The Frugal Inference of Causal Relations
Malcolm Forster, Garvesh Raskutti, Reuben Stern, Naftali Weinberger · The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science · 2016
Recent approaches to causal modelling rely upon the causal Markov condition, which specifies which probability distributions are compatible with a directed acyclic graph (DAG). Further principles are required in order to choose among the large number of DAGs compatible with a given probability distribution. Here we present a principle that we call frugality. This principle tells one to choose the DAG with the fewest causal arrows. We argue that frugality has several desirable properties compared to the other principles that have been suggested, including the well-known causal faithfulness condition. 1 Introduction2 The Causal Markov Condition3 Faithfulness4 Frugality 4.1 Basic independences and frugality 4.2 General properties of directed acyclic graphs satisfying frugality 4.3 Connection to minimality assumptions5 Frugality as a Parsimony Principle6 Conclusion Appendix