Two book-length studies, Brandt (2007) and Proctor (2012a), contain all the information any reader could ask for about the smoking — lung cancer debate, short of reading the actual tobacco company documents (which are available online). Shorter surveys of the smoking-cancer debate in the 1950s are Salsburg (2002, Chapter 18), Parascandola (2004), and Proctor (2012b). Stolley (1991) takes a look at the unique role of R. A. Fisher, and Greenhouse (2009) comments on Jerome Cornfield’s importance. The shot heard around the world was Doll and Hill (1950), which first implicated smoking in lung cancer; though technical, it is a scientific classic.

For the story of the surgeon general’s committee and the emergence of the Hill guidelines for causation, see Blackburn and Labarthe (2012) and Morabia (2013). Hill’s own description of his criteria can be found in Hill (1965).

Lilienfeld (2007) is the source of the “Abe and Yak” story with which we began the chapter.

VanderWeele (2014) and Hernández-Díaz, Schisterman, and Hernán (2006) resolve the birth-weight paradox using causal diagrams. An interesting “before-and-after” pair of articles is Wilcox (2001, 2006), written before and after the author learned about causal diagrams; his excitement in the latter article is palpable.

Readers interested in the latest statistics and historical trends in cancer mortality and smoking may consult US Department of Health and Human Services (USDHHS, 2014), American Cancer Society (2017), and Wingo (2003).

American Cancer Society. (2017). Cancer facts and figures. Available at: https://www.cancer.org/research/cancer-facts-statistics.html (posted: February 19, 2015).

Blackburn, H., and Labarthe, D. (2012). Stories from the evolution of guidelines for causal inference in epidemiologic associations: 1953–1965. American Journal of Epidemiology 176: 1071–1077. Brandt, A. (2007). The Cigarette Century. Basic Books, New York, NY.

Doll, R., and Hill, A. B. (1950). Smoking and carcinoma of the lung. British Medical Journal 2: 739–748.

Greenhouse, J. (2009). Commentary: Cornfield, epidemiology, and causality. International Journal of Epidemiology 38: 1199–1201.

Hernández-Díaz, S., Schisterman, E., and Hernán, M. (2006). The birth weight “paradox” uncovered? American Journal of Epidemiology 164: 1115–1120.

Hill, A. B. (1965). The environment and disease: Association or causation? Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 58: 295–300.

Lilienfeld, A. (2007). Abe and Yak: The interactions of Abraham M.

Lilienfeld and Jacob Yerushalmy in the development of modern epidemiology (1945–1973). Epidemiology 18: 507–514.

Morabia, A. (2013). Hume, Mill, Hill, and the sui generis epidemiologic approach to causal inference. American Journal of Epidemiology 178: 1526–1532.

Parascandola, M. (2004). Two approaches to etiology: The debate over smoking and lung cancer in the 1950s. Endeavour 28: 81–86. Proctor, R. (2012a). Golden Holocaust: Origins of the Cigarette Catastrophe and the Case for Abolition. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA.

Proctor, R. (2012b). The history of the discovery of the cigarette — lung cancer link: Evidentiary traditions, corporate denial, and global toll. Tobacco Control 21: 87–91.

Salsburg, D. (2002). The Lady Tasting Tea: How Statistics Revolutionized Science in the Twentieth Century. Henry Holt and Company, New York, NY.

Stolley, P. (1991). When genius errs: R. A. Fisher and the lung cancer controversy. American Journal of Epidemiology 133: 416–425.

US Department of Health and Human Services (USDHHS). (2014).

The health consequences of smoking–50 years of progress: A report of the surgeon general. USDHHS and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA.

VanderWeele, T. (2014). Commentary: Resolutions of the birthweight paradox: Competing explanations and analytical insights. International Journal of Epidemiology 43: 1368–1373.

Wilcox, A. (2001). On the importance — and the unimportance — of birthweight. International Journal of Epidemiology 30: 1233–1241. Wilcox, A. (2006). The perils of birth weight — A lesson from directed acyclic graphs. American Journal of Epidemiology 164: 1121–1123. Wingo, P. (2003). Long-term trends in cancer mortality in the United States, 1930–1998. Cancer 97: 3133–3275.