Two types of reasoning

How does Tim Henson play so fast?

Tim Henson is a guitarist famous for playing complex compositions so fast that it's kind of scary.

This leads YouTubers to make videos with titles like "How Tim Henson Can Play So Damn Fast".

Watch the first 45 seconds of this video, if you can.

Why do YOU think Tim Henson can play so damn fast? (Write 3 possible explanations. It doesn’t matter if you don’t know anything about guitar—you can imagine any explanations you like, no matter how crazy.)

Look at your explanations. Is there a clear link between cause and effect?

Here’s what YouTuber Tom Johns says makes Tim Henson play so fast:

  • Big hands (let him stretch between distant notes)
  • Placing his thumb behind the neck (instead of over the top, lets him maximise his stretch)
  • He uses a hybrid picking technique (so he can pick harmonic notes quickly and cleanly)
  • He keeps his fingertips very close to the fretboard (so they don’t have far to travel)
  • He uses a small range of motion when picking (so that he can pick notes quickly and cleanly)

Here is one example of Tom Johns explaining his reasoning about Tim's thumb position.

Can you find 2-3 specific phrases he uses to link cause & effect?

In classical guitar, you're taught to put the thumb directly behind the middle finger, and if you look at the best classical guitarists from the front, you rarely see their thumb. And by keeping the thumb down and around halfway behind the neck, it means wide stretches become possible. If you watch Tim Henson's videos, it's really uncommon for the thumb to pop up, and this allows him to get into those extraordinary positions.

How Tim Henson Can Play So Damn Fast

Words and phrases such as "by", "it means" and "this allows" help us describe cause & effect relationships.

Can you find 2-3 cause & effect phrases in this snippet about Tim's picking style?

With natural harmonics, you need to put your finger exactly over the fret and then take it off at exactly the right time. The margin for error is really small, and if you get it right, you get this lovely cascading waterfall of notes. But if you get it wrong, it sounds like pots and pans clashing together. So, to play them consistently and at higher speeds, Tim uses this hybrid picking technique where he alternates between his pick and mainly his middle finger, and he even does it live. It's amazing. Oh God, I sound like such a fanboy.

How Tim Henson Can Play So Damn Fast

How about a very obvious causal word in this snippet about finger position?

In this part of "Playing God," Tim can achieve this blistering speed because all his fingers are staying really close to the fretboard, which has taken a lot of committed practice to get right. One thing that's really weird to me is how much control he has over his index finger. It's held in exactly that position, a few millimeters above the fretboard, and it's just waiting its turn to be called upon. I've never seen someone have so much control over a finger.

How Tim Henson Can Play So Damn Fast

Would you have been as satisfied if Tom Johns had said the reason Tim can play fast was because of “lots of practice” or “good technique”?

Probably not! Those reasons might be true, but they are so generic that they don't tell you anything new.

Causal reasoning isn’t about pointing out just any cause-and-effect links; it’s about choosing the most relevant and interesting links, which often means digging into the details.

When we asked "What if the Earth stopped spinning?" we followed a linear chain of cause & effect, with one event leading to another, which leads to another, and so on.

In explaining why Tim Henson can play so damn fast, there is no single chain of cause & effect.

Instead, we have multiple causes (thumb position, finger position, picking technique, etc) all contributing to one effect: his speed.

Instead of a causal chain, what we have are causal factors.

Notes

  • Some factors can be more important than others.
  • And some factors can be chained. (For example, Tim Henson’s stretch is one factor, and his thumb position is a factor that has a direct effect on his stretch.)
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