The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect (Penguin Science)

by Judea Pearl

Strange, but this new experience has been one of the most rewarding educational trips of my life. The need to shape ideas in your language, to guess your background, your questions, and your reactions, did more to sharpen my understanding of causality than all the equations I have written prior to writing this book.

I hope with this book to convince you that data are profoundly dumb. Data can tell you that the people who took a medicine recovered faster than those who did not take it, but they can’t tell you why.

Counterfactuals are the building blocks of moral behavior as well as scientific thought. The ability to reflect on one’s past actions and envision alternative scenarios is the basis of free will and social responsibility.

My emphasis on language also comes from a deep conviction that language shapes our thoughts. You cannot answer a question that you cannot ask, and you cannot ask a question that you have no words for.