Causal attribution by the chain rule: unifying natural selection, learning, economics, and other disciplines
链式法则下的因果归因:统一自然选择、学习、经济学及其他学科
Analysis often splits change into components. For example, how much of the observed variance is caused by genes or environment? In many cases, the split is ultimately made by the logic of the chain rule, which divides the difference of a product into two terms. Each term quantifies the partial difference associated with change in one component while holding the other component constant. The chain rule is of course widely known. However, this article argues that its deep…