I was indeed thinking about 3., even if 1. and 2. are also important. And I get that the main value of these diagrams is to force an explicit and as formal as possible statement to be made.
I guess my question was more about, given two different causal diagrams for the same risk (made by different researchers for example), have you an idea of how to compare them? Like finding the first difference along the causal path, or others means of comparison. This seems important because even with clean descriptions of our views, we can still talk past each other if we cannot see where the difference truly lies.
Hmm, I’m not sure I fully understand what you mean. But hopefully the following somewhat addresses it:
One possibility is that two different researchers might have different ideas of what the relevant causal pathways actually are. For a simple example, one researcher might not think of the possibility that a risk could progress right from the initial harms to the existential catastrophe, without a period of civilizational collapse first, or might think of that but dismiss it as not even worth considering because it seems so unlikely. A different researcher might think that that path is indeed worth considering.
If either of the researchers tried to make an explicit causal diagram of how they think the risk could lead to existential catastrophe, the other one would probably notice that their own thoughts on the matter differ. This would likely help them see where the differences in their views lie, and the researcher who’d neglected that path might immediately say “Oh, good point, hadn’t thought of that!”, or they might discuss why that seems worth considering to one of the researchers but not to the other.
(I would guess that in practice this would typically occur for less obvious paths than that, such as specific paths that can lead to or prevent the development/spread of certain types of information.)
Another possibility is that two different researchers have essentially the same idea of what the relevant causal pathways are, but very different ideas of the probabilities of progression from certain steps to other steps. In that case, merely drawing these diagrams, in the way they’re shown in this post, wouldn’t be sufficient for them to spot why their views differ.
But having the diagrams in front of them could help them talk through how likely they think each particular path or step is. Or they could each assign an actual probability to each path or step. Either way, they should then be able to see why and where their views differ.
In all of these cases, ideally, the researchers would go beyond just noticing where their views differ and instead discuss why each of them believes what they believe about the point on which they differ.
Does that answer your question?
If by “how to compare them” you mean “how to tell which one is better”, then that’s something that this tool alone can’t do. But by facilitating clear, explicit thought and discussion, this tool could potentially help well-informed people form views about which diagrams/models are more valid or useful.
Thanks for that very in-depth answer!
I was indeed thinking about 3., even if 1. and 2. are also important. And I get that the main value of these diagrams is to force an explicit and as formal as possible statement to be made.
I guess my question was more about, given two different causal diagrams for the same risk (made by different researchers for example), have you an idea of how to compare them? Like finding the first difference along the causal path, or others means of comparison. This seems important because even with clean descriptions of our views, we can still talk past each other if we cannot see where the difference truly lies.
Hmm, I’m not sure I fully understand what you mean. But hopefully the following somewhat addresses it:
One possibility is that two different researchers might have different ideas of what the relevant causal pathways actually are. For a simple example, one researcher might not think of the possibility that a risk could progress right from the initial harms to the existential catastrophe, without a period of civilizational collapse first, or might think of that but dismiss it as not even worth considering because it seems so unlikely. A different researcher might think that that path is indeed worth considering.
If either of the researchers tried to make an explicit causal diagram of how they think the risk could lead to existential catastrophe, the other one would probably notice that their own thoughts on the matter differ. This would likely help them see where the differences in their views lie, and the researcher who’d neglected that path might immediately say “Oh, good point, hadn’t thought of that!”, or they might discuss why that seems worth considering to one of the researchers but not to the other.
(I would guess that in practice this would typically occur for less obvious paths than that, such as specific paths that can lead to or prevent the development/spread of certain types of information.)
Another possibility is that two different researchers have essentially the same idea of what the relevant causal pathways are, but very different ideas of the probabilities of progression from certain steps to other steps. In that case, merely drawing these diagrams, in the way they’re shown in this post, wouldn’t be sufficient for them to spot why their views differ.
But having the diagrams in front of them could help them talk through how likely they think each particular path or step is. Or they could each assign an actual probability to each path or step. Either way, they should then be able to see why and where their views differ.
In all of these cases, ideally, the researchers would go beyond just noticing where their views differ and instead discuss why each of them believes what they believe about the point on which they differ.
Does that answer your question?
If by “how to compare them” you mean “how to tell which one is better”, then that’s something that this tool alone can’t do. But by facilitating clear, explicit thought and discussion, this tool could potentially help well-informed people form views about which diagrams/models are more valid or useful.
That answers my question, yes. :)