 Those who accept the conventional division of causation in the law into two parts, then posit a very minimalist notion of the first requirement, that of “cause-in-fact”. This minimalist requirement is by far the dominant explicit test for cause in fact in both torts and criminal law. It is the “sine qua non”, or “but-for” test. Such a test asks a counterfactual question: “but for the defendant’s action, would the victim have been harmed as she was?” This test is also sometimes called the necessary condition test, because it requires the defendant’s action have been necessary to the victim’s harm. The appeal of this test stems from this fact. The test seems to isolate something we seem to care a lot about, both in explaining events and in assessing responsibility for them, namely, did the defendant’s act make a difference vis-à-vis how the world would have been had she not done what she did? Insofar as we increase moral blameworthiness and legal punishment for actors who cause bad results (and not just try to), we seemingly should care whether a particular bad result would have happened anyway, even without the defendant.