Troythulu’s Top 20 Logical Fallacies #11

This, the 11th installment in my series of posts on questionable reasoning, deals with what has been known since the time of Enlightenment philosopher David Hume as the Naturalistic Fallacy, and in passing, its opposite, the Moralistic Fallacy. Simply put, the former is the confusing of a statement of fact with a statement of subjective worth, a value judgement, without sound justification, and the latter is the confusion of a value judgement with a statement of fact. “Is” does not by necessity imply “Should be,” nor the reverse. Either is known as an informal fallacy. This post shall focus on the former, and its most common variation, the Appeal to Nature. The Appeal to Nature generally takes the form of the argument that because something is natural, it is right, good, safer or superior to something that is artificial, or because something is artificial, it is therefore inferior, undesirable, bad or wrong. For example:

[1] One argument using this fallacy may be that because someone tripped and injured his kneecap on a rock, it is correct to assume that the natural causation (gravity, and impact with a large piece of rock…) of the damage to his kneecap means that the damage is therefore right or desirable, and should thus not be treated by a physician. This is perhaps an extreme example, but it illustrates my point.

[2]…or the argument that something, such as sucrose, when artificial, is harmful to the body, though not when it is natural, is fallacious, because whether natural or synthetic, sucrose is exactly the same molecule regardless of how or where it is produced.

Because these last two examples are concerned with the goodness/badness or rightness/wrongness of something based on its origins they also variations of a genetic fallacy (q.v. Top 20 Logical Fallacies # 1 & 2…). There are many things of completely natural origin that are nonetheless quite unsafe, Arsenic and Uranium are two, the herbs Hemlock and Belladonna are two others, as well as all other animal, mineral, and plant toxins, such as Curare, Rattlesnake or even Platypus venom. Another variation is the assertion that behaviors and practices “found in nature” are good or more desirable than modern behaviors, such as some of our more detrimental evolved social instincts being “right,” even though in our modern technological society they no longer convey the survival benefits they did to our ancestors on the plains of Africa, now that we are a global species. For example, there is the myth that…

[1] Early humans were more in harmony with nature. Let’s examine this for a bit with a sample argument and its rebuttal…

[A]: We have annihilated diseases, each in its turn, that have threatened humankind, and we now lead longer, supposedly much more healthy, lives than at any point in history. However, newer and more resistant illnesses always seem to arrive out of the woodwork as quickly as the old ones are brought to heel. We might have greater life-expectancies, but that should not be taken to imply that we are healthier. Many of the treatments we subject ourselves to now are to treat the symptoms caused by other treatments. On average, modern people in developed countries spend more for health care than they spend on food. How long can ever more novel treatments continue to alleviate new illnesses? How many more great medical advances can we afford? How can our constant warfare with Nature continue to go on any longer without dire consequences?

[B]: It is true that pre-modern peoples lived in simpler ways, to be sure, but we should not mistake ignorance and poverty for harmony. It’s completely mythical that earlier peoples lived in harmony with nature. Nature ravaged them. Nature condemned them to early deaths. Their ignorance of the natural world kept them from accomplishing much in the way of material wealth. To dance to imaginary gods and spirits or to chant and pray for a child dying of bacterial infection is not living in harmony with nature; it is living very much without harmony. Nature is just doing what it does – failing to water the crops, growing bacteria within someone’s lungs – while human beings who are as ignorant of nature as nature is of human beings, moan, chant, pray, dance, build totems, burn leaves and twigs, all in fruitless, useless efforts to make things “right.” It’s us, with our knowledge of how to irrigate fields using science and engineering, and how to make and administer vaccines and antibiotics, who live more harmoniously with nature. We don’t demand miracles. We don’t expect nature to change the way it works merely because we arrogantly wish it to. We accept nature’s ways and work with them.

Well, that’s it for this installment, and as always, never let anyone else do yer thinkin’ for you. To paraphrase a local DJ in my hometown: Make it an awesome day!

(Last Update 1/1/2010, Link Added)