Causal Decision Research Articles

Rational monism and rational pluralism

Consequentialists often assume rational monism: the thesis that options are always made rationally permissible by the maximization of the selfsame quantity. This essay argues that consequentialists should reject rational monism and instead accept rational pluralism: the thesis that, on different occasions, options are made rationally permissible by the maximization of different quantities. The essay then develops a systematic form of rational pluralism which, unlike its rivals, is capable of handling both the Newcomb problems that challenge evidential decision theory and the unstable problems that challenge causal decision theory.

Determinism, Counterfactuals, and Decision

ABSTRACT Rational agents face choices, even when taking seriously the possibility of determinism. Rational agents also follow the advice of Causal Decision Theory (CDT). Although many take these claims to be well-motivated, there is growing pressure to reject one of them, as CDT seems to go badly wrong in some deterministic cases. We argue that deterministic cases do not undermine a counterfactual model of rational deliberation, which is characteristic of CDT. Rather, they force us to distinguish between counterfactuals that are relevant and ones that are irrelevant for the purposes of deliberation. We incorporate this distinction into decision theory to develop ‘Selective Causal Decision Theory’, which delivers the correct recommendations in deterministic cases while respecting the key motivations behind CDT.

Perfect Prediction in normal form: Superrational thinking extended to non-symmetric games

This paper introduces a new solution concept for non-cooperative games in normal form with no ties and pure strategies: the Perfectly Transparent Equilibrium. The players are rational in all possible worlds and know each other’s strategies in all possible worlds — which, together, we refer to as Perfect Prediction. The anticipation of a player’s decision by their opponents is counterfactually dependent on the decision, unlike in Nash Equilibria where the decisions are made independently. The equilibrium, when it exists, is unique and is Pareto optimal.This equilibrium is the normal-form counterpart of the Perfect Prediction Equilibrium; the prediction happens “in another room” rather than in the past. The equilibrium can also be seen as a natural extension of Hofstadter’s superrationality to non-symmetric games. Algorithmically, an iterated elimination of non-individually-rational strategy profiles is performed until at most one remains. An equilibrium is a strategy profile that is immune against knowledge of strategies in all possible worlds and rationality in all possible worlds, a stronger concept than common knowledge of rationality but also stronger than common counterfactual belief of rationality.We formalize and contrast the Non-Nashian Decision Theory paradigm, common to this and several other papers, with Causal Decision Theory and Evidential Decision Theory. We define the Perfectly Transparent Equilibrium algorithmically and prove (when it exists) that it is unique, that it is Pareto-optimal, and that it coincides with Hofstadter’s Superrationality on symmetric games. We relate the finding to concepts found in the literature such as Individual Rationality, Rationalizability, Minimax-Rationalizability, Second-Order Nash Equilibria, the Program Equilibrium, the Perfect Prediction Equilibrium, Shiffrin’s Joint-Selfish-Rational Equilibrium, the Stalnaker–Bonanno Equilibrium, the Perfect Cooperation Equilibrium, the Translucent Equilibrium, the Correlated Equilibrium, and Quantum Games. Finally, we specifically discuss inclusion relationships on the special case of symmetric games between Individual Rationality, Minimax-Rationalizability, Superrationality, and the Perfectly Transparent Equilibrium, and contrast them with asymmetric games.

Structural Stability in Causal Decision Theory

There are decision problems in which rational deliberation fails to result in choosing a pure act. This phenomenon is known as decision instability and has been discussed in the literature on causal decision theory. In this paper we investigate another type of instability, called structural instability in dynamical systems theory. Structural instability indicates that certain qualitative features of the process of rational deliberation are under-determined in a decision situation. We illustrate some of the issues arising from structural instability with a recent argument against causal decision theory proposed by Caspar Hare and Brian Hedden. We show that their argument is undermined by considerations arising from decision instability and structural instability.

Dynamic consistency in the logic of decision

Arif Ahmed has recently argued that causal decision theory is dynamically inconsistent and that we should therefore prefer evidential decision theory. However, the principal formulation of the evidential theory, Richard Jeffrey’s Logic of Decision, has a mixed record of its own when it comes to evaluating plans consistently across time. This note probes that neglected record, establishing the dynamic consistency of evidential decision theory within a restricted class of problems but then illustrating how evidentialists can fall into sequential incoherence outside of this class. Uncovering the evidentialist’s own dynamic inconsistencies reveals, contra Ahmed, that sequential choice considerations do not significantly favor the evidentialist’s theory over the causalist’s.

The Causal Decision Theorist's Guide to Managing the News

According to orthodox causal decision theory, performing an action can give you information about factors outside of your control, but you should not take this information into account when deciding what to do. Causal decision theorists caution against an irrational policy of "managing the news." But, by providing information about factors outside of your control, performing an act can give you two, importantly different, kinds of news. It can tell you that the world in which you find yourself is good, and it can tell you that the act itself is in a position to make the world better. While the first kind of news does not speak in favor of performing an act, I believe that the second kind of news does. I present a revision of causal decision theory which advises you to manage the news about the good you stand to promote, while ignoring news about the good the world has provided for you.

Cheating Death in Damascus

Evidential Decision Theory (EDT) and Causal Decision Theory (CDT) are the leading contenders as theories of rational action, but both face counterexamples. We present some new counterexamples, including one in which the optimal action is causally dominated. We also present a novel decision theory, Functional Decision Theory (FDT), which simultaneously solves both sets of counterexamples. Instead of considering which physical action of theirs would give rise to the best outcomes, FDT agents consider which output of their decision function would give rise to the best outcome. This theory relies on a notion of subjunctive dependence, where multiple implementations of the same mathematical function are considered (even counterfactually) to have identical results for logical rather than causal reasons. Taking these subjunctive dependencies into account allows FDT agents to outperform CDT and EDT agents in, for example, the presence of accurate predictors.

Equal Opportunities in Newcomb’s Problem and Elsewhere

Abstract The paper discusses Ian Wells’s recent argument (Wells 2019) that there is a decision problem in which followers of Evidential Decision Theory end up poorer than followers of Causal Decision Theory despite having the same opportunities for money. It defends Evidential Decision Theory against Wells’s argument, on the following grounds. (i) Wells's has not presented a decision problem in which his main claim is true. (ii) Four possible decision problems can be generated from his central example, in each of which followers of Evidential Decision Theory do at least as well as followers of Causal Decision Theory (but the former typically have better opportunities for money). (iii) There is another case in which followers of Causal Decision Theory have the same opportunities for making money but end up worse than followers of Evidential Decision Theory.

Newcomb University: A play in one act

AbstractCounter-intuitive consequences of both causal decision theory and evidential decision theory are dramatized. Each of those theories is thereby put under some pressure to supply an error theory to explain away intuitions that seem to favour the other. Because trouble is stirred up for both sides, complacency about Newcomb’s problem is discouraged.

Causal decision theory’s predetermination problem

It has often been noted that there is some tension between engaging in decision-making and believing that one’s choices might be predetermined. The possibility that our choices are predetermined forces us to consider, in our decisions, act-state pairs which are inconsistent, and hence to which we cannot assign sensible utilities. But the reasoning which justifies two-boxing in Newcomb’s problem also justifies associating a non-zero causal probability with these inconsistent act-state pairs. Put together these undefined utilities and non-zero probabilities entail that expected utilities are undefined whenever it is a possibility that our choices are predetermined. There are three ways to solve the problem, but all of them suffer serious costs: always assume that, contrary to our evidence, the outcome of our present decision-making is not predetermined; give up the reasoning that justifies unconditional two-boxing in Newcomb’s problem; or allow epistemically impossible outcomes to contribute to expected utility, leading to the wrong results in a series of cases introduced by Ahmed (Br J Philos Sci 65(4):665–685, 2014a, Evidence, decision and causality, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2014b). However they choose to respond, causal decision theorists cannot remain silent: the intuitive tension between decision-making and the possibility of predetermination can be made precise, and resolving it will require giving up something. Causal decision theorists have a predetermination problem.

The Effects of Confounding When Making Automatic Intervention Decisions Using Machine Learning

Decisions supported by machine learning algorithms often have the goal of improving (and thus affecting) an outcome by means of an intervention. Common examples include influencing someone's purchasing behavior with an advertisement or increasing customer retention with a special offer. Unfortunately, if these algorithms use observational data to estimate the effect of the interventions, the resulting estimates will likely suffer from confounding bias. Investing in experimental data offers a way to deal with confounding, but such data are often costly to acquire and may be prone to other sources of bias. This paper addresses the question of whether using readily-available (but confounded) data can lead to decisions that are at least as good as when investing in costly unconfounded data. We present a theoretical comparison between the use of confounded and unconfounded data when the goal is to build models to make automated intervention decisions. The key insight of the work is that optimizing to make the correct decision generally involves understanding whether a causal effect is above or below a given threshold, which is different from optimizing to reduce the magnitude of the bias in a causal-effect estimate. As a result, models trained with confounded data may lead to decisions that are just as good (or better) in certain scenarios, such as when larger causal effects are more likely to be overestimated or when the benefits of larger and cheaper data outweigh the detrimental effects of confounding. The theoretical results are tested by comparing the two approaches using the wide variety of benchmark data sets (77 scenarios and 7,700 data sets in total) from the 2016 ACIC causal modeling competition. Finally, we provide several straightforward tools that may be used in practice to determine whether a confounded model should be deployed to make automatic intervention decisions. It is our hope that a better understanding of this perspective---that confounding does not affect causal effect estimation and causal decision making in the same way---will help improve the chance of success of future methodological developments for automated decision making.

Hamilton meets causal decision theory

In this paper, I contrast two mathematically equivalent ways of modeling the evolution of altruism, namely the classical inclusive fitness approach and a more recent, “direct fitness” approach. Though both are usually considered by evolutionists as mere different ways of representing the same causal process (i.e. that of kin selection), I argue that this consensus is misleading, for there is a fundamental ambiguity concerning the causal interpretation of the DF approach. Drawing on an analogy between the structure of inclusive fitness theory and that of causal decision theory (Stalnaker, 1972), I show that only the inclusive fitness framework can provide us with a proper, and unambiguous causal partition of the relevant variables involved in the evolution of altruism.

Causal concepts and temporal ordering

Though common sense says that causes must temporally precede their effects, the hugely influential interventionist account of causation makes no reference to temporal precedence. Does common sense lead us astray? In this paper, I evaluate the power of the commonsense assumption from within the interventionist approach to causal modeling. I first argue that if causes temporally precede their effects, then one need not consider the outcomes of interventions in order to infer causal relevance, and that one can instead use temporal and probabilistic information to infer exactly when X is causally relevant to Y in each of the senses captured by Woodward’s interventionist treatment. Then, I consider the upshot of these findings for causal decision theory, and argue that the commonsense assumption is especially powerful when an agent seeks to determine whether so-called “dominance reasoning” is applicable.

Causal Decision Theory is Safe from Psychopaths

Until recently, many philosophers (and non-philosophers) took Causal Decision Theory (CDT) to be more successful than its rival, Evidential Decision Theory (EDT). Things have changed, however, with a renewed concern that cases involving an extreme form of decision instability are counterexamples to CDT (Richter in Austral J Philos 62(4):392–403, 1984; Egan in Philos Rev 116(1):93–114, 2007). Most prominent among those cases of extreme decision instability is the Psychopath Button, due to Andy Egan; in that case, CDT recommends a seemingly absurd act that almost certainly results in your death. This renewed attention to decision instability has spurned an array of modifications to and rejections of CDT. I argue, however, that the Psychopath Button and its ilk are no counterexamples to CDT. That is, given the causalist’s commitments in Newcomb Problems, they already have the tools to justify CDT’s verdict in Egan-style cases of extreme decision instability. I first argue that there is no reason to think the Psychopath Button is a counterexample to CDT; in particular, (1) many philosophers have placed too much weight on pre-theoretic intuition in Egan-cases, and (2) apart from pre-theoretic intuition, arguments against CDT in cases of extreme decision instability are flawed. My second claim is that the causalist can provide good reasons for following CDT in cases of extreme decision instability. I present a new case, the Two Button Defense, that highlights precisely why the causalist can reasonably follow CDT in even the Psychopath Button. CDT therefore stands as a viable decision theory, without need for modification, restriction, or rejection.

Strategic decision-making in SMEs: effectuation, causation, and the absence of strategy

Since the early 2000s, effectuation has gained substantial interest in literature. Whereas Sarasvathy in her seminal 2001 article distinguished effectuation from causal decision-making, still effectuation seems to get confused with ad hoc decision-making or strategy absence. On the basis of a qualitative study with 12 managers from 10 Swiss small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs), this manuscript analyzes their decision-making approaches and distinguishes between causal, effectual, and absence-of-strategy reasoning. Whereas principles for effectuation and causation are well established, this study reveals new categories on which strategy absence can be mapped. The three decision approaches and their interplay are then investigated in four business contexts (founding, takeover, new artifact creation, and existing artifacts). Whereas causal reasoning is found in all four, signs of strategy absence are apparent in three. Effectual logic dominates all four contexts. Further, this manuscript finds that choice of the strategic decision approach does not depend on company size but rather on decision context. Also, firms demonstrate the ability to switch between effectual and causal decision models according to the specific decision context.

An empirical investigation of determinants of effectual and causal decision logics in online and high-tech start-up firms

Scholars have criticized effectuation research for being insufficiently embedded in a nomological network of practically relevant antecedents. To address this research gap, the current study uses a mixed-methods design. First, a qualitative study with 20 venturing experts (entrepreneurs and investors) validates various effectuation logics and uncovers the following four antecedents of effectuation and causation: founders’ perceived uncertainty, entrepreneurial experience, management experience, and investor influence. Second, a large-scale quantitative study of founders in online, software, and high-tech start-ups (n = 435) provides statistical support for the identified antecedents, using structural equation modeling and multigroup comparisons over early and later venture stages. The study confirms the multifaceted nature of effectuation; experimentation is the only effectual logic that reflects influences of all the determinants. Founders’ prior experiences affect experimentation and causation in the early venture stage, but not during the later stages. Investor influence displays the broadest array of effects on the decision logics, offering both theoretical embeddedness for effectuation and a new, practically relevant driver.

Causal Decision Theory and Decision Instability

The problem of the man who met death in Damascus appeared in the infancy of the theory of rational choice known as causal decision theory. A straightforward, unadorned version of causal decision theory is presented here and applied, along with Brian Skyrms’s deliberation dynamics, to Death in Damascus and similar problems. Decision instability is a fascinating topic, but not a source of difficulty for causal decision theory. Andy Egan’s purported counterexample to causal decision theory, Murder Lesion, is considered; a simple response shows how Murder Lesion and similar examples fail to be counterexamples, and clarifies the use of the unadorned theory in problems of decision instability. I compare unadorned causal decision theory to previous treatments by Frank Arntzenius and by Jim Joyce, and recommend a well-founded heuristic that all three accounts can endorse. Whatever course deliberation takes, causal decision theory is consistently a good guide to rational action.

Intentions and instability: a defence of causal decision theory

Andy Egan has recently presented a prominent objection to causal decision theory (CDT). However, in this paper, I argue that this objection fails if CDT’s proponent accepts the plausible view that decision-theoretic options are intentions. This result both provides a defence of CDT against a prominent objection and highlights the importance of resolving the nature of decision-theoretic options.

Subfertility: philosophy and methodology of the problem. Part II

The review-philosophical work is devoted to the problem of subfertility. The low fecundity of a part of individuals who are within the fertile population is one of the most urgent social and medical problems of modern society. Usually there are no obvious reasons for fertility decline in subfertile people. The work considers a paradigm in which the low existing fertility in a part of the population is able to find an explanation in connection with the existence of various normal variants of the development of organs and tissues of the reproductive system.Normally the time to pregnancy in subfertile individuals is increased. Timing in general is a major factor in optimizing the management of a couple with unexplained infertility which should be taken into account in the management of infertility.The work presents modern terminology used in reproductive medicine. The paper shows the methodological problems that can arise in the assessment of individual fertility potential. A “fertility scale” is presented that can help in assessing fertility and determining the algorithm for management of infertile couple. The modern understanding of the etiology of subfertility/infertility is showed. The role of evidential and causal decision theory used for understanding of the pathogenesis of fertility decline is discussed. Also the philosophical view on the problem of unexplained infertility and outlines approaches to its solution, which are based on the diagnosis of anatomical and physiological (physical) features of the reproductive system of subfertile individuals are presented.Part II of the article considers the cause-effect relationships characteristic of subfertility and infertility, as well as methods that allow better understanding of such connections. The problem of heterogeneity of compared statistical series, the role of external and internal factors in the development of subfertility and infertility, a number of factors affecting fertility decline, the obligatory conditions for conception and the place of violations of these conditions in the structure of infertility causes, the role of “obvious” and “non-obvious” fertility will discussed. Main principles for optimization of conception conditions and the modern approaches to the management of couples with unexplained infertility are set out in the continuation of the article. The special role of transvaginal sonography in the study of the nature of subfertility and the diagnosis of the reproductive system development features is shown.

Subfertility: philosophy and methodology of the problem. Part І

The review-philosophical work is devoted to the problem of subfertility. The low fecundity of a part of individuals who are within the fertile population is one of the most urgent social and medical problemsof modern society. Usually there are no obvious reasons for fertility decline in subfertile people. The work considers a paradigm in which the low existing fertility in a part of the population is able to find an explanation in connection with the existence of various normal variants of the development of organs and tissues of the reproductive system.Normally the time to pregnancy in subfertile individuals is increased. Timing in general is a major factor in optimizing the management of a couple with unexplained infertility which should be taken into account in the management of infertility.The work presents modern terminology used in reproductive medicine. The paper shows the methodological problems that can arise in the assessment of individual fertility potential. A “fertility scale” is presented that can help in assessing fertility and determining the algorithm for management of infertile couple. The modern understanding of the etiology of subfertility/infertility is showed. The role of evidential and causal decision theory used for understanding of the pathogenesis of fertility decline is discussed. Also the philosophical view on the problem of unexplained infertility and outlines approaches to its solution, which are based on the diagnosis of anatomical and physiological (physical) features of the reproductive system of subfertile individuals are presented.In the continuation of the article will consider the cause-effect relationships characteristic of subfertility and infertility, as well as methods that allow better understanding of such connections. The problemof heterogeneity of compared statistical series, the role of external and internal factors in the development of subfertility and infertility, a number of factors affecting fertility decline, the obligatory conditions for conception and the place of violations of these conditions in the structure of infertility causes, the role of “obvious” and “non-obvious” fertility will discussed. Main principles for optimization of conception conditions and the modern approaches to the management of couples with unexplained infertility are set out in the continuation of the article. The special role of transvaginal sonography in the study of the nature of subfertility and the diagnosis of the reproductive system development features is shown.