> You mean dielectric moments and static electricity?

You're confusing what with why. My understanding is that everyone knows it has something to do with electrons collecting on the balloon; but nobody quite knows why rubbing rubber against hair causes the electrons to do that.

I think I got confused because I was thinking about why it stuck to the wall, rather than why it accumulated charge. I know why electrically charged objects stick to things. The why of how they got like that is a bit different as you mentioned. Triboelectric effect is spooky, but there are some theories. It's one of those non-linear messy quantum things that's a pain in the neck to solve.

That is exactly equivalent to "dunno, maybe something".

> That is exactly equivalent to "dunno, maybe something".

Yup! It's like understanding the why of weather and people. They are messy and have so many factors you can't account for. It's like saying, why are the clouds shaped like that. You can why your way down, but it's turtles all the way!

When it comes to non-linear junk, the why becomes mixed up because the causes are so numerous. There are so many tiny interactions you can't really say there is one individual cause. Often times you have phenomena that occur at specific energy levels that aren't really caused by any one thing. Even something as simple as a double pendulum is unpredictable.

One thing that is kind of mind blowing is strange attractors. Systems that are so random you cannot predict them even a few moments later can exhibit seemingly ordered patterns. They seem to have a cause, but they are literally just statistical mechanics. A slightly more likely outcome out of un-countable numbers of other outcomes.

It is entirely possible that global warming could tip us into the next ice age, though probably not in our lifetimes.

First you would need a world-wide cloud layer reflecting insolation back without conversion to IR. As the temperature drops, ice forms. When the clouds dissipate, the ice takes over reflecting sunlight out.

Or it could return us back to the hothouse earth of the cretaceous era. Or it could turn our entire planet into a second Venus with a runaway effect from all the methane. Or it could do almost nothing at all. There is just no way to know because it's never really happened before. We are playing with fire for sure.

Exactly.

Often the gap between what and why is enormous. Humanity began curing meats to protect against microorganisms around 3000BC. The effect of what was going on was immediately observable, but it wasn't until 4500 years or so later that we discovered the why of microorganisms.