ShmoopTube

00:00

Edited at https://subtitletools.com

00:08

Cause and Effect, a la Shmoop. Just because one thing happens after another…[domino slips on banana peel]

00:13

…doesn’t necessarily mean that the first thing caused the second.

00:21

Your friends keep trying to tell you that…

00:23

…but you refuse to stop intentionally spilling grape juice on the carpet until the Red Sox

00:28

lose. On the other hand, if you spill grape juice [guy in living room watches tv with friends and spills juice]

00:32

on one of the actual Red Sox outfielders…

00:35

...then there may actually be some cause and effect at play. [guy spills juice on baseball player]

00:41

Using cause and effect within an essay can be a great way to show how a situation has

00:44

progressed…[businessman build sky scraper]

00:47

…or regressed. [sky scraper gets torn down]

00:53

By showing your reader how a war caused a depression…[military tank, people in line for the dole]

00:57

…or how the shifting of plates at the Earth’s surface causes earthquakes…[globe switches pasta plates around on a table and loses an eye]

01:02

…a reader can start to make connections they might not have made…

01:07

… if all you had done is dump a bunch of random facts in their lap. [guy reading a book on the couch, words drop in lap]

01:15

Examining cause and effect allows us to think outside the events themselves and contemplate

01:20

their context.

01:22

However, be careful not to confuse causation with correlation.

01:29

Just because two things are related…

01:31

…it doesn’t mean that one caused the other.

01:36

The last three times your Uncle Bertrand has come to visit…

01:42

…there’s been a full moon. [Uncle Berty opens door with full moon outside]

01:43

But unless Uncle Bertie is seeking shelter to avoid one of his… “episodes”…[Uncle turns into werewolf]

01:48

…it’s probably just an odd coincidence. Cause and effect is only when one thing happens

01:58

and a second thing happens as a direct result of the first thing.

02:03

Like when your mom caught Uncle Bertrand going through the trash… so she sent him home.

02:10

Or when Uncle Bertrand tore up the living room carpet… so your mom made him pay to

02:15

get it fixed.

02:16

Or when one of your neighbors dropped by and Uncle Bertrand barked ferociously at him…

02:21

so your mom fit him with a choke collar. Hm. Maybe there is something to that whole

02:28

“full moon” thing. [Uncle pees on fire hydrant]

Full Transcript