Dr.NateNeph said:

Order of operations matters more than any single choice here: establish a baseline, change one thing, wait long enough for it to express itself, then…

Coming at Dr.NateNeph’s question from a different direction. If two explanations both fit, the useful question is which one predicts something the other does not. That is answerable; arguing about which sounds more plausible is not.

Adding the numbers, since they settle part of this. Practical: whatever you change, write down the date and the reason. In three months the reason is what you will have forgotten, and the reason is what makes the record worth having.

One thing that is still open after Dr.NateNeph’s answer:

Was that from a primary source or from a summary of one?

TirzTom said:

Practical: whatever you change, write down the date and the reason.

Filing a mild objection. Mild because I might be wrong; an objection because nobody has addressed the case that does not fit. The counter-case has not been addressed. Somebody upthread described the situation that does not fit, and the thread moved on rather than engaging with it, which is the failure mode this board is supposed to avoid.

TirzTom said:

Practical: whatever you change, write down the date and the reason.

That is right, and it stops being right at the edges. The general case is well behaved; the interesting cases in this thread are all at the boundary where the general case breaks.