Causation and Time Reversal

Abstract

What would it be for a process to happen backwards in time? Would such a process involve different causal relations? It is common to understand the time reversal invariance of a physical theory in causal terms, such that whatever can happen forwards in time (according to the theory) can also happen backwards in time. This has led many to hold that time reversal symmetry is incompatible with the asymmetry of cause and effect. This paper critiques the causal reading of time reversal. First, I argue that the causal reading requires time-reversal-related models to be understood as representing distinct possible worlds, and on such a reading causal relations are compatible with time reversal symmetry. Second, I argue that the former approach does however raise serious sceptical problems regarding the causal relations of paradigm causal processes, and as a consequence there are overwhelming reasons to prefer a non-causal reading of time reversal whereby time reversal leaves causal relations invariant. On the non- causal reading, time reversal symmetry poses no significant conceptual nor epistemological problems for causation.