i like where QC went here but i want to take this in a different direction -- causality is fucked because we're bad at being clear about the "types" of causal leaps we make (and the implicit metaphorical models underlying them) https://twitter.com/QiaochuYuan/status/1359590473547976704

biggest fuck-up point i see for addressing "why?" is confusing "top-down" (archimedean, universal) with "bottom-up" (phenomenological, individual) causality

one goes up to find the universal cause (e.g. in "evolution" or "God"), the other goes down to find the personal cause

(of course all "personal causes" will ultimately fall into a universal cause, and vice versa, if you pursue deeply enough to the metaphysical level, but it's important to be aware of which direction you're going)

the other huge "why?" issue i see a lot is confusing synchronic (static, spatial, systematic) and diachronic (dynamic, temporal, historical) explanations

this distinction of synchronic vs diachronic shows up in QC's original thread. a static analysis is applied in terms of "social systems", resulting in a claim about "the world". any further explanation then needs to pivot into a dynamic/historical model https://twitter.com/QiaochuYuan/status/1359590477675171841

lots of explanations fail at this essential "pivot" point, where they shift from a static analysis of a situation, usually premised on empirical evidence within a model taken as given, to a dynamic one that tries to explain "where it comes from"

a key point here is that diachronic or historical explanations tend to be a lot *harder* to pull off than synchronic ones, because they're far more difficult to test empirically. the interpretive process has more leeway. this is why Certain Types of Science are worse than others.

Certain Other Types of Science are also bad because Science is, by necessity, a universal or top-down study.

the closer your object of investigation is to "experience", the harder it is to draw universal conclusions based on acting as a perfect observer. you become implicated.

fun games as final takeaway:
- (easier) try explaining a (social) phenomenon without relying on diachronic/historical explanations
- (harder) try explaining a (mental) phenomenon without relying on any "universal" knowledge that you learned through Psych class or something