Aggregating causal judgments

Decision making typically requires judgments about causal relations: we need to know both the causal e§ects of our actions and the causal relevance of various environmental factors. Judgments about the nature and strength of causal relations often di§er, even among experts. How to handle such diversity is the topic of this paper. First, we consider the possibility of aggregating causal judgments via the aggregation of probabilistic ones. The broadly negative outcome of this investigation leads us to look at aggregating causal judgments independently of probabilistic ones. We do so by transcribing causal claims into the formal judgment-aggregation framework and applying some recent results in this field. Finally, we look at the implications for probability aggregation when it is constrained by prior aggregation of qualitative causal judgments.