Within the natural and social scientific domains alike, one of the most successful and useful principles underpinning our collective accumulation of knowledge is the act and art of reductionism. By breaking down larger systems into smaller segments, analyzing and comparing individual, assumedly independent parts in isolation, our understanding, modeling and prediction of both social and natural systems have undoubtedly benefited greatly. This principle has thus, rightly shaped the various analytical tools we have at our disposal, where assumptions of independence of observations is often foundational.