 Note that here Pearl seems to invoke a notion of intervention that is different from (and stronger than) a pure setting conception. After all, as Reutlinger (2012) notes, it is arguable that there is no problem about imagining the state of the universe at \(S_t\) set to some different value and then determining by reference to the laws governing its evolution what its state will be at \(S_{t  +1}\).[5]  Pearl’s remark seems to assume that the imagined intervention has to meet some additional constraint beyond this (having to do in some way with the possibility of realizing the intervention). Pearl’s claim is controversial—it is discussed sympathetically by Hitchcock 2007b and Woodward 2007 and criticized by other writers such as Reutlinger 2012.