Predictive Advantage, Regime Dependence, and Direction-Specific Causal Control in Kinetic Ising Dynamics

We study how the choice of description affects predictive and causal information about future evolution in the two-dimensional kinetic Ising model. We report four empirical results together with a predictor–handle dissociation result. Fine descriptions based on locally exposed and junction-type defects outperform a block-variance coarse rival for predicting future domain-wall change in the ordered phase; the best organism is E≥3 + J, with predictive advantage ΔR² = +0.415 (95% CI +0.389, +0.443). (Axis 2, regime crossover) This advantage reverses sign in the disordered phase (+0.183 ordered, −0.064 disordered), showing that the fine-over-coarse advantage is regime-dependent. (Axis 3, target specificity) Under a fine-over-coarse ΔR² criterion, future domain-wall change ΔW is the target most specifically favoured by the fine description (ΔR² = +0.415); this is not merely the most predictable target in absolute terms. (Axis 4, causal control) Biasing the Glauber generator toward wall-reducing flips at exposed sites reduces future wall loss, while biasing against the same flips increases it; this direction-specific sign flip holds across all tested perturbation strengths (4/4). (Dissociation) The best predictor of ΔW—the coarse macro-state W₀, Bmag (R² = 0.378)—differs from the causal handle family (exposed-site structure, R² = 0.181), with gap +0.197. The best predictor and the best causal handle are empirically distinct within the same system at the same temperature.