ext_27571 ([identity profile] philmophlegm.livejournal.com) wrote in [personal profile] philmophlegm 2010-03-11 09:25 am (UTC)

I'm trying to stay with you on the science here. (Bear in mind I haven't done any science since GCSE, and I haven't done any biology since I was 14.) Is what is happening something like:

Someone has done a study that (for example) suggests something of a correlation between people who eat more than the average amount of stilton and people who get cancer of the little fingernail, and then extrapolated that to say that I (as an individual) should eat less stilton because "stilton has been shown to be a cause of fingernail cancer"?

That would be false logic along the lines of:
A and B are sometimes found together, therefore A is a cause of B.
I've ranted before on the subject of false logic. Is this anotber example?

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