Pages

Friday, January 16, 2015

Watch your logic

One of the most common mistakes in logic is the "false dichotomy" or "false dilemma." In America this most commonly takes the form of assuming there are only two choices: the government does it or no one does it.

Let's take education for example. If you are against public school obviously you don't believe in education.

No, not true. You may just know enough history to know that we had a higher literacy level before the government got involved, when parents and charities (mostly churches) paid the bill instead of the government.

If we outlawed government school (radical idea, I know) history tells us every church in the country would open its own private school as would a whole lot of other people. We would have way more choices in education, including free (privately donation funded) charity schools.

The same logic fallacy is being used in nearly every area in our culture.

No comments:

Post a Comment