Informational pattern

Historical starting point

A chronology begins where one explanation becomes dominant while directly relevant prior events or later discontinuities disappear.

The diagnostic question

How does the causal story change if the timeline begins earlier or preserves major later breaks?

What to look for

The alleged cause occurs after the outcome began
A long period is narrated without discontinuities
The selected start assigns responsibility before causality is tested

See it in context

Public analyses using this lens

The post-World War I settlement

Did the Treaty of Versailles cause World War II?

It helped create grievances and constraints that Hitler exploited, but later economic collapse, political choices, ideology, and deliberate aggression made the path to war contingent rather than inevitable.

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The collapse of Lehman Brothers

Did Lehman Brothers cause the 2008 financial crisis?

Lehman's failure was a decisive trigger and amplifier, but mortgage losses, leverage, opaque exposures, and fragile short-term funding had already created a systemic crisis.

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The Great Depression

Did Smoot-Hawley cause the Great Depression?

It damaged trade and deepened the downturn, but the Depression began before the tariff and became catastrophic through banking panics, monetary contraction, deflation, debt, and the gold standard.

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