Angle 'Wipeout'? How about 'Post hoc ergo propter hoc' fallacy?

There are two possibilities at work with the latest Angle ad ‘Wipeout’:

1- Sharron Angle and staff never took a course in logic, and are innocently missing the obvious logical fallacies of their so-called ‘arguments’.

2- Sharron Angle and her staff - and their GOP handlers - don’t care about logical fallacies as long as it stirs up a constituency too ignorant to note them.

I’m going with the more cynical view of number 2.

Here is an example of how a ‘post hoc ergo propter hoc’ fallacy might look:

Since Sharron Angle declared her candidacy for Harry Reid’s Senate seat, Nevada’s economy has worsened.Therefore, Sharron Angle is responsible for our more recent economic decline.

The following are actually ‘cum hoc ergo propter hoc’ fallacies (see below for the distinction between the two):

Sharron Angle made the observation that sporting goods stores were unable to keep ammunition in stock. From this, she concluded that the nation “is fearful” and arming themselves against some sort of massive breakdown in governance.

Sharron Angle concludes that since women both get abortions and breast cancer, abortions therefore cause breast cancer.

So, for those who aren’t up on logical fallacies, the first one is generally referred to as ‘post hoc ergo propter hoc’ or more simply “Since that event followed this one, that event must have been caused by this one.” This is standard fare in GOP and Tea Party ‘arguments’, so you will see a lot of examples.

This is subtly different from a very similar- but equally popular GOP logical fallacy: ‘cum hoc ergo propter hoc’ or correlation doesn’t imply causation argument. The difference between the two is the time element.

In the case of Angle’s newest ad ‘Wipeout’, she draws the correlation that A- the economy tanked with homes losing their value,  it must have been caused by Harry Reid simply because B- He’s the Senate Majority Leader. Sort of like A- Harry Reid became Senate Majority Leader. B- the economy tanked after he assumed that position.  Therefore Reid must have caused the economic crash.

This begs the issue of economic policy being the provenence of the President and his economic team, and not the Senate Majority Leader. It also ignores this obvious timeline that suggests - no, actually screams - that this mess began more than 30 years ago with the gutting of financial regulation (Glass-Steagall Act ) by Republicans, and then was given the final push over the brink by the irresponsible and reckless Bush White House economic policy.

Here’s how it works:

The form of the post hoc fallacy can be expressed as follows:

• A occurred, then B occurred.
• Therefore, A caused B.

When B is undesirable, this pattern is often extended in reverse: Avoiding A will prevent B.

One class of examples is sometimes called the “Rooster Syndrome”: “giving credit to the rooster’s crowing for the rising of the sun”.

Here is final, serious example:

More and more young people are attending high schools and colleges today than ever before. Yet there is more juvenile delinquency and more alienation among the young. This makes it clear that these young people are being corrupted by their education.

Just so you can see the difference between the two logical fallacies - and they are subtle - here is how a ‘cum hoc ergo propter hoc’ fallacy works:

The cum hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy can be expressed as follows:

1. A occurs in correlation with B.
2. Therefore, A causes B.

In this type of logical fallacy, one makes a premature conclusion about causality after observing only a correlation between two or more factors. Generally, if one factor (A) is observed to only be correlated with another factor (B), it is sometimes taken for granted that A is causing B even when no evidence supports this. This is a logical fallacy because there are at least five possibilities:

1. A may be the cause of B.
2. B may be the cause of A.
3. some unknown third factor C may actually be the cause of both A and B.
4. there may be a combination of the above three relationships. For example, B may be the cause of A at the same time as A is the cause of B (contradicting that the only relationship between A and B is that A causes B). This describes a self-reinforcing system.
5. the “relationship” is a coincidence or so complex or indirect that it is more effectively called a coincidence (i.e. two events occurring at the same time that have no direct relationship to each other besides the fact that they are occurring at the same time). A larger sample size helps to reduce the chance of a coincidence, unless there is a systematic error in the experiment.

In other words, there can be no conclusion made regarding the existence or the direction of a cause and effect relationship only from the fact that A and B are correlated. Determining whether there is an actual cause and effect relationship requires further investigation, even when the relationship between A and B is statistically significant, a large effect size is observed, or a large part of the variance is explained.

This logical fallacy doesn’t have the time element. Synchronicity is the key, and it is generally referred to as: ‘Correlation doesn’t imply causation’.

Now, gentle reader, go forth and analyze Angle ads with logic as your sword.

-maven