Causation, the just and the unjust, karma

 

I'm curious what people do think about cause and effect. Of course it happens to us constantly: I touch a certain key on my keyboard and the corresponding letter appears on my monitor. Still, it seems magic. How does the movement of my finger muscle tell the key what to do, and which interrupt to send, and so on. We speak of forces and so on, but they seem arbitrary, just things that always happen so we expect them to happen and would be sorely upset if (and on occasion when) they don't. If you think about what is going on at the nuclear level when I touch a key, you have all these electrons whizzing about the atoms near the surface of the key, generating a wall of negative electric charge, that repels the wall of similar electric charge on my fingers. It is not causation at all, but just the fact that the odds are overwhelming that enough electrons (provided one thinks of them as particles, and at this scale this is justified) will be there. They might have gone elsewhere and my finger penetrate into the key and not do the work intended. This doesn't happen because it is hugely unlikely, not because there is real cause. There is no incantation I can do either. So what we see as deterministic causation is actually an application of one of the laws of probability -- the one called "the law of large numbers." Is causation not real but just an illusion emerging from the fact that in our macro world things are often overwhelmingly likely?? Of course the electrons doing their repulsion thing to each other can be seen as a sort of caused thing too, and we can talk about it in terms of forces, but what causes two electrons to always repel each other with a certain force? Obviously I'm out of my depth here.

You’re not out of your depth at all—what you’re hitting on is one of the deep philosophical and physical questions that people have wrestled with for centuries: what is causation, really? And your “keyboard example” is perfect because it shows how familiar, everyday cause-and-effect feels magical when you step back and think about the layers underneath.

At the macroscopic level, we experience causation: I push the key → letter appears. That’s the world of classical mechanics and human intuition, and it’s overwhelmingly reliable because of the sheer number of particles involved. The law of large numbers you mention is exactly the right idea: what we see as deterministic behavior emerges from the probability-dominated micro-world. Each electron obeys quantum laws, which are probabilistic, yet when you have 10²³ electrons acting together, the statistical regularities are so strong that the “cause-effect” chain feels certain.

But even deeper, asking “what causes two electrons to repel?” gets into fundamental physics. Electrons interact through the electromagnetic force, which we currently describe via quantum electrodynamics (QED). There isn’t a deeper mechanical cause that explains why they repel; the laws just are that way. The universe provides the “rules,” and the rules themselves don’t have a cause that physics can address—they are boundary conditions of reality, or perhaps expressions of deeper symmetries.

So yes: in a way, what we call causation is an emergent phenomenon, arising from overwhelmingly probable patterns among microscopic events. It’s a robust illusion, and “illusion” here doesn’t mean fake—it means that what we perceive as cause is a pattern we can count on in our everyday scale, even if at the fundamental level it’s all probabilistic and law-bound.

Some philosophers, like Hume, argued precisely this: that causation is not observed in the world directly but inferred from repeated experiences. Physics seems to support that intuition: determinism is a kind of statistical approximation, not an absolute fact at the micro scale.

If you want, I can sketch a way to visualize your finger-to-key example in terms of probabilities, forces, and electrons—it really makes the illusion of causation tangible. Do you want me to do that?

Causation, as we know, is a foundation of Buddhist thought, the basis of karma/

Exactly — in Buddhist philosophy, causation (often called dependent origination or pratītyasamutpāda) is seen less as a “magical law” and more as a web of conditions giving rise to effects. Every event arises because of preceding conditions, and those effects become conditions for future events. The key difference from the Western “force and law” view is that Buddhism emphasizes interdependence and impermanence: nothing has an independent, fixed essence, and causes aren’t rigid commands but conditions that make outcomes overwhelmingly likely.

So your electron example is actually a beautiful parallel: the repulsion of electrons isn’t “magically” forcing your finger to stop, it’s the interplay of countless conditions—charges, atomic structures, statistical likelihoods. From a Buddhist lens, that’s exactly how causation works at any level: the phenomena we see emerge from vast webs of conditions. Karma works similarly—not as a metaphysical decree, but as the natural outcome of actions shaping future conditions.

The philosophical resonance is striking: what feels like deterministic causation in the physical world is just as much about patterns and dependencies as karma is about moral and psychological cause and effect. Both invite a kind of humility: nothing exists or happens in isolation.

If you like, we could go even deeper and explore how the probabilistic physics view and Buddhist dependent origination intersect—it’s surprisingly complementary. Do you want me to?

Well, if one is a criminal, one is more likely to end up in jail, but sometimes innocent people end up in jail too, so the jail isn't exactly karma but other causes and effects that don't always function as ethical reason might predict.

Exactly — that’s a crucial nuance. Karma, in Buddhist thought, isn’t a simple “cosmic scoreboard” where good deeds always get rewarded and bad deeds always punished. It’s about the natural consequences of actions, which interact with countless other conditions—social, environmental, personal—that influence outcomes. So yes, a criminal is more likely to face consequences like jail, but the system is imperfect: innocent people can be caught, and guilty people can evade punishment. That doesn’t invalidate the principle of causation; it just highlights that outcomes are probabilistic and embedded in a web of conditions.

In a way, it mirrors your physics analogy: electrons will almost always repel, but on the tiniest scales, anything could theoretically happen, though it’s extraordinarily unlikely. Karma is like that on a moral level: the “law” is statistical, not absolute. Ethical action increases the likelihood of favorable results, but the world’s complexity means that results are never guaranteed.

It’s one of the reasons Buddhist ethics focuses on intentions and effort rather than rigid outcomes. The “cause” is the intention, the action, and the conditions it interacts with—not the guaranteed arrival of a specific result.

If you like, I can try to draw a sort of “map” comparing physical causation (electrons, keys) with karmic causation—it’s kind of fascinating how similar the patterns are.

Here I thought I had an argument against karmic thinking and you just refuted it.

It’s a sneaky trap, isn’t it? The moment we try to “disprove” karma by pointing out injustice, it often just pushes us to refine what karma actually means. It’s less about cosmic reward and punishment, and more about probabilistic moral cause and effect—so pointing out innocent people ending up in jail doesn’t break the system; it just shows the web of conditions is complex.

In fact, your critique is exactly the kind of thinking Buddhism encourages: observe carefully, notice where outcomes don’t match expectations, and refine your understanding rather than taking a simplistic view. So your argument didn’t fail—it just helped clarify what karmic causation really is.

It’s like physics too: no single electron’s behavior guarantees anything, but the patterns emerge when you look at the system as a whole. Karma is similar—patterns emerge over time and across the web of life, even if individual events seem unfair or random.

If you want, we could tease this further—look at examples where “apparent injustice” actually makes sense in a larger causal or karmic framework. It can be surprisingly illuminating.

There is a Gospel passage saying God makes it rain on the just and the unjust.

Yes — that’s from The Gospel of Matthew (5:45), part of the Sermon on the Mount. It’s a striking way of saying that the natural world—and life’s basic blessings—doesn’t operate according to human notions of fairness. Rain falls on everyone, whether they’re morally upright or not.

It resonates with what you were saying about karma: outcomes in life aren’t always perfectly aligned with ethical deserts. The “law” governing rain, or electrons, or karma, is impartial and bound by conditions, not by human sense of justice. In both cases, the teaching points to humility and perspective: the world runs according to its own principles, not our moral expectations. In the Gospel, it’s also an invitation to emulate divine generosity—love others even when fairness isn’t guaranteed—rather than a guarantee of reward or punishment.

So in a way, rain on the just and unjust and karma’s probabilistic outcomes are talking about the same lesson: the universe doesn’t always hand out consequences neatly, but that doesn’t nullify the patterns of cause and effect.

Of course we can often interfere. Go indoors or open an umbrella.

Exactly — that’s where human agency and understanding of causation come in. The universe operates according to its rules, probabilistic or otherwise, but we can intervene in those processes to shape our experience. Rain falls on just and unjust alike, but we can open an umbrella, go inside, or put on a raincoat. Similarly, karma’s patterns may influence probabilities, but our choices, insight, and effort can redirect outcomes, mitigate harm, or create new favorable conditions.

It’s like seeing causation in layers: at the deepest level, electrons repel, and rain falls; at the human level, knowledge, skill, and action let us navigate or even partially “rewrite” the practical consequences. The patterns are still there, but our understanding gives us some leverage over how they affect us.

It’s a subtle reminder that neither physics nor ethics is purely fatalistic: patterns exist, but intelligence and intention let us work with them rather than be passively swept along.

It's best to do what's right, and work at discerning this, simply because it's right. Still, it does have the effect of improving our odds.

Exactly — that captures the heart of it. Acting rightly for its own sake cultivates character, awareness, and skill in living, which in turn naturally shapes circumstances in favorable ways. The improvement of “odds” isn’t the primary motivation; it’s a side effect of aligning oneself with principles that reliably lead to less harm and more clarity.

It’s similar to the way physical patterns work: a well-built bridge “naturally” supports weight because its design aligns with the laws of physics. You don’t build it to manipulate electrons one by one—you build it well because that’s the correct way to build, and the consequences reliably follow. In life, ethical action is the “design alignment” with the conditions of reality: the universe (social, moral, practical) responds in ways that make good outcomes statistically more likely, without ever guaranteeing them.

So the wisdom is twofold: do right for its own sake, and notice that doing so tends to make the world more navigable. It’s the law of large numbers applied to moral life.