Julian Dörfler

Julian Dörfler, Benito van der Zander, Markus Bläser et al.

Learning the unknown causal parameters of a linear structural causal model is a fundamental task in causal analysis. The task, known as the problem of identification, asks to estimate the parameters of the model from a combination of assumptions on the graphical structure of the model and observational data, represented as a non-causal covariance matrix. In this paper, we give a new sound and complete algorithm for generic identification which runs in polynomial space. By standard simulation results, this algorithm has exponential running time which vastly improves the state-of-the-art double exponential time method using a Gröbner basis approach. The paper also presents evidence that parameter identification is computationally hard in general. In particular, we prove, that the task asking whether, for a given feasible correlation matrix, there are exactly one or two or more parameter sets explaining the observed matrix, is hard for $\forall R$, the co-class of the existential theory of the reals. In particular, this problem is $coNP$-hard. To our best knowledge, this is the first hardness result for some notion of identifiability.

Julian Dörfler, Benito van der Zander, Markus Bläser et al.

The framework of Pearl's Causal Hierarchy (PCH) formalizes three types of reasoning: probabilistic (i.e. purely observational), interventional, and counterfactual, that reflect the progressive sophistication of human thought regarding causation. We investigate the computational complexity aspects of reasoning in this framework focusing mainly on satisfiability problems expressed in probabilistic and causal languages across the PCH. That is, given a system of formulas in the standard probabilistic and causal languages, does there exist a model satisfying the formulas? Our main contribution is to prove the exact computational complexities showing that languages allowing addition and marginalization (via the summation operator) yield NP^PP, PSPACE-, and NEXP-complete satisfiability problems, depending on the level of the PCH. These are the first results to demonstrate a strictly increasing complexity across the PCH: from probabilistic to causal and counterfactual reasoning. On the other hand, in the case of full languages, i.e. allowing addition, marginalization, and multiplication, we show that the satisfiability for the counterfactual level remains the same as for the probabilistic and causal levels, solving an open problem in the field.

Markus Bläser, Julian Dörfler, Maciej Liśkiewicz et al.

We study the complexity of satisfiability problems in probabilistic and causal reasoning. Given random variables $X_1, X_2,\ldots$ over finite domains, the basic terms are probabilities of propositional formulas over atomic events $X_i = x_i$, such as $P(X_1 = x_1)$ or $P(X_1 = x_1 \vee X_2 = x_2)$. The basic terms can be combined using addition (yielding linear terms) or multiplication (polynomial terms). The probabilistic satisfiability problem asks whether a joint probability distribution satisfies a Boolean combination of (in)equalities over such terms. Fagin et al. (1990) showed that for basic and linear terms, this problem is NP-complete, making it no harder than Boolean satisfiability, while Mossé et al. (2022) proved that for polynomial terms, it is complete for the existential theory of the reals. Pearl's Causal Hierarchy (PCH) extends the probabilistic setting with interventional and counterfactual reasoning, enriching the expressiveness of languages. However, Mossé et al. (2022) found that satisfiability complexity remains unchanged. Van der Zander et al. (2023) showed that introducing a marginalization operator to languages induces a significant increase in complexity. We extend this line of work by adding two new dimensions to the problem by constraining the models. First, we fix the graph structure of the underlying structural causal model, motivated by settings like Pearl's do-calculus, and give a nearly complete landscape across different arithmetics and PCH levels. Second, we study small models. While earlier work showed that satisfiable instances admit polynomial-size models, this is no longer guaranteed with compact marginalization. We characterize the complexities of satisfiability under small-model constraints across different settings.