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Causality or causation denotes the relationship between one event (called cause) and another event (called effect) which is the consequence (result) of the first. [1] This informal understanding suffices in everyday usage, however the philosophical analysis of causality or causation has proved exceedingly difficult. The work of philosophers to understand causality and how best to characterize it extends over millennia. In the western philosophical tradition explicit discussion stretches back at least as far as Aristotle, and the topic remains a staple in contemporary philosophy journals. Though cause and effect are most often held to relate events, other candidates include processes, properties, variables, facts, and states of affairs; which of these comprise the correct causal relata, and how best to characterize the nature of the relationship between them, has as yet no universally accepted answer, and remains under discussion.