S5E2: Setting the table for Season 5

Welcome back to SERious Epidemiology! This is the first official episode of the fifth season of SERious Epidemiology. This season we’ll be discussing the textbook Causal Inference: What If . Chapter 1 discusses foundational concepts of causal inference, including identifiability assumptions, counterfactuals, individual vs. population-level causal effects, and null effects. We talk about the example of Greek gods and goddesses and the notation (e.g., Y for the outcome) used throughout the textbook. In this episode, we hope to highlight the concept that causal effects involve a comparison. Matt also offers a hot take comparing the identifiability assumptions to the Marvel cinematic universe: exchangeability is Captain America, consistency is the Hulk, positivity Ironman, the no interference assumption is Groot. Do you agree?

You can listen to S5E2: Setting the table for Season 5 online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

S5E2: Setting the table for Season 5 is an episode from SERious EPI by Sue Bevan - Society for Epidemiologic Research.

This episode is 51:17 long.

This episode was published on Feb 15, 2026.

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