Sunday, April 19, 2020

Despite or Because

I would like to introduce a new tagline "Despite or Because"--a method of deeper-level thinking.

Specifically, analysis attains sophistication when it is distinguishing between causation and correlation and answering the question: "Is [this result] in spite of or because of [that]?".

The example du jour is COVID-19.

As we stand today a lot remains to be seen including if our efforts will prove successful. Assuming success, we would like to know if the successful flattening of the curve and much below forecast CFR was in fact because of the federal, state, and local governments' lockdown and shelter-in-place orders or despite them?

I'm not just asking if they had no effect. Did they actually impair the battle against the virus? There are three ways I could see the extreme efforts leading to a net harm setting aside the very important social loss of wealth and way of life not to mention that an economy on a strong footing is better able to withstand and respond to a major threat.

  • By putting at risk people into high-dose exposures
  • By preventing helpfully-quicker herd immunity
  • By disallowing the virus to mutate into a milder strand (this ope is very speculative on my part and I might be very off base here)
Or did those efforts have no meaningful effect period? All of it is interesting and very hard to ask in mixed company much less get open-minded thinking on. 

Sweden, South Korea, Taiwan, and perhaps certain states and cities in the U.S. might provide the counter examples as natural experiments we would need to answer this question to some degree of satisfaction eventually

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