Skeptico

Dinesh D'Souza is Not Very Bright

This is funny. Via Pharyngula today I found this piece of very poor reasoning from Dinesh D'Souza. D’Souza is banging on about how the spiritual world is of a completely different order from anything we know, and how we have no way to investigate or comprehend it. PZ has the obvious response: “So how does Dinesh D'Souza know anything about it?” Read D’Souza’s whole piece – it’s all bad.

I just had to laugh at one point he made – and it’s that part I want to comment on. Bereft of any arguments of his own, D’Souza relies on an argument made by the philosopher Kant. Briefly, Kant argued that human knowledge is limited by “the limited sensory apparatus of perception” we possess. That is, we cannot be sure our perception of reality shows us what reality is really like. D’Souza goes on to say this (with my bold):

When I challenged Daniel Dennett to debunk Kant's argument, he posted an angry response on his website in which he said several people had already refuted Kant. But he didn't provide any refutations, and he didn't name any names. Basically Dennett was relying on the argumentum ad ignorantium-the argument that relies on the ignorance of the audience.

LOL – argument from ignorance is an argument that relies on the ignorance of the audience? Nooooooo. Can he really believe that’s what argument from ignorance is? No. Argument from ignorance is:

… a logical fallacy in which it is claimed that a premise is true only because it has not been proven false or that a premise is false only because it has not been proven true.

And here’s the funny bit. You see, super duper ironically, that’s exactly what D’Souza is doing when he says that since no one can refute Kant – Kant must be right. D’Souza’s argument is an argument from ignorance. Add the straw man D’Souza started with, and you have a mish-wash of illogical waffle.

Of course, Kant could be right. There could be another reality we can’t comprehend. But just because there could be a different reality we can’t comprehend, that doesn’t mean there is one. And even if there were, there is no reason to believe that it’s anything like the version D’Souza or any other religious nit wits believe in.

Argument By Analogy

An argument by analogy takes place when the arguer:

1. Has a point to prove about something
2. Gives you an analogy for the thing
3. Points out that the analog contains the feature they are trying to prove exists in the original
4. Concludes the feature in the analog must also exist in the original.

The flaw in this method of argument

The flaw is simple: the analogy always breaks down somewhere. If the analogy breaks down, the conclusion the arguer is trying to draw from the analogy just doesn’t follow. That’s all there is to it. Argument by analogy is rarely as good as an argument by logic, evidence or facts. Clearly if the arguer had any logic, evidence or facts to support his case he would present them. That he resorts to argument by analogy shows his argument is probably devoid of logic, evidence or facts.

Examples

The most persistent users of argument by analogy are ID creationists. For example, Michael Behe is especially fond of his Mount Rushmore analogy:

For example, unintelligent physical forces like plate tectonics and erosion seem quite sufficient to account for the origin of the Rocky Mountains. Yet they are not enough to explain Mount Rushmore.

Of course, we know who is responsible for Mount Rushmore, but even someone who had never heard of the monument could recognize it as designed.

So by analogy, life on Earth must also have been designed. He goes on to invoke William Paley and his watch analogy – essentially the same argument only with a watch instead of Mount Rushmore. The obvious place the analogy breaks down is that neither Mount Rushmore nor a watch can have offspring, while living things regularly  reproduce themselves. Since this reproduction (with minor changes) is fundamental to the theory of evolution, and since it obviously doesn’t work with Mount Rushmore, Behe’s analogy is bogus. The only startling thing in my view, is how ID proponents like Behe can still use this lame analogy when it is so obviously bogus and has been debunked so many times.

Michael Egnor (another creationist) uses argument from analogy in his plea for dualism - ‘Verizon Deniers’ Find a Cellphone. He compares the human mind to a cell phone, which (as we all know) picks up signals from elsewhere. That is, we know the people we hear on the phone don’t actually live inside the phone – the phone is just a receiver of the voices. Egnor concludes that the human brain is the same – the mind exists elsewhere (in some unspecified non-material realm), and the brain is just a receiver for the mind’s thoughts. Of course, we know that if we placed the cell phone in a faraday cage that is impervious to radio waves, the signal would be lost. That is one place the analogy breaks down, since there is no equivalent way to block the “signal” (analog or digital – ha ha), from the “mind” to the brain. We also know that damage to specific areas of the brain can produce specific changes in personality or other brain functions, while damage to specific areas of the phone produce no analogous changes in the message received. (Usually damage to the phone produces either no change or the phone stops working completely.) So right there we have two places the analogy breaks down, and we can dismiss the argument. It is notable that Egnor produces no actual evidence for this rather extraordinary claim of his. (Orac did a fine and more detailed take-down of Egnor’s argument, as did Steven Novella and others.)

Correct uses of analogies

I believe there are two correct uses of an analogy in a discussion. The first is to explain something that is complex and perhaps technical, in language that is simpler or within the recipient’s experience. As an example, I modestly (well no, not really) present the Beatles analogy I used in the Lost Tomb of Jesus post. James Cameron used the analogy of some future archaeologist finding a tomb in Liverpool, marked with the names John, Paul, George and Ringo, and concluding he had found the lost tomb of The Beatles. I wrote that, by analogy, Cameron had really found a tomb with the names John, Paul, George and Britney, and concluded Britney Spears was the drummer in The Beatles. (Bear with me – you have to read the whole post.) But my analogy wasn’t used to make the case – I had done that by examining the statistics and showing where they were wrong. The analogy was to help explain it.

The other correct use of an analogy is to get around a mental block – where someone simply can’t conceive of the point you are making so you make an analogy they might be able to think about. An example would be to explain to a theist, how an atheist simply has no belief in God. A religious person possibly couldn’t even conceive of there being no God, so instead you present Bertrand Russell’s teapot analogy. Here, he believer is asked to consider if he believes there is a teapot in orbit between the Earth and Mars, and when he realizes he can’t prove there isn’t one he might understand why the atheist has no belief in God and why the burden of proof is upon the person saying God (or a teapot in orbit), exists, rather than upon those saying they don’t. Note that the teapot analogy doesn’t prove the point, but it might help the theist understand the idea.

You just might be a Secretard if…

What are Secretards? Why the blind robotic followers of The Secret and its idiot child The Law of Attraction (LOA).

Note: I think the pronunciation should be Sec-REtards (the “sec” rhyming with the first syllable of “secretary,” and the emphasis on the “re” of “retards”) – although I’m open to discussion.  Edit:  It's been suggested the pronunciation should be "Secrete-Tard," in that they are secreting retarded arguments.  I'll leave the final decision to the individual reader. 

Most believers use fallacious arguments, but the Secretards are the most illogical, immature, vindictive and gratuitously offensive commenters I’ve met in all my years debating with believers on the Web. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t mind people with differing views who are prepared to defend those views, even vigorously at times. And I don’t even object too much to believers who sometimes get a little rude, or who occasionally use bad language. We can all get carried away at times in debates, especially on the Web. But the Secretards take this to another level in their complete inability to acknowledge contradictory arguments, combined with a nastiness and vindictiveness that is the equal of the anti-vaccination groups. With the degree of vitriol they spit, you have to wonder if they aren’t a little too invested in something that perhaps, deep down, they know isn’t true.

The purpose of this post is to summarize the fallacious arguments used by the Secretards. Admittedly some of these arguments are generic to all woos, but the majority are Secret specific. So with apologies to Jeff Foxworthy and his “You just might be a redneck” shtick, and to Orac and his You just might be an altie post, I give you, you just might be a Secretard if... Here goes:

1. If you repeatedly state that skeptics are negative people, you just might be a Secretard.
2. If you claim that the burden of proof is with the skeptics to prove The Secret is not valid, you just might be a Secretard.
3. If you start your comment by saying “skepticism is healthy” and then spend the rest of the comment, and numerous comments that follow, arguing that skepticism is unhealthy, you just might be a Secretard.
4. If you claim the LOA “always works, every time, no exceptions,” you just might be a Secretard.
5. If you claim the LOA is a scientific law just like gravity, and yet cannot produce one citation showing the LOA is a scientific law, you just might be a Secretard.
6. If you misrepresent what the laws of gravitation actually say and ignore all explanations about how the laws of gravitation are different from the LOA, you just might be a Secretard.
7. If you say you never said the LOA always works, every time, no exceptions, and yet you still support The Secret, you just might be a Secretard.
8. If you state that when the LOA doesn’t work for someone it’s because it was IMPROPERLY APPLIED (bonus points for using ALL CAPS as in the example), you just might be a Secretard.
9. If you state that God (or the universe) answers all prayers (or requests), but sometimes the answer is "No", you just might be a Secretard.
10. If you equivocate by arguing that being positive, confident etc will make people react more positively towards you, will tend to make you more successful etc. and then sneakily use this as an argument in favor of the “thoughts become things” and “it always works every time” woo version expressed in the film, you just might be a Secretard.
11. If you state that the observer, in the act of observing, changes the observed, and/or reference Schrödinger’s Cat as though it proves something, and/or parrot any other poorly understood Quantum Mechanics, you just might be a Secretard.
12. If you try to support the above by copying and pasting definitions from quantum mechanics sites you just found with Google in an attempt to show that you really do understand quantum mechanics, you just might be a Secretard.
13. If you state that for hundreds of years nobody could prove the presence of atoms, electricity or radio waves, or that people used to think the Earth was flat, or that for years we couldn’t get to the Moon, as if these were actual valid arguments in favor of The Secret, you just might be a Secretard.
14. If you claim The Secret is a radical paradigm shift that skeptics are just not ready to hear, you just might be a Secretard.
15. If you cite What The (Bleep) Do We Know!?, in all seriousness, as a reference, you just might be a Secretard.
16. If you state this cannot be “New Age Garbage” since the technique has been practiced for thousands of years, you just might be a Secretard.
17. If you state that we only use 10% (or some other randomly chosen percentage) of our brain, you just might be a Secretard.
18. If you later claim you meant the “mind” not the “brain”, you just might be a Secretard.
19. If you fail, when asked, to produce evidence that we only use 10% of our brain mind, although this was your claim, you just might be a Secretard.
20. If you state “recently absolutely everything I’ve put my focus on has come to pass,” and then as evidence for this produce a detailed list of your recent successes in getting a better job, better health, better sex etc, you just might be a Secretard.
21. If you state that a little girl who was brutally raped attracted the rape because in a past life she was possibly, herself, a rapist, you just might be a Secretard.
22. If you Suggest that the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust attracted their fate, and/or the ones practicing The Secret were the ones who survived, you just might be a Secretard.
23. If you ask skeptics “what contributions have you made to society” as if this were a valid argument for your position, you just might be a Secretard.
24. If you state that skeptics are being skeptical for skeptic sake (whatever that means), you just might be a Secretard.
25. If you ask “where did they say that you can solve a traffic jam just by thinking about it?” although this was part of the film, you just might be a Secretard.
26. If you say that if thoughts cannot create reality this means we can’t own or possess anything that is man made, as if you thought this argument actually made any sense, you just might be a Secretard.
27. If you claim that this concept of the universe has flown over skeptics’ heads, you just might be a Secretard.
28. If you call skeptics sad, sad sacks, a sad lot, unsuccessful, pessimistic, incomplete, frustrated, little boys, pitiful, losers, dumb, misfits, negative, should have beens, drones, sad (again), who “deserve each other”, or any combination of the above, you just might be a Secretard.
29. If you include all of the above insults in one long content-free rant after all your arguments have been debunked, and right before you flounce off for good with the final line ‘I’m gone and I leave you with your angst forever’, you just might be a Secretard.
30. If you post silly, childish, vulgar comments on this blog under the names of several other regular commenters, as though this tactic somehow strengthened your position, you just might be a Secretard.
31. If you start your own pseudo-blog where you complain that skeptics don’t allow you free speech to comment exactly as you wish, and yet on this “blog” of yours you don’t allow anyone to comment at all, you just might be a Secretard.
32. If you state that skeptics are negative thinking people (yes, I know this is a repeat), you just might be a Secretard.
33. If you continue with any of the above arguments even after they have been debunked three, four or five times the same day in the same thread, you just might be a Secretard.

The comments are open, in case I missed any.

Schrödinger’s Cat

"What have you done to the cat, Erwin? He looks half dead."

- Mrs. Schrödinger.

The above quotation is attributed to Erwin Schrödinger's wife – apparently an early animal rights activist. The rest, as they say, is history.

I was reminded of Schrödinger’s Cat after reading this comment and this comment recently. Each of these commenters enlisted Schrödinger’s Cat to prove some facts woo they were promoting. Unfortunately for them it does no such thing.

First, for those unfamiliar with it, a summary of the Schrödinger’s Cat thought experiment:

Schrödinger imagined that a cat is locked in a box, along with a radioactive atom that is connected to a vial containing a deadly poison. If the atom decays, it causes the vial to smash and the cat to be killed. When the box is closed we do not know if the atom has decayed or not, which means that [the cat] can be in both the decayed state and the non-decayed state at the same time. Therefore, the cat is both dead and alive at the same time...

Note: the cat is both dead and alive at the same time. The woo’s argument goes: this is really weird and counterintuitive, therefore __________ (insert preferred brand of woo) is real. There are several flaws in this line of reasoning.

First, from this translation of Schrödinger's original "cat paradox paper", we know that Schrödinger was deliberately presenting this dead and alive scenario as a “quite ridiculous” case. In other words, since a cat obviously cannot be both dead and alive at the same time, the extreme version of the Copenhagen interpretation (the version that says consciousness is necessary), must be wrong. This could be because “observation” really means “measurement” (ie the Geiger counter measuring the atomic decay is the “observer”), or because Copenhagen itself is wrong. Either way, it is amusing when woos throw Schrödinger’s Cat into the debate, quite oblivious to the fact that is was designed to show the exact opposite of what they think it shows.

But there is a more fundamental reason Schrödinger’s Cat doesn’t support the woo position.

I Taught I Taw A Puddy Tat

Schrödinger’s Cat is a thought experiment only. Thought experiments can be useful to explain a complex idea, or to get people to question assumptions, but a thought experiment cannot by itself prove or disprove anything. To prove or disprove something, you have to perform a real experiment. Schrödinger’s Cat has never actually been performed as a real experiment, and in my view could never even in principle be performed as a real experiment. The reason should be obvious. Schrödinger’s Cat says the cat is both dead and alive until we look at it. But we cannot tell if the cat is dead or alive until we look at it. It’s Catch-22: to perform Schrödinger’s Cat we’d have to look at the experiment without looking at it. Clearly impossible. So it proves nothing.

Of course, this also means that Schrödinger’s point wasn’t proven either: since we can’t say for sure that the cat isn’t both dead and alive, we can’t say if Copenhagen is right or wrong. The “consciousness is necessary” interpretation of QM is unfalsifiable.

But even if the experiment could be performed, and the dead and alive at the same time position confirmed, that still wouldn’t support the many woo claims made for quantum mechanics. If you want to demonstrate that something is true, you need to show some actual evidence that the thing actually is true. Just because quantum mechanics is weird and counterintuitive yet true, it doesn’t follow that any weird and counterintuitive woo is also true.

Poor Puddy Tat!

A Straw Man gets AIDS

One of the skills of critical thinking is to understand logical fallacies – to recognize them in your opponent’s arguments and not rely on them yourself. But it’s easy for beginners to get caught out by them – to misunderstand a fallacy and call it out in error. You certainly need to be sure you understand them before you make a fool of yourself. Nowhere is this more evident than in the link Orac sent me to a post on Hank's "You Bet Your Life" blog. Hank doesn’t think HIV causes AIDS, and in his post AIDS Inc: Common Logical Fallacies he lists what he thinks are the logical fallacies employed by what he calls the “AIDS bunglers”. As an educational exercise I thought I should point out Hank’s errors, which are threefold:

1. Calling fallacies that aren’t
2. Calling the wrong fallacy, and
3. Stating Straw Man versions of his opponents’ positions, and calling them fallacies.

For brevity I’m going to refer to the idea that HIV causes AIDS as the “HIV theory”, and its proponents “HIV theorists”. I will refer to the people who disagree with this as “dissenters”. In this post I’m not going to discuss specific evidence that shows HIV does or does not cause AIDS – I’m going to focus solely on Hank’s misuse of logical fallacies.

Here goes:

Ad Hominem:

If you don't believe that HIV causes AIDS, well, you suck.

If that was all the HIV theorists had to offer, this would be ad hominem. However, they don’t rely on ad hominem, they rely on the evidence, and if evidence is presented to support your position, you are not relying on fallacious logic. Which brings us neatly to Hank’s next point:

Appeal To False Authority:

The NIH has a great government website, which explains why HIV Causes AIDS

This is not an Appeal To Authority. If the claim was just “the NIH says HIV causes AIDS”, this might be an appeal to authority. But here’s the thing: the actual article Hank links to is a summary of the evidence that HIV causes AIDS, plus rebuttals to the many “HIV does not cause AIDS” myths. Someone could debate these evidences if they wanted to, but they can’t deny that the website does, in fact, list detailed evidence that HIV causes AIDS. Therefore, the website is not relying on the authority of the NIH but on the evidence it lists. Citing evidence is not an appeal to authority, and so citing this website is not fallacious.

This is a classic example of someone who has heard the term “Appeal To Authority”, but has not understood it. If an “authority” lists evidence, it is not fallacious to cite it.

Appeal To Emotion:

Look, millions of poor Africans are gonna die, if you don’t immediately start believing that HIV causes AIDS!!!

That would be an Appeal To Emotion, but the HIV theory relies on evidence not on this Straw Man Hank has created.

Appeal to Fear:

Did you see what we did to Duesberg? If you don't accept that HIV causes AIDS, we will strip away your funding and ostracize you. Now, get smart, will ya?

I’m not sure why this paper from 1987 is cited – it doesn’t really say what anyone “did to Duesberg”, and if this is all that happened in 19 years is this really anything to fear? In any case, Duesberg’s credibility has been damaged because the preponderance of evidence supports the HIV theory and not Duesberg’s largely unsupported claims, not because anyone “did” something to him.

Appeal To Force:

If you don't agree that HIV causes AIDS, we will call CPS and take away your children.

The cited article suggests that children are being experimented on in violation of medical standards, but nowhere in the article is it suggested that the children were taken away because their parents doubted that HIV causes AIDS. Hank’s citing this article is really itself an Appeal to Fear, or an Appeal to Emotion.

Appeal To Majority:

C’mon, everybody’s wearing a red ribbon, why not you?

This is hilariously absurd. The link is to one of Hank’s earlier posts which describes a Seinfeld sketch - the one where Kramer is ostracized for not wearing a red AIDS ribbon. I’m not making that up – check the link. It takes some serious chutzpah to write an article about how your opponents use logical fallacies, and as evidence for this you cite the script of a TV sitcom. I’m not sure exactly what fallacy that would be (argument from authority?) – but it is certainly ludicrous.

The funny thing is that even in the sitcom, Kramer is not saying HIV doesn’t cause AIDS, he just doesn’t want to wear a ribbon – which makes Hank’s citing it a False Analogy too. I think it is probably also a non sequitur, but I’m open to other suggestions of what fallacies Hank is relying on here.

Appeal to Novelty:

Yeah, I know that retroviruses historically haven’t been show to kill cells, but this is a NEW retrovirus from a Chimpanzee in Cameroon via the Castro!

I don’t ever recall any HIV theorists relying on that Straw Man argument.

Appeal To Numbers:

Thousands of scientists think that HIV causes AIDS, why not you?

No. An Appeal to Popularity (as I prefer to call it) is something like “millions believe homeopathy works, so it must work”. But those millions are being fooled by the placebo effect amongst other things, which is why the number of people who believe it is irrelevant. But the “thousands of scientists” are all looking at the evidence.

Appeal To Tradition:

Traditionally, viruses are very bad things, causing many different ailments, why not this virus, too?

Another rather silly Straw Man of the HIV theory. Did anyone ever seriously make this argument for the HIV theory?

Argumentum Ad Nauseum:

HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter. HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter. HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter. HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter. HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter. HIV causes AIDS. You’re a Dissenter.

That might be Argumentum Ad Nauseam (note the correct spelling) if that was all that was offered, but (again), HIV theorists have evidence too.

Begging The Question:

AIDS is the disease that is caused by HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Again, if that was all that was offered it would be circular reasoning, but there is that pesky evidence too.

Burden Of Proof:

Can you prove that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS?

Since the evidence that HIV causes AIDS is pretty strong and widely accepted by scientists in the field, I think the burden of proof is back in the dissenters’ camp to show evidence for their alternative.

Complex Question:

Have you stopped beating your wife while denying that HIV causes AIDS?

That doesn’t even make sense. Anyway, another Straw Man.

False Dilemma:

Either you accept that HIV causes AIDS or you're responsible for killing millions of Africans.

This doesn’t really make sense as a false dilemma. A false Dilemma is where two alternatives are held to be the only options, when in reality there exist one or more other options which have not been considered. But “accept that HIV causes AIDS” and “be responsible for killing millions of Africans” are not really alternatives, are they? It’s more an appeal to consequences, but even that doesn’t really work. Either way it’s another of Hank’s Straw Men.

False Premise:

Since HIV is found in all cases of AIDS, obviously HIV must cause AIDS.

If there was no known mechanism for how HIV causes AIDS, or if there was no evidence for the HIV theory, he might have a point.

Gambler's Fallacy:

Look, highly credentialed scientists have usually got it right in the past, so I just know they got AIDS right this time!

No, this is not a Gambler’s Fallacy. The Gambler’s Fallacy refers to random activities, such as coin tossing. For example, if you just tossed a coin three times and got three heads, a gambler’s fallacy would be to say the next toss would be more likely to be tails (since you just got three heads in a row). Of course, the probability of getting heads again would still be 50% since a random event is not less likely to occur because it recently happened. But science isn’t “random”. The reason the “highly credentialed scientists have usually got it right in the past” is not due to randomness – it’s due to the reliability of the scientific method. It is not fallacious to say that scientists are likely to be right, unless you can specifically explain why they are likely to be wrong in this case (which Hank hasn’t done).

Guilt By Association:

You know who else doesn’t believe that HIV causes AIDS?

*(insert pictures of Nixon, Mbeki, Kary Mullis here)*

Would be ad hominem, if the above was the argument presented. Again, it’s one of Hank’s Straw Men.

Non Sequitur:

HIV causes AIDS, because if not, that means we've been lying to people all these years.

More of an Appeal to Consequences, actually. Or perhaps a false dilemma. And if the above was the argument it would be fallacious. But again, there is the evidence.

No True Scotsman:

Argument: "No Scientist questions whether HIV causes AIDS

Reply: " Dr. Kary Mullis questions whether HIV causes AIDS."

Rebuttal: "Ah yes, but no true scientist questions whether HIV causes AIDS.

That would be a NTS, except that I don’t think anyone says "No Scientist questions whether HIV causes AIDS”. After all, we know Duesberg questions it, and he’s a scientist. Another Straw Man.

Post Hoc/False Cause:

Since we’'ve started pumping people with AZT and other toxic drugs, AIDS deaths have decrease 62%. Therefore, HIV causes AIDS.

No, this is not a Post-Hoc fallacy. If there was no theoretical mechanism for how AZT works, and we just randomly noticed that AIDS deaths decreased in correlation with AZT, this would be a post hoc fallacy. But we do have theories of how AZT works, and recipients of AZT and other AIDS drugs have been monitored very carefully since their introduction to determine the results. It is not Post Hoc fallacious reasoning to note that people got better after taking drugs designed to make them better – if it were we would never be able to trial any new drug or therapy, and there would be no point ever to double-blind studies.

Red Herring:

Well, you say that to prove HIV causes AIDS, requires extraordinary evidence, because it's an extraordinary claim. Well, we’d like to note that "Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence" is itself an extraordinary claim.

Another Straw Man. Extraordinary claims do require extraordinary evidence, but no one claims that this, is itself an extraordinary claim. In any case, I think the HIV theorists have provided the extraordinary evidence – it is the dissenters who don’t have the evidence.

Slippery Slope:

If you don't accept that HIV causes AIDS, you will do poorly in class, drop out of school, commit crimes, go to prison, and die of AIDS.

Not really a slippery slope; more an Appeal to Consequences, I would have thought. Either way Hank is making another Straw Man.

Just to be clear on this Straw Man business – I’m not claiming that no one ever said anything like the things Hank is claiming; I’m saying these Straw Man arguments Hank is putting forward are not the main arguments put forward by the scientists who support the HIV theory.

Reading Hank’s post I was reminded of something Jason Rosenhouse wrote recently:

… it has never once happened in the history of science that a theory achieves mainstream status, only to fall apart when a clever outsider notices a simple logical oversight.

Of course Jason was writing about Ann Coulter’s supposed “disproval” of evolution, but it occurred to me that it could just as easily apply to AIDS dissenters. They have a lot in common: a poor understanding of science and logic, combined with a religious need for the orthodox science to be wrong. With HIV/AIDS, as with (say) evolution and global warming, you don’t have to understand all the evidence to accept that the orthodox view is probably correct - you can get a pretty good idea just by looking at the position the majority of peer reviewed science is supporting. That doesn’t mean the orthodox position is definitely 100% correct – all science is provisional and anyone can challenge the orthodoxy if they have compelling evidence. But challenging orthodoxy is an extraordinary claim, for the good reason that the orthodoxy is already supported by extraordinary evidence. To overturn this you need even more extraordinary evidence to the contrary, and this misnamed list of fallacies isn’t it.

Equivocation

The logical fallacy of equivocation is committed when someone uses the same word in different meanings in an argument, implying that the word means the same each time. For example, someone asserts that I have “faith” in science, and then implies this is the same as religious faith. This argument (that I have to refute with the same friend, periodically), seems to be saying that since I have not personally performed every single scientific experiment ever performed, by every scientist, in the history of the world – since I haven’t personally performed them all - I can’t know for sure that they have been performed at all. Therefore if I believe what I read about science, I must have “faith” in science. This is the same as religious faith, and therefore science is my religion.

Of course, the correct word to describe my view of science is “trust”, not “faith”. I have trust in science because (1) I have evidence that science works (look at all the products of science around you), and (2) there is evidence that science is self-correcting, and that if some scientist just made something up to con the rest of the world, another scientist would eventually expose the fraud. Of course, I can’t prove that all scientific experiments actually took place as described, and perhaps that’s where my friend’s confusion lies. But I do have evidence; therefore accepting science is not faith. The fallacy is to say that trust, based on evidence, is the same as blind faith based on no evidence at all. The ploy is to use the word “faith” for both of these definitions, but then to imply they both mean religious blind faith.

Recently it struck me that New Agers (and other woos) employ a slightly more subtle version of equivocation. You can see an example in this comment by author Daniel Pinchbeck. He is replying to my criticism that his book appears to center around the Mayan prophecy that 2012 will bring about the end of the world as we know it. He wrote:

"The world as we know it" ending in 2012 is flap copy - but it is probably true in any case, Mayan Calendar or not, when you combine the effects of climate change, resource depletion, and the increasing toxification of the environment, plus proliferation of WMDs etc. Species extinction is also passing a critical threshold, so that if we don't make an ecological u-turn in the next few years, it may be irreversible.

Note the double speak – how he’s trying to have it both ways? He backs away from the Mayan prophesy because he knows it’s nonsense, and instead introduces things he thinks are more believable – climate change, extinctions, etc. The idea is I’ll be drawn in (because I can’t deny global warming, etc), and I have to agree with him. Just like I “have” to agree with my friend that I can’t personally prove the big bang happened and therefore I have faith in science. So I agree the world is in crisis and then Bazam! - I’ve just agreed to the premise of his book, namely that the Mayan prophesy is real.  (And despite the weasel words about “flap copy”, that is one of its premises.) Sneaky. Clever though.

I experienced this fallacy at a dinner party recently. Some people were talking about the absurd What The Bleep Do We Know!? film: specifically the “Indians didn’t see the ships” myth. For those who haven’t heard about this, a premise of the film is that we can create our own reality with the powers of our minds only. It’s standard Newage drivel drawing on distorted interpretations of quantum mechanics among other things. Anyway, one example given in the film, to support the premise, is how when Columbus first arrived in the West Indies, the natives were literally unable to see his ships.  Why?  Because they had never seen ships before, so ships did not exist in their reality.

When I pushed these people on the absurdity of this claim, they started to retreat to lesser versions of the myth. For example, they suggested perhaps the Indians just didn’t realize they were large ships containing people. Or, perhaps they didn’t realize the significance of the ships – that they contained colonizers who would steal their lands and kill most of them off. See how the story has now been downgraded to something believable? But this was the same shtick as with the Mayan prophesy. Surely I must agree the Indians might not have realized the significance of the ships? How could I not see this might have been true? And the moment I agree to this possibility - Bazam! - I’ve just agreed to the absurd premise of the film, and all my other criticisms of it have been refuted. They have got me to agree to a lesser, more believable version of the story, but are using acceptance of that lesser version to show the premise supported by the woo version is true.

Debating people like this can be frustrating - a bit like trying to nail jelly to the wall. Just when you think you have nailed the absurdity of something they say, their story slips almost imperceptibly to something less woo, and you find you have to agree with them. You have to be focused to prevent them from claiming victory as they slide back to the woo point that started the argument. Specifically, you have to be clear about the different versions of the story that are now being discussed, and you have to push them to say which ones they believe. If they believe the woo version, then ask them for the evidence. If they are equivocating about a lesser version, point out that this lesser version does not support the premise that they want to prove. Keep a clear head as they slide between the different versions of the story. Point out they are equivocating – using different versions of the story but implying that both support the woo premise.

An interesting question is do they realize they are doing this? My view is that most of them don’t: their thought processes are so muddled that they really don’t see they are equivocating. After all, if they could think clearly, they wouldn’t believe the stuff they do believe, would they?

Edited to add:

Check out this comment that in an incredibly timely manner, demonstrates again equivocation around the “Indians didn’t see the ships” myth. As I said – muddled thinking.

The appeal to “science doesn’t know everything”

Here is another fallacious argument:

Science doesn’t know everything

… or equivalent wording.

The argument is that since science doesn’t know everything, the believer’s unscientific claim is worthy of consideration.

The flaw in the argument

The statement “science doesn’t know everything” is obviously true. The believer thinks the corollary is that any idea he likes the sound of, that cannot be proven false, is worthy of consideration. This is wrong. Something is only worthy of consideration if there is a reason to suppose it is true. Usually that means some evidence.

If you don’t restrict yourself to things that are backed by some evidence, or if there is at least some logical reason to suppose they might be true, you will believe in absolutely anything. And I have this really great bridge to sell you.

Examples

This is a typical version of this fallacy:

Hundreds of years ago we didn’t know radio waves existed, but they obviously did exist, so how do you know “qi” (or whatever woo idea they are promoting) does not exist today?

The answer is – we don’t. But, no one imagined radio waves existed, or claimed to be using them before they were scientifically discovered either. The thing is, “how do you know “qi” does not exist?” is the wrong question. The question you should be asking is, “is there any evidence for “qi”?

Another example would include the ever lame James Van Praagh on Larry King last night:

Just because things cannot be proven scientifically in the scientific method or the way you choose it to be in your paradigm, your way of thinking, it doesn't mean it (sic) doesn't exist.

To which the obvious rejoinder would have been: just because I can’t prove to everyone that you’re a fraud doesn’t mean you aren’t one. 

And if you thought that wasn’t lame enough, he had his own rather garbled version of the radio waves argument:

If that was the way it is germs, bacteria they wouldn't have existed if we didn't find them and prove them. Look at the planet Pluto. Pluto, we would not have known it existed until we discovered it. That does not mean it does not exist.

I’m going to write up a longer review of Larry’s Wednesday night “psychic” show when I get time.

The appeal to “science was wrong before”

Here is another fallacious argument:

Science was wrong before

… or equivalent wording.

The argument is that since science is sometimes wrong, the believer’s claim is as likely to be true as one supported by scientific evidence.

The flaw in the argument

Science is a series of provisional truths, backed by evidence, that are amended when better evidence is available. The key word here is “evidence”. In other words, we have a reason to suppose scientifically supported ideas are true. Contrast this with unscientific ideas, where there is rarely any rational reason to suppose they are true. Additionally, the scientific idea that was shown to be “wrong” was often not completely wrong: it often still had utility.

In reality, science has proved the most reliable method we know for evaluating claims and figuring out how the universe works. The appeal to “science was wrong before” is just a smoke screen to disguise the fact that the believer has no evidence for his claim. It does not follow that science should not be applied to evaluate claims, or that unscientific claims are likely to be true.

What they’re missing

As well as being a flawed argument, it also shows ignorance of how science works. Yes, science has been wrong, but the scientific method is self-correcting. And it is always scientists who have unearthed new evidence who do the correcting, never people who ignore the scientific method.

Ironically it also shows up the strength of science and the weakness of believer methods. For example, compare the way scientific errors are discovered and corrected, with what happens in, for example, astrology or alternative medicine. In those fields no errors are ever corrected for the simple reason that no one ever critically tests those beliefs to see if they even contain errors. Errors are a permanent feature of those beliefs. Error recognition and correction is a strength of science.

Examples

There are several versions of this fallacy. For example, believers often cite Newton being proven wrong by Einstein. Of course, Newton’s calculations are close enough for anything other than close-to light speed calculations – that’s why Newton’s formulae are used by NASA.

Alternative medicine proponents will often note that evidence-based doctors are sometimes wrong in their diagnoses, as if this means altie therapies work. Doctors are fallible and our knowledge is incomplete, but the evidence-based approach has led to huge advances and improvements in healthcare, unlike alternative treatments that have achieved virtually nothing.

This fallacy is related to, but is slightly different from, the appeal to other ways of knowing.

The appeal to other ways of knowing

Here is another fallacious argument skeptics will have heard:

There are ways of knowing other than the scientific one

or

The scientific method is not the only source of truth

..or similar wording. It is an appeal to other ways of knowing apart from science. The claim is that the tools of critical thinking and science are not sufficient to evaluate the believer’s claim; therefore the believer's claim has validity despite the lack of evidence for it.

The flaw in the argument

No one is claiming that science has all the answers or is always right. However, science has proved to be the most reliable method we know for evaluating claims and figuring out how the universe works. If the believer is claiming that there is a better method, it is up to him or her to justify that claim. To demonstrate this, believers need to explain their better method for evaluating claims, and provide evidence that it is indeed a better method. If they cannot do this their appeal to other ways of knowing is vacuous and fallacious.

For examples of this fallacy in action, you can do no worse that go to the astrologers such as Robert Hand or Dorian Gieseler Greenbaum. Of course, they have no choice but to utilize this fallacy since all rational evidence shows that astrology is made-up and astrology doesn’t work. Astrologers aren’t the only ones though. For some other examples you could read some of the believer comments posted to this blog. A prime example is this plea for the truth of reincarnation.

The appeal to be open-minded

All skeptics have heard this from someone at some point in a debate: “You need to be more open-minded” or “You’re too closed-minded”. This is presented as though it is actually a valid argument. In reality it just shows they have run out of arguments. They hide behind it to disguise the complete lack of any rational reason for you to accept what they are telling you. It's the last resort of someone who has nothing – if they had evidence they would obviously present it. 

Even so, it can seem compelling, since calling someone closed-minded is pejorative. But it’s fallacious rhetoric: doubting something is not necessarily closed minded. In fact, the closed minded ones are the believers who insist some fantastic story is true despite a complete lack of evidence to support it. They are too closed minded to accept that their fantasy might be false.

An open mind is…

Here’s the thing. An open mind is open to all ideas, but it must be open to the possibility that the idea could be true or false. It is not closed-minded to reject claims that make no sense. If you can’t accept the possibility that an idea might be false, then you are the closed minded one. An open minded person will critically examine all claims but will not accept them if there is no reason to believe they are true or if there is reason to believe they are false. To do so would be fallacious. And credulous.

The real problem

The “have an open mind” crowd are more than just logically wrong.  Their way of thinking is actually destructive to good ideas. Bad ideas should be discarded - by weeding out bad ideas the good can flourish. An earlier version of this argument would have gone, “You’re closed-minded in saying that humors don’t exist” to justify bloodletting. But by focusing uncritically on bloodletting, germ theory would never have been discovered. Germ theory was discovered by skeptical scientists who insisted on evidence, not by new-agers with open minds.

If you accept something when there is no reason to believe it is true you are just credulous. And if you will not reject something when there is no reason to believe in it then you are in freefall – you will believe in anything. This way of thinking is a complete dead end. Or to put it another way, don’t be so open minded that your brains fall out.

That’s better – my mind is now completely open!

 

 

Further reading

UK Skeptics have a good write up on this fallacy.

To see the fallacy in action, read some of the comments to my review of What the (bleep) do we know!? Start with this comment, then read this comment (and the rebuttals that follow them), but especially see this series of comments from Boney – see he stretches the have an open mind fallacy to amazing lengths.

Also, see this thread on JREF (long)