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Guilt by Association Fallacy?

Most of the people in new york are criminals.

Therefore everyone you met are likely to be criminals.

asked on Wednesday, Jan 26, 2022 12:02:25 AM by

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Answers

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Bo Bennett, PhD
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No, this is not an ad hominem (guilt by association) . This is general non sequitur . It is a false statement/claim with a conclusion that does not follow. If the premise were true, the conclusion would be "Therefore most of the New Yorker's you met are likely to be criminals." Even this assumes an equally likely chance of meeting a criminal vs. non-criminal, which is unlikely to be the case.

answered on Wednesday, Jan 26, 2022 06:24:59 AM by Bo Bennett, PhD

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account no longer exists writes:

What if I told 

"90% of miracles have been proven wrong therefore 10% of miracles (which haven't been proven wrong) are likely to be false/wrong."

I heard people saying this is a fallacy and wrong.

posted on Wednesday, Jan 26, 2022 09:38:42 PM
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Bo Bennett, PhD writes:
[To Lynx Ssss]

Of course, I think all alleged miracles are "wrong" (i.e., have a naturalistic explanation), but I would say this is problematic at the least if not fallacious. It is a poor use of induction . It assumes phenomena that can be explained 90% of the time has the same explanation the other 10%. There is no basis for this. We can say that alleged miracles are likely false for many legitimate reasons; we don't need to use a poor inductive argument.

[ login to reply ] posted on Thursday, Jan 27, 2022 07:39:59 AM
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account no longer exists writes:

[To Bo Bennett, PhD]

Well I am not saying that, maybe I should have explained it in details but I am not saying the miracles can be explained 90% of the time has the same explanation the other 10%. I was saying 90% of the same miracles have been proven wrong, say people rising from graves it is proven 90% of the time it is wrong it doesn't matter if they have different or same explanation and 10% of which hasn't yet been proven wrong or proven right, but will it be valid to assume it is unlikely that other 10% is true?

[ login to reply ] posted on Thursday, Jan 27, 2022 08:44:03 AM
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Bo Bennett, PhD writes:
[To Lynx Ssss]

This is still poor reasoning. The 10% could be completely independent of the 90%.

Consider the inductive reasoning that the sun has risen every day in recorded history so it will likely rise tomorrow. The sun could explode for some reason tonight, but it is highly unlikely given the number of successful sun rises (billions). We can say it is likely the sun will rise tomorrow. What we cannot say is that is likely that out of the all days (past and future) that the sun will rise. See the difference? If you wanted to claim that given all the alleged miracles that have been demonstrated to be false, the chances of this one alleged miracle is false , then this would be a good use of inductive reasoning. But we can't use that same reasoning to say that all the unknowns are probably false as well.

It is probably more true that 99% of alleged miracles have not been proven false and 1% have. Millions of people make miraculous claims every day and they are just too pedestrian to be falsified or unfalsifiable (e.g., "I had a dream about my friend and he called! I am psychic!"). So your ratio would be way off to begin with (starting with a false premise).

[ login to reply ] posted on Thursday, Jan 27, 2022 09:31:47 AM
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account no longer exists writes:
[To Bo Bennett, PhD]

Ok

[ login to reply ] posted on Thursday, Jan 27, 2022 09:59:23 PM
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TrappedPrior (RotE)
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The first premise is false, that's the problem. Most New Yorkers aren't criminal. They're just New Yorkers.

Since P1 is false, it does not imply conclusion C).

answered on Wednesday, Jan 26, 2022 04:42:21 AM by TrappedPrior (RotE)

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Ed F writes:

In determining whether a conclusion is implied by the premises, the truth of the premises is not relevant.   The issue is  if the premises were true, does the conclusion follow (or probably follow)?    

This would be a valid argument even though all of the premises are false:

Most of the people in New York are criminals.   Criminals are admirable people.  Therefore, most of the people in New York are admirable people.     

Because the premises are false, the argument is unsound, but there is no fallacy in the inference from the premises to the conclusion.

posted on Wednesday, Jan 26, 2022 10:16:22 AM
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TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:
[To Ed F]

I'm aware; the faulty premise 1 is just what caught my attention first.

[ login to reply ] posted on Thursday, Jan 27, 2022 11:25:04 AM