A Regularity Theoretic Approach to Actual Causation

The majority of the currently flourishing theories of actual (token-level) causation are located in a broadly counterfactual framework that draws on structural equations. In order to account for cases of symmetric overdeterminiation and pre-emption, these theories resort to rather intricate analytical tools, most of all, to what Hitchcock (J Philos 98:273-299, 2001) has labeled explicitly nonforetracking counterfactuals. This paper introduces a regularity theoretic approach to actual causation that only employs material (non-modal) conditionals, standard Boolean minimization procedures, and a (non-modal) stability condition that regulates the behavior of causal models under model expansions. Notwithstanding its lightweight analytical toolbox, this regularity theory performs at least as well as the structural equations accounts with their heavy appliances.