An algorithm for deciding if a set of observed independencies has a causal explanation

  • Authors:
  • Thomas Verma;Judea Pearl

  • Affiliations:
  • Northrop Corporation, Palos Verdes, CA;Cognitive Systems Laboratory, Computer Science Department, University of California, Los Angeles, CA

  • Venue:
  • UAI'92 Proceedings of the Eighth international conference on Uncertainty in artificial intelligence
  • Year:
  • 1992

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Abstract

In a previous paper [Pearl and Verma, 1991] we presented an algorithm for extracting causal influences from independence information, where a causal influence was defined as the existence of a directed arc in all minimal causal models consistent with the data. In this paper we address the question of deciding whether there exists a causal model that explains ALL the observed dependencies and independencies. Formally, given a list M of conditional independence statements, it is required to decide whether there exists a directed acyclic graph (dug) D that is perfectly consistent with M, namely, every statement in M, and no other, is reflected via d-separation in D. We present and analyze an effective algorithm that tests for the existence of such a dag, and produces one, if it exists.