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Causation, Evidence, and Inference

In this book, Reiss argues in favor of a tight fit between evidence, con-
cept, and purpose in our causal investigations in the sciences. There is no
doubt that the sciences employ a vast array of techniques to address causal
questions such as controlled experiments, randomized trials, statistical and
econometric tools, causal modeling and thought experiments. But how do
these different methods relate to each other and to the causal inquiry at
hand? Reiss argues that there is no ‘gold standard’ in settling causal issues
against which other methods can be measured. Rather, the various methods
of inference tend to be good only relative to certain interpretations of the
word ‘cause’, and each interpretation, in turn, helps to address some salient
purpose (e.g., prediction, explanation, or policy analysis) but not others.
The main objective of this book is to explore the metaphysical and method-
ological consequences of this view in the context of numerous cases studies
from the natural and social sciences.

Julian Reiss (PhD 2002, LSE) is Professor of Philosophy at Durham Uni-

versity and Co-Director of the Centre for Humanities Engaging Science and
Society (CHESS). His main research interests are methodologies of the sci-
ences (especially causality and causal inference, models, simulations and
thought experiments, and counterfactuals), philosophy of economics, and
science and values.
Routledge Studies in the Philosophy of Science

1╇Evolution, Rationality and ╇ 9╇Models, Simulations, and

Cognition Representations
A Cognitive Science for the Paul Humphreys and Cyrille
Twenty-First Century Imbert
Edited by António Zilhão
10╇Platonism, Naturalism, and
2╇ Conceptual Systems Mathematical Knowledge
Harold I.€Brown James Robert€Brown

3╇Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy 11╇Thought Experiments in

of Science Science, Philosophy, and
Edited by Stephan Hartmann, the€Arts
Carl Hoefer, and Luc Bovens Edited by Mélanie Frappier,
Letitia Meynell, and James
4╇ Fictions in Science Robert€Brown
Philosophical Essays on Modeling
and Idealization 12╇Kuhn’s The Structure of
Edited by Mauricio Suárez Scientific Revolutions Revisited
Edited by Vasso Kindi and
5╇Karl Popper’s Philosophy of Theodore Arabatzis
Science
Rationality without Foundations 13╇Contemporary Philosophical
Stefano Gattei Naturalism and Its Implications
Edited by Bana Bashour and Hans
6╇Emergence in Science and D. Muller
Philosophy
Edited by Antonella Corradini 14╇Science after the Practice Turn
and Timothy O’Connor in Philosophy, History, and the
Social Studies of Science
7╇ Popper’s Critical Rationalism Edited by Léna Soler, Sjoerd
A Philosophical Investigation Zwart, Vincent Israel-Jost, and
Darrell Rowbottom Michael€Lynch

8╇ Conservative Reductionism 15╇Causation, Evidence, and

Michael Esfeld and Christian Inference
Sachse Julian€Reiss
Causation, Evidence, and
Inference

By Julian€Reiss
First published€2015
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY€10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14€4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor€& Francis Group,
an informa business
© 2015 Taylor€& Francis
The right of Julian Reiss to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by him in accordance with sections€77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act€1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication€Data
Reiss, Julian, author.
â•… Causation, evidence, and inference / by Julian Reiss.
â•…â•… pages cm.—(Routledge studies in the philosophy of science; 15)
â•… Includes bibliographical references and index.
╇1.╇Causation.╅ 2.╇Inference.╅ 3.╇Evidence.╅ I.╇Title.
â•… BD531.R45 2015
â•…122—dc23
â•…2014046903
ISBN: 978-0-415-39422-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-77160-1 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
To Billy and€Suzy
This page intentionally left blank
Contents

Foreword ix

1╅ Causation in a Complex€World 1

PART I
Evidence

2â•… What’s Wrong with Our Theories of Evidence? 33

3â•… Evidence in Context 58

PART II
Singular Causation

4â•… Counterfactuals, Thought Experiments, and

â•…â•⁄ Singular Causal Inference in History 79

5â•… Counterfactuals in the Social Sciences 91

6â•… Contrastive Causation 120

7â•… Singular Causation without Counterfactuals 148

PART III
Causal Laws

8â•… Time Series, Nonsense Correlations, and

â•…â•⁄╛╛the Principle of the Common€Cause 165
viiiâ•… Contents
╇ 9╅ Causal Laws in Biomedical and
╅╇â•⁄â•›Social Research: Evidence, Inference, and Purpose 180

PART IV: Semantics

10â•… Third Time’s a Charm: Causation, Science, and

â•…â•…Wittgensteinian Pluralism 203

11â•… Causation in the Biomedical and Social Sciences: An

╅╇â•⁄ Inferentialist Account 221

References 241
Index 253
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Foreword

My interest in causation was first sparked by the AHRC-funded research

project Causality: Metaphysics and Methods on which I€ worked as a
research officer from 2001 till 2004. Nancy Cartwright, John Worrall, and
Elliott Sober were the directors of the project, covering causality in eco-
nomics, medicine, and biology, respectively. This book could not have been
written without the project and without the countless debates and seminars
we had. In particular Nancy’s views on causal pluralism, John’s on evidence
and evidence-based medicine, and Elliott’s on the principle of the common
cause have profoundly changed my thinking about these matters. I€discuss
Nancy’s views in some detail in Chapter€10, John’s in Chapter€2 and Elliott’s
in Chapter€8.
From 2005 to 2007 I€worked at Complutense University, Madrid, as a
Ramón y Cajal research fellow on a project on Stochastic Causal Models in
the Special Sciences, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Educa-
tion. Mauricio Suárez had been kind enough to sponsor my application, and
I€profited greatly from exchanges with him as well as his students during my
time in Madrid.
I left the job in Spain to take up a lectureship at the Erasmus Institute
of Philosophy and Economics in Rotterdam in 2007, but I€never stopped
collaborating—on causation, inference, and related topics—with the friends
I’d made there. I€want to mention in particular the following grants which
supported research for this€book:

• (2013–15) Explanation and Representation in the Sciences: Monist

and Pluralist Approaches, research grant of the Spanish Ministry
of Science and Innovation (PI: José Diez, University of Barcelona,
FFI2012–37354/Consolider Ingenio CSD2009–0056);
• (2012–14) Inferentialism as Social Epistemology, research grant of the
Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PI: Jesús Zamora Bonilla,
UNED, Madrid: FFI2011-23267);€and
• (2009–12) Representation and Explanation in the Sciences: Functional
and Inherentist Accounts, research grant of the Spanish Ministry
xâ•… Foreword
of Science and Innovation (PI: José Diez, University of Barcelona,
FFI2008–01580/Consolider Ingenio CSD2009–0056).

In 2011, I€was awarded a grant from the City of Paris to work on this book.
I€spent about six months in 2011–12 at the Institut d’Histoire et de Philoso-
phie des Sciences et des Techniques (IHPST Paris) at Paris I€Sorbonne and
would like to thank its members for their almost unbounded hospitality and
the intellectual stimulation I€received in these months. Special thanks go to
Jean Gayon who sponsored my application.
Finally, I€wish to express my most since gratitude to my editors at Rout-
ledge, Margo Irvin and Katie Laurentiev, for the unrivaled patience with
which they accompanied the production of this book over the years.
Some material that appears in this book has been published previously:

• Chapter€2 in Theoria 29(2): 283–306 (2014);

• Chapter€4, Sections€2–6 in Philosophy of Science 76(5): 712–23 (2009);
• Chapter€5 in Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Social Science
(ed. by Harold Kincaid), Oxford: Oxford University Press, 154–83
(2012);
• Chapter€6 in Philosophy Compass 8(11): 1066–90 (2013);
• Chapter€8 in Causality and Probability in the Sciences (ed. by Federica
Russo and Jon Williamson), London: College Publications, 179–96
(2007);
• Chapter€9 in Philosophy of the Social Sciences 39(1): 20–40 (2009);
• Chapter€10 in Causality in the Sciences, (ed. by Phyllis McKay Illari,
Federica Russo, and Jon Williamson), Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 907–27 (2011);
• Chapter€11 in Studies in the History and Philosophy of Biological and
Biomedical Sciences 43(4): 769–77 (2012).
1 Causation in a Complex
World

WHY CAUSATION?1

Knowledge of causal relations is of extraordinary importance for us human

beings. If we didn’t know facts such as that bread nourishes and driving
tired kills, that exercise is good for you and smoking bad, that adding salt to
bread dough makes it taste better and retards fermentation, whether explic-
itly or subconsciously, it would be much harder to live a good life (hard
enough as it is). Knowledge of causal relations is important for the expla-
nation of past events (‘The ice on the road made the driver lose control of
his car and killed him in the ensuing accident’), for the prediction of future
events (‘If I€drink another cup of coffee, I’ll feel restless’), for interventions
to bring about or change outcomes (‘She turned up the oven temperature to
240°C/465°F to crisp the duck’s skin’), and for the attribution of blame (‘It
was the car rental agency’s fault to fail to make sure the brakes work prop-
erly [which contributed to the accident]’), among other things.
Many causal relations, probably all those mentioned so far, have been
established by trial and error, by critical observation and adaptive responses.
Scientists too are in the business of establishing causal relations—not exclu-
sively, but to a significant degree. In a complex world we cannot always rely
on unaided critical observation and trial and error. This is in part because
effect sizes may be not be large enough to directly experience the causal
relation. Smoking does kill, but the chances of dying from smoking-induced
lung cancer are in fact quite small. The opposite reason may hold too:
an event may be too large or too scattered to be amenable to critical
observation—think of the causes of the recent Financial Crisis, of the First
World War, or of anti-Semitism. A€third reason is that science is often itself
responsible for the development of new substances, treatments, and devices,
and it should make sure that these are ‘safe and effective’ (which are both
causal notions). Before a pharmaceutical company can apply to gain market
access for a new medicine, for instance, its research and development unit
should have shown that the medicine is more effective in curing or treating
a disease than an existing competitor, safer in that it produces fewer side
effects, or both. A€fourth reason is that critical observation, as reliable as it
may be for day-to-day applications, often errs, and scientific methods can
2â•… Causation, Evidence, and Inference
help to make errors visible and eliminate them. (For a medical example, just
think of the history of bloodletting.)
Owing to its enormous importance to human well-being, causality has
been a popular or even favorite topic among philosophers since the begin-
ning of Western philosophy. According to Thales of Miletus (whose predic-
tion of the solar eclipse on 28 May€585 BCE is often taken to constitute
the beginning of Western philosophy), the ultimate cause of everything
was water. What was important in this discovery or hypothesis was that
Thales denied gods the status of instigators and controllers of phenomena
and instead envisaged phenomena as natural events with natural causes and
therefore possible of rational explanation.
A couple of centuries down the line Aristotle developed the first theory of cau-
sality worth its name. According to him, there were four types or aspects of causes:

1. The formal cause;

2. The material cause;
3. The efficient cause;
4. The final cause.

Using the metaphor of a sculptor who transforms a block of marble into a

sculpture, Aristotle argued that the question ‘Why is the sculpture as it is?’
could be addressed in four ways. We can ask, first, about the design, the
blueprint, or idea the sculptor followed when shaping the marble. We can
ask, second, about the matter from which it is made. We can ask, third, who
made it. And finally, we can ask why it was made. Aristotle was therefore a
pluralist about causality. He did not think that a question such as ‘What was
its cause?’ has a single answer but rather that several answers are possible
and which answer was adequate depends on the context within which the
question was asked. Moreover, to Aristotle, explanation and causation were
essentially the same. To ask ‘Why?’ solicits an explanation. Alternatively,
the question solicits a statement of the cause. I€will come back to pluralism,
context, and explanation below.
The watershed year for the philosophy of causation was 1738, the year
David Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature was published. Hume’s empiri-
cism led him to maintain that only observable states of affairs could be
knowable. So when we ask what we can know about causes, we have to
look to causal relations as they happen (Hume, [1739] 1960: Abstract):

Here is a billiard ball lying on the table, and another ball moving
towards it with rapidity. They strike; and the ball which was formerly
at rest now acquires a motion.

These are the facts. And what can we say about causal relations?

It is evident that the two balls touched one another before the motion
was communicated, and that there was no interval betwixt the shock
 Causation in a Complex Worldâ•… 3
and the motion. Contiguity in time and place is therefore a requisite
circumstance to the operation of all causes. It is evident, likewise, that
the motion which was the cause is prior to the motion which was the
effect. Priority in time is therefore another requisite circumstance in
every cause. But this is not all. Let us try any other balls of the same
kind in a like situation, and we shall always find that the impulse of the
one produces motion in the other. Here, therefore, is a third circum-
stance, viz. that of a constant conjunction betwixt the cause and effect.
Every object like the cause produces always some object like the effect.
Beyond these three circumstances of contiguity, priority, and constant
conjunction, I€ can discover nothing in this cause. The first ball is in
motion; touches the second; immediately the second is in motion: and
when I€try the experiment with the same or like balls, in the same or like
circumstances, I€find that upon the motion and touch of the one ball,
motion always follows in the other. In whatever shape I€turn this matter,
and however I€examine it, I€can find nothing farther.

Hume’s constant conjunction or regularity account of causation is the

starting point for all modern debates on the topic. All contemporary theo-
ries of causation are either more or less direct developments of Hume’s or
they have been created as explicit anti-Humean ‘realist’ theories. Among
the former I€would include more recent regularity accounts such as John
Mackie’s INUS theory (1980) or Michael Strevens’ still more recent ver-
sion (2007), Patrick Suppes’ probabilistic account (1970), Wesley Salmon’s
(1984, 1998) and Phil Dowe’s (2000) process theories, David Lewis’ coun-
terfactual account (1973a, 2000), and James Woodward’s interventionist
theory (2003). Among the latter are certain mechanistic theories such as
James Bogen’s (2008), Elizabeth Anscombe’s account ([1971] 1992) and
various causal power theories such as Nancy Cartwright’s (1999) and Ste-
phen Mumford and Rani Lill Anjum’s (2011).
Scientists who look to philosophy for guidance with their causal inquiries
are now spoilt for choice. In the first half of the 20th century, the regular-
ity theory dominated the discussion. There was widespread agreement that
causality was some form of constant conjunction. Today, there is no agree-
ment whatsoever. There are at least five families of neo-Humean theories
and numerous anti-Humean alternatives. How should we respond to this
multitude of theories and lack of consensus? Should we try to improve on
the theory that we like best until it is free from problems and counterex-
amples? Or shall we become ‘pluralists’ as some notable philosophers of
causation have proposed?
In what follows I€aim to show that the notion of cause is a complex one
and not easily captured by a single idea; nevertheless, each of the major phil-
osophical theories of causation embodies an important insight that a future,
more satisfactory account ought to preserve. To make my point I€will go
through all major theories and describe first what they say in some detail,
then what I€believe it gets right, and where it goes wrong.
4â•… Causation, Evidence, and Inference
CAUSAL COMPLEXITY

Regularity Accounts
I will begin with regularity accounts. While dominant in the first half of
the 20th century, these have largely fallen out of fashion and are currently
defended by only a few philosophers. In the sciences they are still used in
some places, as we will see in Chapter€9.
Hume himself was a little vague concerning the relata of a causal relation:
in some places he refers to objects, in others to events. In his paradigm exam-
ple cited above one billiard ball pushes another one, and so it makes some
sense to regard objects as causally related. Clearly, however, it is not the first
billiard as such that sets the second one in motion but rather the first ball’s
touching the second ball with a certain momentum. Events (or more pre-
cisely, event-types: kinds of event that can be instantiated in many places and
times) are more plausible as a candidate for the relata of causation. And yet,
as John Stuart Mill observed, many event-types are not regularly followed
by their effects unless certain conditions are in place (Mill [1843] 1874).
A€match doesn’t light when struck (the event) unless oxygen is present (a
background condition); an egg doesn’t coagulate nicely when thrown in a
pot of hot water (the event) unless the water contains an acid such as vinegar
(a background condition); a reduction in class size (the event) will not lead
to an improvement in student performance unless there are enough qualified
teachers to teach the larger number of classes (a background condition).
Moreover, the background conditions may include absences. A€match
has to be dry (water should be absent); the presence of salt will prevent
the egg from coagulating; classes can be of any size and performance won’t
improve unless the environment is quiet and peaceful enough for learning
to take place.
Lastly, for each effect(-type) there are alternative sets of conditions that
can act as causes. Striking is just one way to light a match. Alternatively, one
can heat it up directly in a fire or in the oven or induce the reaction chemi-
cally. There are many ways to poach an egg. Investing in the right infrastruc-
ture can be as effective as smaller classes in improving performance.
John Mackie has put these ideas together and argued that causes are
INUS,€or:

Insufficient parts€of
Non-redundant sets€of
Unnecessary€but
Sufficient

conditions (Mackie 1980). The striking of the match is in itself insufficient. It

should, for it to be a genuine cause, make a difference to the effect, that is, the
set should be non-redundant. The striker’s wearing of black bow ties when
striking the match may well be part of the set of conditions that is followed
by the lighting of the match but it’s not among its causes. It is a redundant
 Causation in a Complex Worldâ•… 5
member of the set. Together, the striking, the presence of oxygen, the absence
of disturbing factors such as water is in a sense unnecessary because there are
alternative ways to bring about the effect. On the other hand, the entire set is
always followed by the effect and therefore sufficient for€it.
Mackie introduced another modification. Causal judgments are normally
made in a specific context that takes some factors as stable background con-
ditions and others as variable (or perhaps, as deviations from a background
of normal conditions). Mackie calls the set of background conditions the
causal field. He explains (Mackie 1980, 35; emphasis original):

Consequently if we take the field as being this block of flats as normally

used and lived in, we must take Jones’s striking a match to light his
cigarette as part of the field, and therefore not as the cause of, or even a
cause of, or as causing, the explosion. What caused the explosion must
be a difference in relation to the field, and the gas leak, or the presence
of the gas that had leaked out, is the obvious candidate.

It is evident that whether a factor is a candidate cause or belongs to the

causal field is at least in part a pragmatic affair. The striking of the match
may well be a cause of an explosion if it occurs at a petrol station where
people are not supposed to handle open fire. Or think of the cooking or
baking case where anything could make a difference. Certainly the presence
of oxygen, normally a background condition that is relegated to the causal
field, can cause failure when cooking a dish sous vide.
Causal laws, then, have this form (ibid.:€63):

In F, all (ABC or DGH or JKL) are followed by P, and, in F, all P are

preceded by (ABC or DGH or JKL),

where F signifies the causal field, P the effect or outcome, and a double
strikethrough X the absence of a factor.
What Mill and Mackie got right. All four modifications of Hume’s con-
stant conjunction theory by Mill and Mackie are lasting contributions to
the philosophy of causality. First, that a cause brings about its effect all on
its own is the exception rather than the rule and rare at that. In Newtonian
physics, a massive particle will attract another qua having mass. Nothing
else is needed. In the biomedical and social sciences all causes need helping
factors. According to a number of commentators, the Fed’s loose monetary
policy in the early 2000s was a major cause, if not ‘the’ cause, of the recent
Financial Crisis. However (Posner 2011:€281),

The financial crisis would have been averted, or at least would have
[been, JR] much less grave, despite the very low interest rates, had it
not been for the second cause—inadequate banking regulation: a com-
pound of deregulation, lax regulation, regulatory inattention, and regu-
latory ineptitude€.€.€.
6â•… Causation, Evidence, and Inference
Bad regulation was thus a helping factor without which loose monetary
conditions would not have led to the crisis. Second, causes can obtain with-
out their effects obtaining because of the intervention of disturbing factors.
Loose monetary conditions would never have led to a boom in the housing
market if there had been price controls, say. The set of helping factors there-
fore always contains the absence of disturbances.
Third, few effects have specific causes to themselves—factors that must
be present for the effect to be present. There are more ways of killing a dog
than by hanging, as they say. On this point, there are some dissenting voices.
For an influential view in biomedical science consider the germ theory of
disease, according to which causes of disease are necessary universal condi-
tions and which was extraordinarily successful in the 19th century (Carter
2003). Few if any diseases are now believed to fall under this model, how-
ever. In the social sciences, too, the view that for a factor to be a cause of
an outcome it must be a necessary condition has some leverage (e.g., Goertz
and Starr 2002). Nevertheless, these cases constitute at best an exception to
the rule that outcomes can, for the most part, be produced in many€ways.
Fourth, the distinction between causes and background conditions
remains important. Consider Posner’s account of the causes of the Crisis
again (Posner 2011:€285):

We don’t call oxygen a cause of arson because we don’t think that

removing the oxygen from the atmosphere would be a sensible way
of reducing the amount of arson. Similarly, we don’t think that aban-
doning money and banking and restoring a prehistoric barter economy
would be a sensible response to the risk of another financial crisis, pain-
ful as this one has been. Risky banking, [sic] was, in other words, a
necessary condition of the crisis. But it was neither a sufficient condition
nor a cause we want to change .€.€.

Chapter€6 will talk about the ‘cause vs condition’ distinction in a lot more
detail.
What Mill and Mackie got wrong. Simply put, not all causes are INUS
conditions, nor are all INUS conditions causes. Genuinely indeterministic
causes are not INUS conditions. If, say, we keep a radium-228 atom in a
sealed container and, after some time, detect a beta particle, then the pres-
ence of the radium atom was certainly a cause of the decay. Whether or not
an atom decays is, however, a purely stochastic process and so there are no
conditions that are jointly sufficient for the effect. It is controversial whether
or not macroscopic events such as those biomedical and social scientists are
interested in explaining can be the result of indeterministic causal relations.
What is clear is that scientists are frequently not in the position to predict
an outcome for sure, even if they could be in the possession of all available
background knowledge. There is no way, for instance, to predict whether
or not a smoker will develop lung cancer, given complete knowledge of
his behavior, family history, anamnesis, and any other factors that are
 Causation in a Complex Worldâ•… 7
considered relevant. Now, whereas it is certainly possible that there exists a
set of factors that is sufficient for the development of the disease, it would
be unwise to exclude smoking as cause just because no such complete set
has been found. From a scientific or methodological point of view it is there-
fore inconsequential whether every outcome has a complete set of INUS
conditions sufficient for it. What matters is that many factors are accepted
as bona fide causes even though there is no knowledge of the complete€set.
Moreover, the INUS theory does not distinguish between genuine causes
and ‘epiphenomena’, factors that are the result of a common cause but
obtain before the effect in question. Are smaller classes responsible for
improved student performance? Maybe. What is clear is that parents’ edu-
cation (or socio-economic status) causes both class size (in that kids from
households with higher status or a higher level of education tend to end up
in schools that have smaller classes) and student performance. Call S the
parents’ education or socio-economic status, C class size, P student perfor-
mance, X whatever else S needs to bring about P (the student’s effort, say), Y
any other possible cause of P, Z whatever else S needs to bring about C (the
parents’ being informed about the potential importance of class size, say),
and W any other possible cause of C. Now, CY will always be preceded by
S, and SX will be followed by P. Therefore SCY will always be followed by
P. Class size is thus an INUS condition for student performance, whether or
not it is a genuine cause (Mackie 1980:€84).

Probabilistic Accounts
Probabilistic accounts aim to solve both of the problems of regularity
accounts just mentioned. They assume not that (sets of) causes are sufficient
for their effects but rather that they make them more likely. Suppes (1970)
is one of the first major systematic developments of this idea. Suppes makes
the assumption that every cause is what he calls a prima facie cause. It is
defined as follows:

Xt is a prima facie cause of Yt+1 if and only if Prob(Yt+1 | Xt) > Prob(Yt+1),
where Xt and Yt+1 are time ordered variables (and Xt obtains before Yt+1).

Essentially, a necessary condition for an earlier variable to cause a later one

is that the two are correlated. (Correlation and probabilistic dependence are
related but not the same; for details, see Chapter€8.)
Another problem of the regularity theory was that it could not distin-
guish between direct causal relations (where, say, X causes Y) and causal
forks (where a third variable causes both X and Y). If the probabilistic
theory stopped here, it would suffer from the same problem. Suppes solved
the problem by using an idea Hans Reichenbach had developed: that com-
mon causes ‘screen off’ their effects (Reichenbach 1956). A€variable Z
is said to screen off X from Y if and only if Prob(Y | X) > Prob(Y) but
Prob(Y | X, Z)€=€Prob(Y | Z).2
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