Speaker: Fausto Barbero (University of Helsinki)
Date and Time: Thursday, October 26th 2023, 16:30-18:00
Venue: ILLC seminar room F1.15 in Science Park 107 and online
Title: Generalizations of causal models
Abstract. A popular approach to the study of causation in the sciences and in philosophy makes use of structural equation models to encode causal assumptions. Such models can be used to assign a meaning to interventionist counterfactuals, which are expressions of the form “If variables X1 … Xn were set to values x1 … xn, then phi would hold” to which many notions of causation can be reduced.
After presenting the basic ideas of this framework, I will consider some of the directions in which it can be generalized, in particular by developing connections with ideas from team semantics. These generalizations involve the interaction of causation with other concepts such as uncertainty, learning, and dependence; but also natural extensions of the notion of causation, such as indeterministic causal laws and indeterminate interventions.
Along the way, I will present the results obtained (with various coauthors) and ongoing work about generalized logics of interventionist counterfactuals, in the contexts of deterministic, probabilistic and qualitatively indeterministic causation.