Today's post, Belief in the Implied Invisible was originally published on 08 April 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

 

That it's impossible even in principle to observe something sometimes isn't enough to conclude that it doesn't exist.


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I sometimes like to think that Bayesian causal networks should be drawn directly onto spacetime diagrams, with their edges timelike curves. This automatically enforces some causal structure. But if you care about things whose future lightcone doesn't meet yours then this becomes impossible, your utility function is (in once sense of the word) causally effected by something that can't (in the other sense of the word) causally effect it.