Teacher: Alexander Gebharter

Content: This course provides a crash course in basics of
probability theory followed by an overview of
accounts of causation related to probabilities. The
general idea is that causal structure explains
various kinds of probabilistic dependence and that
while knowledge of correlation is a useful tool for
prediction, only causal information provides a
reliable guide to control one’s environment.

Topics discussed include:

• Regularity and probability
• The interpretation of probability
• Reductive and non-reductive accounts of causation
• Probability-raising and difference making accounts of causation
• General causation and actual causation
• Screening off and the common cause principle
• Causation and Simpson’s paradox
• Causation and context relativity