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Causality

TagLast edit: Feb 7, 2021, 3:11 PM by Yoav Ravid

Causality is the intuitive notion that some events happening “result” in other events happening. What’s going on with that? What does it mean for A to cause B? How do we figure out the causal relationship between things?

See also

External links

Causal Di­a­grams and Causal Models

Eliezer YudkowskyOct 12, 2012, 9:49 PM
154 points
297 comments15 min readLW link

Bayesian Net­works Aren’t Ne­c­es­sar­ily Causal

Zack_M_DavisMay 14, 2023, 1:42 AM
102 points
38 comments8 min readLW link1 review

Three more sto­ries about causation

cousin_itNov 3, 2020, 3:51 PM
15 points
6 comments1 min readLW link

Causal Universes

Eliezer YudkowskyNov 29, 2012, 4:08 AM
134 points
395 comments11 min readLW link

Time­less Causality

Eliezer YudkowskyMay 29, 2008, 6:45 AM
48 points
67 comments8 min readLW link

Finite Fac­tored Sets

Scott GarrabrantMay 23, 2021, 8:52 PM
148 points
95 comments24 min readLW link1 review

No Cau­sa­tion with­out Reification

Gordon Seidoh WorleyOct 23, 2020, 8:28 PM
21 points
38 comments3 min readLW link

Finite Fac­tored Sets in Pictures

Magdalena WacheDec 11, 2022, 6:49 PM
174 points
35 comments12 min readLW link

[Question] Col­lider bias as a cog­ni­tive blindspot?

TurnTroutDec 30, 2020, 2:39 AM
54 points
12 comments2 min readLW link

Book re­view: Pearl’s Book of Why

PeterMcCluskeyJul 7, 2018, 5:30 PM
69 points
8 comments6 min readLW link
(www.bayesianinvestor.com)

Fake Causality

Eliezer YudkowskyAug 23, 2007, 6:12 PM
138 points
88 comments4 min readLW link

Zen and Ra­tion­al­ity: Karma

Gordon Seidoh WorleyJan 12, 2021, 8:56 PM
11 points
1 comment1 min readLW link

Limit­ing Causal­ity by Com­plex­ity Class

BunthutJan 30, 2021, 12:18 PM
18 points
10 comments1 min readLW link

Se­quence An­nounce­ment: Ap­plied Causal Inference

Anders_HJul 30, 2014, 8:55 PM
44 points
3 comments5 min readLW link

Why 1-box­ing doesn’t im­ply back­wards causation

Chris_LeongMar 25, 2021, 2:32 AM
7 points
14 comments4 min readLW link

Causal In­fer­ence Se­quence Part II: Graph­i­cal Models

Anders_HAug 4, 2014, 11:10 PM
15 points
4 comments6 min readLW link

Sav­ing Time

Scott GarrabrantMay 18, 2021, 8:11 PM
160 points
20 comments4 min readLW link1 review

Finite Fac­tored Sets: In­tro­duc­tion and Factorizations

Scott GarrabrantJun 4, 2021, 5:41 PM
36 points
2 comments10 min readLW link

AXRP Epi­sode 9 - Finite Fac­tored Sets with Scott Garrabrant

DanielFilanJun 24, 2021, 10:10 PM
59 points
2 comments59 min readLW link

Pos­si­bil­ity and Could-ness

Eliezer YudkowskyJun 14, 2008, 4:38 AM
67 points
113 comments9 min readLW link

Finite Fac­tored Sets: Con­di­tional Orthogonality

Scott GarrabrantJul 9, 2021, 6:01 AM
29 points
2 comments7 min readLW link

Is Causal­ity in the Map or the Ter­ri­tory?

johnswentworthDec 17, 2019, 11:19 PM
23 points
36 comments3 min readLW link

[Question] Good soft­ware to draw and ma­nipu­late causal net­works?

J BostockSep 2, 2021, 2:05 PM
6 points
3 comments1 min readLW link

Causal vs Pre­dic­tive Models, and the Causal Taboo

HazardOct 18, 2021, 3:05 PM
22 points
1 comment2 min readLW link

Pre­dic­tive Cat­e­gories Make Bad Causal Variables

HazardOct 18, 2021, 3:02 PM
27 points
5 comments7 min readLW link

Is back­wards cau­sa­tion nec­es­sar­ily ab­surd?

Chris_LeongJan 14, 2020, 7:25 PM
22 points
9 comments1 min readLW link

Op­ti­mized Pro­pa­ganda with Bayesian Net­works: Com­ment on “Ar­tic­u­lat­ing Lay The­o­ries Through Graph­i­cal Models”

Zack_M_DavisJun 29, 2020, 2:45 AM
105 points
10 comments4 min readLW link

[Question] What is the sub­jec­tive ex­pe­rience of free will for agents?

Gordon Seidoh WorleyApr 2, 2020, 3:53 PM
10 points
19 comments1 min readLW link

An Illus­trated Sum­mary of “Ro­bust Agents Learn Causal World Model”

DalcyDec 14, 2024, 3:02 PM
63 points
2 comments10 min readLW link

Causal­ity and de­ter­minism in so­cial sci­ence—An in­ves­ti­ga­tion us­ing Pearl’s causal ladder

tailcalledJan 3, 2022, 5:51 PM
12 points
10 comments9 min readLW link

Re­duc­tion­ism is not the ul­ti­mate tool for causal inference

tailcalledJan 7, 2022, 9:51 PM
11 points
1 comment3 min readLW link

Ideal­ized Agents Are Ap­prox­i­mate Causal Mir­rors (+ Rad­i­cal Op­ti­mism on Agent Foun­da­tions)

Thane RuthenisDec 22, 2023, 8:19 PM
74 points
14 comments6 min readLW link

[Question] What is the equiv­a­lent of the “do” op­er­a­tor for finite fac­tored sets?

Chris van MerwijkMar 17, 2022, 8:05 AM
8 points
2 comments1 min readLW link

Don’t Pull a Bro­ken Chain

johnswentworthAug 28, 2019, 1:21 AM
31 points
6 comments5 min readLW link

In­tro­duc­tion to Towards Causal Foun­da­tions of Safe AGI

Jun 12, 2023, 5:55 PM
67 points
6 comments4 min readLW link

[Question] How Often Does ¬Cor­re­la­tion ⇏ ¬Cau­sa­tion?

niplavApr 2, 2024, 5:58 PM
19 points
17 comments2 min readLW link

AI al­ign­ment as a trans­la­tion problem

Roman LeventovFeb 5, 2024, 2:14 PM
22 points
2 comments3 min readLW link

[Question] Ex­am­ples of prac­ti­cal im­pli­ca­tions of Judea Pearl’s Causal­ity work

ChristianKlJul 1, 2022, 8:58 PM
23 points
6 comments1 min readLW link

The Use­ful Idea of Truth

Eliezer YudkowskyOct 2, 2012, 6:16 PM
194 points
545 comments14 min readLW link

[LDSL#4] Root cause anal­y­sis ver­sus effect size estimation

tailcalledAug 11, 2024, 4:12 PM
29 points
0 comments2 min readLW link

[Question] What is the in­ter­pre­ta­tion of the do() op­er­a­tor?

BunthutAug 26, 2020, 9:54 PM
10 points
6 comments1 min readLW link

[Question] Are there any good, easy-to-un­der­stand ex­am­ples of cases where statis­ti­cal causal net­work dis­cov­ery worked well in prac­tice?

tailcalledJul 12, 2023, 10:08 PM
42 points
6 comments1 min readLW link

Goal-Direc­tion for Si­mu­lated Agents

Raymond DJul 12, 2023, 5:06 PM
33 points
2 comments6 min readLW link

[Question] The­ory of Causal Models with Dy­namic Struc­ture?

johnswentworthJan 23, 2020, 7:47 PM
24 points
6 comments1 min readLW link

AXRP Epi­sode 38.0 - Zhijing Jin on LLMs, Causal­ity, and Multi-Agent Systems

DanielFilanNov 14, 2024, 7:00 AM
14 points
0 comments12 min readLW link

Causal­ity: a chap­ter by chap­ter review

VaniverSep 26, 2012, 4:55 PM
103 points
20 comments12 min readLW link

Com­pu­ta­tional Model: Causal Di­a­grams with Symmetry

johnswentworthAug 22, 2019, 5:54 PM
53 points
29 comments4 min readLW link

[Link] Sarah Con­stantin: “Why I am Not An AI Doomer”

lbThingrbApr 12, 2023, 1:52 AM
61 points
13 comments1 min readLW link
(sarahconstantin.substack.com)

Stu­pidity and Dishon­esty Ex­plain Each Other Away

Zack_M_DavisDec 28, 2019, 7:21 PM
38 points
18 comments1 min readLW link

z is not the cause of x

hrbigelowOct 23, 2023, 5:43 PM
6 points
2 comments9 min readLW link

Time is ho­mo­ge­neous se­quen­tially-com­pos­able determination

TsviBTOct 8, 2023, 2:58 PM
15 points
0 comments21 min readLW link

Stuff That Makes Stuff Happen

Eliezer YudkowskyOct 18, 2012, 10:49 AM
103 points
128 comments9 min readLW link

Causal Reference

Eliezer YudkowskyOct 20, 2012, 10:12 PM
68 points
247 comments12 min readLW link

Causal In­fer­ence Se­quence Part 1: Ba­sic Ter­minol­ogy and the As­sump­tions of Causal Inference

Anders_HJul 30, 2014, 8:56 PM
46 points
26 comments10 min readLW link

A re­for­mu­la­tion of Finite Fac­tored Sets

Matthias G. MayerJul 24, 2023, 1:02 PM
76 points
1 comment8 min readLW link

A crit­i­cal agen­tial ac­count of free will, cau­sa­tion, and physics

jessicataMar 5, 2020, 7:57 AM
25 points
10 comments12 min readLW link
(unstableontology.com)

Causal­ity and a Cost Se­man­tics for Neu­ral Networks

scottviteriAug 21, 2023, 9:02 PM
22 points
1 comment1 min readLW link

Grasp­ing Slip­pery Things

Eliezer YudkowskyJun 17, 2008, 2:04 AM
36 points
17 comments7 min readLW link

The Fal­lacy of Dress­ing Like a Winner

benelliottDec 26, 2010, 8:59 PM
27 points
21 comments6 min readLW link

The goal of physics

Jim PivarskiSep 2, 2023, 11:08 PM
46 points
4 comments5 min readLW link

For­mal­iz­ing «Boundaries» with Markov blankets

ChipmonkSep 19, 2023, 9:01 PM
21 points
20 comments3 min readLW link

[LINK] Judea Pearl wins 2011 Tur­ing Award

[deleted]Mar 15, 2012, 4:32 PM
32 points
2 comments1 min readLW link

Michael Niel­sen ex­plains Judea Pearl’s causality

gwernJan 24, 2012, 7:35 PM
30 points
15 comments1 min readLW link

Causal­ity does not im­ply correlation

Richard_KennawayJul 8, 2009, 12:52 AM
18 points
58 comments4 min readLW link

At 87, Pearl is still able to change his mind

rotatingpaguroOct 18, 2023, 4:46 AM
148 points
15 comments5 min readLW link

Against but­terfly effect

ForensicOceanographyFeb 9, 2021, 7:46 AM
5 points
10 comments1 min readLW link
(forensicoceanography.wordpress.com)

Many meth­ods of causal in­fer­ence try to iden­tify a “safe” sub­set of variation

tailcalledMar 30, 2021, 2:36 PM
13 points
6 comments9 min readLW link

Does but­terfly af­fect?

pchvykovMay 14, 2021, 4:20 AM
14 points
21 comments2 min readLW link

Progress on Causal In­fluence Diagrams

tom4everittJun 30, 2021, 3:34 PM
73 points
6 comments9 min readLW link

[Question] Causal with­out cor­re­la­tion, how?

MoritzGAug 30, 2021, 4:43 PM
2 points
7 comments1 min readLW link

A FLI post­doc­toral grant ap­pli­ca­tion: AI al­ign­ment via causal anal­y­sis and de­sign of agents

PabloAMCNov 13, 2021, 1:44 AM
4 points
0 comments7 min readLW link

Anti-cor­re­lated causation

DirectedEvolutionDec 6, 2021, 4:36 AM
18 points
2 comments3 min readLW link

What is a Coun­ter­fac­tual: An Ele­men­tary In­tro­duc­tion to the Causal Hierarchy

DarmaniJan 2, 2022, 3:46 AM
11 points
2 comments5 min readLW link

[Question] How to write a LW se­quence to learn a topic?

PabloAMCApr 3, 2022, 8:09 PM
3 points
2 comments1 min readLW link

Causal­ity, Trans­for­ma­tive AI and al­ign­ment—part I

Marius HobbhahnJan 27, 2022, 4:18 PM
14 points
11 comments8 min readLW link

How RL Agents Be­have When Their Ac­tions Are Mod­ified? [Distil­la­tion post]

PabloAMCMay 20, 2022, 6:47 PM
22 points
0 comments8 min readLW link

In­ves­ti­gat­ing causal un­der­stand­ing in LLMs

Jun 14, 2022, 1:57 PM
28 points
6 comments13 min readLW link

Causal con­fu­sion as an ar­gu­ment against the scal­ing hypothesis

Jun 20, 2022, 10:54 AM
86 points
30 comments15 min readLW link

What Is The True Name of Mo­du­lar­ity?

Jul 1, 2022, 2:55 PM
39 points
10 comments12 min readLW link

How to de­stroy the uni­verse with a hypercomputer

Trevor CappalloJul 5, 2022, 7:05 PM
2 points
3 comments1 min readLW link

Dis­cov­er­ing Agents

zac_kentonAug 18, 2022, 5:33 PM
73 points
11 comments6 min readLW link

Causal rep­re­sen­ta­tion learn­ing as a tech­nique to pre­vent goal misgeneralization

PabloAMCJan 4, 2023, 12:07 AM
21 points
0 comments8 min readLW link

An Open Philan­thropy grant pro­posal: Causal rep­re­sen­ta­tion learn­ing of hu­man preferences

PabloAMCJan 11, 2022, 11:28 AM
19 points
6 comments8 min readLW link

Agent mem­branes and causal distance

ChipmonkJan 2, 2024, 10:43 PM
20 points
3 comments3 min readLW link

In­ter­pretabil­ity as Com­pres­sion: Re­con­sid­er­ing SAE Ex­pla­na­tions of Neu­ral Ac­ti­va­tions with MDL-SAEs

Aug 23, 2024, 6:52 PM
42 points
8 comments16 min readLW link

From Finite Fac­tors to Bayes Nets

J BostockJan 23, 2024, 8:03 PM
38 points
7 comments8 min readLW link

[Question] Choos­ing a book on causality

martinkunevFeb 7, 2024, 9:16 PM
4 points
3 comments1 min readLW link

Causal­ity is Everywhere

silentbobFeb 13, 2024, 1:44 PM
26 points
12 comments8 min readLW link

[Question] Define “Agent” (Embed­ded)

ApolloniaMar 24, 2024, 8:14 PM
10 points
1 comment1 min readLW link

My thoughts on cor­re­la­tion and causation

Victor PortonDec 11, 2024, 5:08 AM
−13 points
3 comments1 min readLW link

[Question] Ques­tion about Lewis’ coun­ter­fac­tual the­ory of causation

jbkjrJun 7, 2024, 8:15 PM
12 points
7 comments1 min readLW link

How To Do Patch­ing Fast

Joseph MillerMay 11, 2024, 8:13 PM
44 points
8 comments4 min readLW link

Ap­ply­ing Force to the Wrong End of a Causal Chain

silentbobJun 22, 2024, 6:06 PM
41 points
0 comments9 min readLW link

Sav­ing Lives Re­duces Over-Pop­u­la­tion—A Counter-In­tu­itive Non-Zero-Sum Game

James Stephen BrownJun 28, 2024, 7:29 PM
6 points
0 comments5 min readLW link
(nonzerosum.games)

Beyond Bio­mark­ers: Un­der­stand­ing Mul­tis­cale Causality

Matěj NekoranecJul 7, 2024, 9:56 AM
13 points
0 comments7 min readLW link

Free Will, Deter­minism, And Choice

Zero ContradictionsJul 6, 2024, 6:34 AM
7 points
3 comments1 min readLW link
(thewaywardaxolotl.blogspot.com)

[Question] Why do Min­i­mal Bayes Nets of­ten cor­re­spond to Causal Models of Real­ity?

DalcyAug 3, 2024, 12:39 PM
27 points
1 comment1 min readLW link

Proof Ex­plained for “Ro­bust Agents Learn Causal World Model”

DalcyDec 22, 2024, 3:06 PM
25 points
0 comments15 min readLW link

But Where do the Vari­ables of my Causal Model come from?

DalcyAug 9, 2024, 10:07 PM
36 points
1 comment8 min readLW link

Causal in­fer­ence for the home gardener

bracesNov 27, 2024, 5:55 PM
42 points
1 comment5 min readLW link

Where Free Will and Deter­minism Meet

David BravoApr 4, 2023, 10:59 AM
0 points
0 comments3 min readLW link

The Fun­da­men­tal The­o­rem for mea­surable fac­tor spaces

Matthias G. MayerNov 12, 2023, 7:25 PM
38 points
2 comments2 min readLW link

Ap­ply to the Con­cep­tual Boundaries Work­shop for AI Safety

ChipmonkNov 27, 2023, 9:04 PM
50 points
0 comments3 min readLW link

Your in­ner Google

PhilGoetzSep 16, 2011, 6:56 AM
163 points
70 comments1 min readLW link

You Are A Brain

LironMay 9, 2009, 9:53 PM
131 points
64 comments1 min readLW link

Self-fulfilling correlations

PhilGoetzAug 26, 2010, 9:07 PM
151 points
50 comments3 min readLW link

What is Ev­i­dence?

Eliezer YudkowskySep 22, 2007, 6:43 AM
195 points
62 comments3 min readLW link

Right­ing a Wrong Question

Eliezer YudkowskyMar 9, 2008, 1:00 PM
131 points
111 comments3 min readLW link

The Sim­ple Truth

Eliezer YudkowskyJan 1, 2008, 8:00 PM
167 points
15 comments22 min readLW link

Mini-re­view: The Book of Why

Brian SlesinskyMay 21, 2018, 11:11 PM
21 points
5 comments1 min readLW link

Ex­plain­ing vs. Ex­plain­ing Away

Eliezer YudkowskyMar 17, 2008, 1:59 AM
109 points
101 comments4 min readLW link

Model­ing AGI Safety Frame­works with Causal In­fluence Diagrams

Ramana KumarJun 21, 2019, 12:50 PM
43 points
6 comments1 min readLW link
(arxiv.org)

Con­found it! Cor­re­la­tion is (usu­ally) not cau­sa­tion! But why not?

gwernJul 9, 2014, 3:04 AM
67 points
34 comments1 min readLW link

Tak­ing “cor­re­la­tion does not im­ply cau­sa­tion” back from the internet

sixes_and_sevensOct 3, 2012, 12:18 PM
62 points
70 comments1 min readLW link

Is Caviar a Risk Fac­tor For Be­ing a Million­aire?

Anders_HDec 9, 2016, 4:27 PM
67 points
9 comments1 min readLW link

Real­ity and re­al­ity-boxes

Jim PivarskiMay 13, 2023, 2:14 PM
37 points
11 comments21 min readLW link

Gen­er­al­iz­ing Ex­per­i­men­tal Re­sults by Lev­er­ag­ing Knowl­edge of Mechanisms

Carlos_CinelliDec 11, 2019, 8:39 PM
50 points
5 comments1 min readLW link

Causal di­a­grams and soft­ware engineering

MorendilMar 7, 2012, 6:23 PM
53 points
29 comments5 min readLW link

Causal­ity and Mo­ral Responsibility

Eliezer YudkowskyJun 13, 2008, 8:34 AM
55 points
55 comments5 min readLW link

Log­i­cal Rep­re­sen­ta­tion of Causal Models

johnswentworthJan 21, 2020, 8:04 PM
37 points
0 comments3 min readLW link

The Gen­er­al­ized Anti-Zom­bie Principle

Eliezer YudkowskyApr 5, 2008, 11:16 PM
49 points
64 comments10 min readLW link

Ghosts in the Machine

Eliezer YudkowskyJun 17, 2008, 11:29 PM
67 points
30 comments4 min readLW link

New pa­per: The In­cen­tives that Shape Behaviour

RyanCareyJan 23, 2020, 7:07 PM
23 points
5 comments1 min readLW link
(arxiv.org)

Three Fal­la­cies of Teleology

Eliezer YudkowskyAug 25, 2008, 10:27 PM
38 points
14 comments9 min readLW link

Time­less Control

Eliezer YudkowskyJun 7, 2008, 5:16 AM
47 points
69 comments9 min readLW link

Causal­ity: A Brief Introduction

Jun 20, 2023, 3:01 PM
49 points
18 comments6 min readLW link

[Link] In­tro to causal in­fer­ence by Michael Niel­sen (2012)

yagudinJul 19, 2019, 12:19 PM
29 points
0 comments1 min readLW link

Agency from a causal perspective

Jun 30, 2023, 5:37 PM
40 points
5 comments6 min readLW link

In­cen­tives from a causal perspective

Jul 10, 2023, 5:16 PM
27 points
0 comments6 min readLW link

Re­ward Hack­ing from a Causal Perspective

Jul 21, 2023, 6:27 PM
29 points
6 comments7 min readLW link
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