Skip to main content

Concepts and Background of Causation

  • Chapter
Causation and Disease
  • 121 Accesses

Abstract

Since the beginning of history, natural science has been based on common experience. Primitive man observed things in space and in time and made conjectures for the explanation of natural phenomena (Lenzen, 1954). Such experiences led to the belief that the sun is the cause of light, that fire caused smoke, and that injury caused pain. They led to the concept that causation is a process by which one phenomenon, the cause, gives rise to another phenomenon, the effect.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  • Ackernecht EH: A Short History of Medicine. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baker G: An Essay Concerning the Cause of the Endemic Colic of Devonshire. London, Delta Omega Society, 1958.

    Google Scholar 

  • Budd W: Alleged discovery of the cause of cholera. Lancet 2:371–372, 1849a.

    Google Scholar 

  • Budd W: Malignant Cholera: Its Modes and Propagation and Its Prevention. London, Churchill, 1849b.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bulloch W: The History of Bacteriology. London, Oxford University Press, 1938.

    Google Scholar 

  • Evans AS: Causation and disease: The Henle-Koch postulates revisited. Yale J Biol Med 49:175– 195, 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  • Evans AS: Two errors in enteric epidemiology. The stories of Austin Flint and Max von Pettenkofer. Rev Infect Dis 7:434–440, 1985.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fracastoro G: De Contagrone et Contagrosis Morbis et Earum Curatione ,Libri III, Wright WC (trans). London, GP Putnam’s Sons, 1930.

    Google Scholar 

  • Garrison FH: Contributions to the History of Medicine. New York, Hafner, 1966.

    Google Scholar 

  • Howard-Jones N: Choleranomolies: The unhistory of medicine as exemplified by cholera. Perspect Biol Med 13:422–433, 1971.

    Google Scholar 

  • Howard-Jones N: Gelsenkirchen typhoid outbreak of 1901. Robert Koch and the dead hand of Max von Pettenkofer. Br Med J 1:103–105, 1973.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Howard-Jones N: Fracastoro and Henle: A reappraisal of their contributions to the concept of communicable disease. Med Hist 21:61–68, 1977.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koch R: Ueber die Cholerabakterien. Deutsch Med Wochenschr 10:725–728, 1884.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Koch R: Uber den augenblicklichen Stand der bakteriolischen Cholera Diagnose. J Hyg Infektionskr 14:319–426, 1893.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lenzen VF: Causality in Natural Science. Springfield, Ill, Charles C Thomas Publisher, 1954.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lind J: Treatise on Scurvy ,Stewart CP, Guthrie D (eds). Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 1953.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pettenkofer M: Cholera. Lancet 2:769–771, 816–819, 861–864, 904–905, 992–994, 1042–1043, 1086–1088, 1884.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Semmelweiss IP: The etiology of childbed fever (English translation), in Kelley’s Classics ,vol. V, 1981, p338.

    Google Scholar 

  • Snow J: On the mode of communication of cholera, in Snow on Cholera. New York, The Commonwealth Fund, 1936, pp 1–175.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spink WW: Infectious Disease Prevention in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Minneapolis, University of Minneapolis Press, 1978.

    Google Scholar 

  • Susser M: Causal Thinking in the Health Sciences: Concepts and Strategies. London, Oxford University Press, 1978.

    Google Scholar 

  • Terris M: Goldberger on Pellagra. Baton Rouge, Louisiana University Press, 1964.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 1993 Springer Science+Business Media New York

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Evans, A.S. (1993). Concepts and Background of Causation. In: Causation and Disease. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-3024-4_1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-3024-4_1

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4613-6318-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4615-3024-4

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

Publish with us

Policies and ethics