Is induced drag not caused by tip vortices?
Oh, but they are all* correct!

First, we have to say that we are not talking about cause here. There is a flow around the wing and it has certain properties and neither is cause of the other; they are both effects of the flow. What we are talking about here is explanations why every flow that produces lift also produces induced drag.

And as far as explanations go, there can be more than one, because the physical theories have a lot of redundancy in them. You can usually arrive at the result by multiple ways.

You can use the orientations of the normals (the Peter's answer), you can use laws of conservation of energy and momentum (my answer) or you can use the potential flow theory and that explanation will indeed involve the wake vortices. Because the potential flow theory is a mathematical apparatus for analysing fluid flow as a combination of vortices and from that angle of view, the energy is indeed carried away by the wake vortices.

However, the wake vortex explanation has one problem: it is often associated with different misconception, the one that the vortices are caused by transverse flow around the tip and the resulting idea that it can be eliminated by doing something with the tips specifically.

But that's not what the potential flow theory says. According to the potential flow theory, there is a vortex originating from every point along the span and they combine to form the two tip vortices. So like the other explanations, it also clearly says the induced drag is related to any generation of lift. And if you understand that, it is correct. I still consider it unnecessarily more complicated.



* All the three you listed that is. The ones that claim the wingtip vortex is caused by transverse flow around the tip are not, because it isn't. The wingtip vortex is just the vortex line of the overall wake (and should preferably be called wake vortex).