The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect

by Judea Pearl

And when you prohibit speech, you prohibit thought and stifle principles, methods, and tools.

If I could sum up the message of this book in one pithy phrase, it would be that you are smarter than your data. Data do not understand causes and effects; humans do. I hope that the new science of causal inference will enable us to better understand how we do it, because there is no better way to understand ourselves than by emulating ourselves. In the age of computers, this new understanding also brings with it the prospect of amplifying our innate abilities so that we can make better sense of data, be it big or small.

Of primary concern to us was the notion that the emergence of human knowledge was not a joyful process but a painful one, accompanied by disobedience, guilt, and punishment.