> This is palin and simple: a confusion of cause and effect.
> The vast majority of people are stupid and have not the wit or
> imagination to think about what they eat. The vast unwashed masses
> therefore eat anything that comes their way.
> However this does not indicate that meat eaters are stupid becasue they
> eat meat, or that vegetarianism somehow improves intelligence.
> All it means is that most people who are vegetarians are bourgeois,
> above average intelligent people who have thought about food.
> There are also many meat eaters who have thought carefully about food
> and enjoy a great diet of meat, dairy and vegetables who are as smart
> as their more sensitive vegetarian friends.
>
Confusing Cause and Effect is a fallacy that has the following general
form:
A and B regularly occur together.
Therefore A is the cause of B.
This fallacy requires that there is not, in fact, a common cause that
actually causes both A and B.
This fallacy is committed when a person assumes that one event must
cause another just because the events occur together. More formally,
this fallacy involves drawing the conclusion that A is the cause of B
simply because A and B are in regular conjunction (and there is not a
common cause that is actually the cause of A and B). The mistake being
made is that the causal conclusion is being drawn without adequate
justification.
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/confusing-cause-and-effect.html
Questionable Cause
Description of Ignoring a Common Cause
This fallacy has the following general structure:
A and B are regularly connected
(but no third, common cause is
looked for).
Therefore A is the cause of B.
This fallacy is committed when it is concluded that one thing causes
another simply because they are regularly associated. More formally,
this fallacy is committed when it is concluded that A is the cause of B
simply because A and B are regularly connected. Further, the causal
conclusion is drawn without considering the possibility that a third
factor might be the cause of both A and B.
In many cases, the fallacy is quite evident. For example, if a person
claimed that a person's sneezing was caused by her watery eyes and he
simply ignored the fact that the woman was standing in a hay field, he
would have fallen prey to the fallacy of ignoring a common cause. In
this case, it would be reasonable to conclude that the woman's sneezing
and watering eyes was caused by an allergic reaction of some kind. In
other cases, it is not as evident that the fallacy is being comitted.
For example, a doctor might find a large amount of bacteria in one of
her patients and conclude that the bacteria are the cause of the
patient's illness. However, it might turn out that the bacteria are
actually harmless and that a virus is weakening the person, Thus, the
viruses would be the actual cause of the illness and growth of the
bacteria (the viruses would weaken the ability of the person's body to
resist the growth of the bacteria).
As noted in the discussion of other causal fallacies, causality is a
rather difficult matter. However, it is possible to avoid this fallacy
by taking due care. In the case of Ignoring a Common Cause, the key to
avoiding this fallacy is to be careful to check for other factors that
might be the actual cause of both the suspected cause and the suspected
effect. If a person fails to check for the possibility of a common
cause, then they will commit this fallacy. Thus, it is always a good
idea to always ask "could there be a third factor that is actually
causing both A and B?"
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ignoring-a-common-cause.html
Beware that confusions of cause and effects which may lead one to
ignore a common_cause, such as vegitarian or meat eating lifestyles of
"moderation," moderation which might be the root cause of health and
internal cleanliness.
> Lies, damn lies and statistics.
>
