arXiv Machine Learning

The observational partial order of causal structures with latent variables

The paper studies observational dominance among causal structures with latent variables, defining one structure as dominating another if it can realize all distributions that the other can over the same visible variables. It provides a full characterization of this dominance partial order for three visible variables and a partial one for four, and shows that many equivalence classes are distinguished by nontrivial inequality constraints similar to Bell or instrumental inequalities. The authors also demonstrate that constraint‑based causal discovery algorithms relying only on conditional independence are much less powerful than those incorporating nested Markov and inequality constraints.

arXiv AI
Aug 26

Partial Identification under Causal Orders by Linear Programming

The paper presents a method for partially identifying counterfactual queries without requiring a fully specified causal graph. By exploiting the topological ordering implied by the query itself, the authors transform the identification problem into a linear programming task, enabling bounds on arbitrary counterfactual and nested counterfactual queries. They demonstrate the tightness of these bounds and illustrate the approach on several case studies, showing its usefulness even when causal knowledge is incomplete.

By Eric Rossetto, Alessandro Antonucci
arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 19

Unsupervised Causal Abstractions Discovery

arXiv:2606. 19594v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Causal abstractions formalize when a high-level structural causal model (SCM) captures the interventional behavior of a lower-level SCM.

By Th\'eo Saulus, Simon Lacoste-Julien, Dhanya Sridhar
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 3

Nonparametric Partial Disentanglement via Mechanism Sparsity: Sparse Actions, Interventions and Sparse Temporal Dependencies

arXiv:2401. 04890v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: This work introduces a novel principle for disentanglement we call mechanism sparsity regularization, which applies when the latent factors of interest depend sparsely on observed auxiliary variables and/or past latent factors.

By S\'ebastien Lachapelle, Pau Rodr\'iguez L\'opez, Yash Sharma, Katie Everett, R\'emi Le Priol, Alexandre Lacoste, Simon Lacoste-Julien
arXiv AI
Sep 10

Optimal Experiments for Partial Causal Effect Identification

The paper tackles selecting a cost‑constrained set of experiments that most effectively tighten bounds on a partially identifiable causal query. It formalizes this as the NP‑hard max‑potency problem, introduces efficient graphical pruning rules to reduce the search space, and demonstrates the approach on synthetic graphs and real NHANES data to estimate the effect of physical activity on diabetes.

By Tobias Maringgele, Jalal Etesami
Hugging Face Trending Papers
Sep 3

Federated Causal Discovery via Regression-Directed Cumulants

The paper investigates federated learning for linear non‑Gaussian acyclic models (LiNGAM), proposing the FedRCD family of algorithms that use higher‑order cumulants to enable privacy‑preserving causal discovery across distributed clients. It addresses limitations of existing federated methods, such as FedISHC’s failure under near‑symmetric noise, and introduces variants that balance communication rounds with algebraic noise handling. Experiments reveal that cumulant‑based federated approaches rank variables by a variance ladder induced by the DAG rather than by population asymmetry, and that marginal standardisation degrades performance while scale‑invariant DirectLiNGAM remains robust.

arXiv AI
Jul 14

CDFM: Towards a General-Purpose Causal Discovery Foundation Model

arXiv:2607. 11508v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Causal discovery, the process of recovering underlying causal structures from observational data, is a fundamental pursuit across scientific disciplines.

By Jie Qiao, Ruichu Cai, Zijian Li, Weilin Chen, Pengfei Hua, Boyan Xu, Zhengming Chen, Zhifeng Hao, Peng Cui