Re:When correlation is better than causation
by jasonwatkinspdx on Saturday August 28, 2021 @04:53AM
(#28336612)
I agree with this. Causality doesn't have much in the way of advanced math or statistics, but there is a fairly large volume of material to go through, which is its own challenge.
A lightweight introduction to Pearl's ideas is the epilog of his book, which is also his Turing award lecture. Here's a pdf scan, there's also video of him giving this lecture up on the internet if you prefer: http://bayes.cs.ucla.edu/BOOK-2K/causality2-epilogue.pdf
I read Causality which I understand is the more technical of their books, and everything was presented surprisingly intuitively. Sure, I had to go over some things twice, but that's to be expected when you learn something new.
If you're worried, start with one of the more pop-aimed books? You'll be fine.
(Pearl did change the way I look at causality and correlation, fundamentally for the better, so I do strongly recommend getting familiar with it. I also liked Willful Ignorance which is sort of one the same theme but also not and takes a wider approach.