed, philosophers defending a theory of causation along the lines of Donald Davidson's Essays on Actions and Events (CH, Apr'81) or David K. Lewis's Philosophical Papers (1983-86) will be especially interested in how Owens bases the crucial distinction between nomological and logical necessity on the a priori independence of events. Even so, realists will not find this account naturalistic enough because Owens resolves causal claims on the basis of an explanation of noncoincidence. Nevertheless, a valuable feature of the book is the extension of the thesis to answer some of the thorniest problems of causation: time's arrow, reductionism, and deviant causal claims; and, on this basis, Owens's book is highly recommended for graduate programs in the philosophy of science. L. C. Archie; Lander College