First, your non-standard use of the term “counterfactual” is jarring, though, as I understand, it is somewhat normalized in your circles. “Counterfactual” unlike “factual” means something that could have happened, given your limited knowledge of the world, but did not. What you probably mean is “completely unexpected”, “surprising” or something similar. I suspect you got this feedback before.
Sticking with physics. Galilean relativity was completely against the Aristotelian grain. More recently, the singularity theorems of Penrose and Hawking unexpectedly showed that black holes are not just a mathematical artifact, but a generic feature of the world. A whole slew of discoveries, experimental and theoretical, in Quantum mechanics were almost all against the grain. Probably the simplest and yet the hardest to conceptualize was the Bell’s theorem.
Not my field, but in economics, Adam Smith’s discovery of what Scott Alexander later named Moloch was a complete surprise, as I understand it.
What you probably mean is “completely unexpected”, “surprising” or something similar
I think it means the more specific “a discovery that if it counterfactually hadn’t happened, wouldn’t have happened another way for a long time”. I think this is roughly the “counterfactual” in “counterfactual impact”, but I agree not the more widespread one.
It would be great to have a single word for this that was clearer.
First, your non-standard use of the term “counterfactual” is jarring, though, as I understand, it is somewhat normalized in your circles. “Counterfactual” unlike “factual” means something that could have happened, given your limited knowledge of the world, but did not. What you probably mean is “completely unexpected”, “surprising” or something similar. I suspect you got this feedback before.
Sticking with physics. Galilean relativity was completely against the Aristotelian grain. More recently, the singularity theorems of Penrose and Hawking unexpectedly showed that black holes are not just a mathematical artifact, but a generic feature of the world. A whole slew of discoveries, experimental and theoretical, in Quantum mechanics were almost all against the grain. Probably the simplest and yet the hardest to conceptualize was the Bell’s theorem.
Not my field, but in economics, Adam Smith’s discovery of what Scott Alexander later named Moloch was a complete surprise, as I understand it.
I think it means the more specific “a discovery that if it counterfactually hadn’t happened, wouldn’t have happened another way for a long time”. I think this is roughly the “counterfactual” in “counterfactual impact”, but I agree not the more widespread one.
It would be great to have a single word for this that was clearer.
Maybe “counterfactually robust” is an OK phrase?