ribe it
as an indispensable antecedent, with this reservation (which will
be more fully understood afterwards), that if we speak of a
general effect, such as death, the antecedents must be taken with
corresponding generality.

It is misleading to suggest, as Mill does, by defining cause as "the
sum total of conditions"--a definition given to back up his conception
of cause as phenomenal--that science uses the word cause in a
different meaning from that of ordinary speech. It is quite true
that "the cause, philosophically speaking, is the sum total of the
conditions, positive and negative, taken together: the whole of
the contingencies of every description, which being realised,
the consequent invariably follows". But this does not imply any
discrepancy between the scientific or philosophical meaning and the
ordinary meaning. It is only another way of saying that the business
of science or philosophy is to furnish a complete explanation of an
event, an account of all its indispensable antecedents. The plain
man would not refuse the name of cause to anything that science or
philosophy could prove to be an indispensable antecedent, but his
interest in explanation is more limited. It is confined to what he
wants to know for the purpose he has in hand. Nor could the man of
science consistently refuse the name of cause to what the plain man
applies it to, if it really was something in consequence of which the
event took place. Only his interest in explanation is different. The
indispensable antecedents that he wants to know may not be the same.
Science or philosophy applies itself to the satisfaction of a wider
curiosity: it wants to know all the causes, the whole why, the sum
total of conditions. To that end the various departments of science
interest themselves in various species of conditions. But all
understand the word cause in the ordinary sense.

We must not conclude from accidental differences in explanation or
statement of cause, dependent on the purpose in view, that the word
Cause is used in different senses. In answering a question as to
the cause of anything, we limit ourselves to what we suppose our
interrogator to be ignorant of and desirous of knowing. If asked why
the bells are ringing, we mention a royal marriage, or a victory, or a
church meeting, or a factory dinner hour, or whatever the occasion
may be. We do not consider it necessary to mention that the bells
are struck by a clapper. Our hearer unders