Causality has been variously defined, and even given an empirical understanding. Causality is derived from the term “cause which means anything capable of changing something else or that which “produces something (makes something happen; bring about the occurrence of something) without which that thing would not have resulted. That which is produced (or changed) is called the effect and the effect is explained by it cause. Nevertheless, in the treatment of causality Aristotle in his first philosophy or metaphysics gave a holistic analysis of the concept of causality, were he uses the term “cause” to mean explanation. However, for the Africans, “cause” has meaning basically from a metaphysical approach. That every effect has a cause is a very strong belief in the African world view. This means that whatever happens physically or otherwise has an explanation and this explanation may be spiritual as well as natural. Nevertheless, this work attempts a critique of Aristotle’s analysis of causality.
The problem of causality has been among the central concerns of many thinkers. When certain events happen, we tend to ask ‘why’. This is because such events produce some effects. In asking the question ‘why’, we are asking for the cause of the event. We seek an explanation that would enable us understand the effect which the event produces. This explains the whole problem and notion of causality. The Ionian philosophers probably the earliest thinkers did not fail to recognize that the world as it is did not come to be without being caused by some other things.
The Ionian philosophers occupied themselves with the cosmological problem; of what substance is the universe composed? This of course was a causal question and Thales of Miletus; the first Greek philosopher posited that the primary stuff of the cosmos was ‘water’1 Anaximander, criticizing the causal theory of his predecessor held the stuff of the universe is an indefinite or boundless realm.2 Anaximenes the third and last Milesian philosopher designated air as the primary substance from which all things come.3 These philosophers certainly did not regard the universe as anything other than an effect which requires a cause in order to be. Plato equally had his version of causality which was deeply rooted in his philosophy. For Plato, the sensible world is the changing world of appearance.
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