If it’s only about maps, its doubtful whether it deseres to be called causality.
ETA:
Indeed, EY seems to take the view that correlation is in the map, and causation in the territory:-
“More generally, for me to expect your beliefs to correlate with reality, I have to either think that reality is the cause of your beliefs, expect your beliefs to alter reality, or believe that some third factor is influencing both of them.
This is the more general argument that “To draw an accurate map of a city, you have to open the blinds and look out the window and draw lines on paper corresponding to what you see; sitting in your living-room with the blinds closed, making stuff up, isn’t going to work.”
Correlation requires causal interaction; and expecting beliefs to be true means expecting the map to correlate with the territory. ”
I’m not sure what Eliezer believes here; the way he talks about causality is why I added the “as I understand it” to the grandparent.
I think that even if it is just in the map we should still call it causality. It’s a useful concept and it is similar to the concept of causality we had before we understood these insights. It’s expected that when you come to understand something better it won’t turn out behave exactly the way you thought it did.
I don’t see any insight that causality is on the map not the territory. I think EY’s overall point is that supernatural claims can be assesed by the same episetmology as scientific ones.
If it’s only about maps, its doubtful whether it deseres to be called causality.
ETA:
Indeed, EY seems to take the view that correlation is in the map, and causation in the territory:-
“More generally, for me to expect your beliefs to correlate with reality, I have to either think that reality is the cause of your beliefs, expect your beliefs to alter reality, or believe that some third factor is influencing both of them.
This is the more general argument that “To draw an accurate map of a city, you have to open the blinds and look out the window and draw lines on paper corresponding to what you see; sitting in your living-room with the blinds closed, making stuff up, isn’t going to work.”
Correlation requires causal interaction; and expecting beliefs to be true means expecting the map to correlate with the territory. ”
I’m not sure what Eliezer believes here; the way he talks about causality is why I added the “as I understand it” to the grandparent.
I think that even if it is just in the map we should still call it causality. It’s a useful concept and it is similar to the concept of causality we had before we understood these insights. It’s expected that when you come to understand something better it won’t turn out behave exactly the way you thought it did.
I don’t see any insight that causality is on the map not the territory. I think EY’s overall point is that supernatural claims can be assesed by the same episetmology as scientific ones.