Examples Of Confusion Of Causation
In the 21st century, science has developed to an unbelievable extent. There are so many scientific phenomenons that scientists nowadays, have numerous ways to prove the scientific credibility of an object or a product. While, it is also the human nature to believe in the things they want or wish to happen in real life. Therefore, if products in the market say “lose your weight up to 40 pounds a week”, “build up abs in just 1 week” or “get taller by 6” in just a month”, people tend to believe these, because they wish this to happen. Whereas, they ignore the fact that there is no scientific proof or credibility that proves that these products work. Due to such human thinking, this pseudoscience is still prevailing in our modern society. People
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in our modern societies tend to let down their critical thinking power, and that very moment they unknowingly promotes the absurd pseudoscience products and believes. The biology-online website defines pseudoscience as “Any body of knowledge, methodology, belief, or practice purported to be scientific but which fails to comply with the scientific method, lacks supporting evidence, or cannot be tested in practice or in principle.” If we go out in the market especially into a drug store, or watching TV commercials at home, we can find lots of examples of such products that claims to do wonders, but does not carry any scientific proof for healing or functioning as it says on their labels or in advertisements on TV.
In the video “Here Be Dragons”, the producer/presenter, Brain Dunning emphasized on pseudoscience beliefs in modern world like psychic readers, tarot card readers, medical supplement products in the market, ancient believes etc. He tries to aware the modern societies of the dangers of these pseudoscience products that does nothing more than having you waste your money on these. He provides his understanding and knowledge of these believes and denotes them as “Red Flags” and appeals the society to remain alert from them. Some examples of “Red Flags” are, Appeal to authority, Ancient wisdom, Red herring, Proof by verbosity, confusion of causation and correlation etc. I would be focusing on the “Confusion of Causation and Correlation” red flag, because this is the most prevailing pseudoscience in the present society.
“Confusion of Causation and Correlation” is a logical fallacy by which we assume that the two things that happened together have a cause and effect relationship.
If two things tend to occur at same instance of time, there is a high possibility that people will believe them to be inter-related. Dunning also provides few examples of “Confusion of Causation and Correlation” in his video, e.g. it is believed that autism in young children is caused by vaccination, but the reality is that the age at which a child is supposed to get vaccine, autism becomes apparent at the same age too. Therefore, unknowingly, some people have developed a cause and correlation between autism and vaccination. There is a product named “Hollywood 48 hours Miracle Diet”, that is in the market for quite a long time, at least more than a year. This supplement claims to have you lose 10 pounds of your weight in just 2 days. Isn’t that sounds great? Almost every person who has gained some weight wants to lose it, and what could be a quicker method than this? My cousin thought the same and tried this self claimed “miraculous” product which costs him $20 just for a single 32oz. bottle. He came to me the next weekend and told me that he lost 6 pounds in just one week, not 10 pounds in 2 days, but still better than nothing. He loved this product and also told his friends to buy one too. It is just great how they advertise their products to catch the customers. I looked up on their website and I saw some catchy …show more content…
lines written on their page to attract the customers like “Want to make a splash in sexy swimsuit in just 2 days?”, “Over 15 million bottles sold”, “Lose weight naturally, while you cleanse, detoxify and rejuvenate your body” or “the secret of Stars!”. All they leave behind is the main part, which they do not highlight in bold letter like those above lines. When I looked down on the details and usage of product, I was amazed to see how they make a fool out of people. The users of this product are advised not to consume heavy food, alcohol beverages, while using this product. Moreover, they ask you to drink at least 8 glasses of water daily, maintain a consistent healthy diet plan and exercise regularly. If that is what their requirements are, then who needs a supplement? If someone is eating a healthy diet, drinking lots of water, reduces alcohol consumption and exercises regularly, he/she will be losing some weight, doesn’t matter whether they are taking any supplement or not. The same thing I explained to my cousin and asked him to stop drinking his “miraculous” drink and try the same usage routine they want you to maintain for one week and see the result. After one week when I asked him that does it made any difference, he said, he was such an idiot for taking that supplement and wasting his money, because he lost the same amount of weight he was losing while using that. Then he understood that it was not the product that caused it, it is the routine, the diet, the exercise you do and follow that makes a difference. That was a clear example of “Confusion of Causation and Correlation”, as my cousin believed that weight loss happened when he used the drink, but he ignored the fact that he started on a balanced diet and started doing exercise, which he never did before. There are countless examples of such products nowadays, because we, the people like things quick and easy. These companies make profit out of this thinking. Also, if we look at the products carefully, we could find that these products are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
We need to be aware of these, what Dunning calls “Red Flags”.
There are so many products out in the market with big labels claiming to do amazing miracles, but just aims at getting money out of your pocket. Science has developed a lot and we need to keep up with it and start understanding the facts rather than just keeping up with the beliefs. FDA is putting every single effort to make sure that the citizens consume a better product. We need to have faith in them and appreciate the work they are putting in. If an event takes place, first look onto the scientific side of that, why did it occurred and then make any assumptions rather than straight away assuming that it happened because of another event taking place somewhere. Believe me you will save a lot of money which you are spending on these ineffective products, and will be remaining healthy and secure of the side-effects of these
products.
Works cited
“48 hour Miracle Diet-32oz. bottle”. Hollywood Diet. Sunset Health Products Inc. web. 13 September2010. <http://www.hollywoodcookiediet.coiom/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=28>
Here be Dragons- An Introduction to Critical Thinking. By Brian Dunning. Creative Commons Attribution. 13 September 2010. <http://herebedragonsmovie.com/>
in our modern societies tend to let down their critical thinking power, and that very moment they unknowingly promotes the absurd pseudoscience products and believes. The biology-online website defines pseudoscience as “Any body of knowledge, methodology, belief, or practice purported to be scientific but which fails to comply with the scientific method, lacks supporting evidence, or cannot be tested in practice or in principle.” If we go out in the market especially into a drug store, or watching TV commercials at home, we can find lots of examples of such products that claims to do wonders, but does not carry any scientific proof for healing or functioning as it says on their labels or in advertisements on TV.
In the video “Here Be Dragons”, the producer/presenter, Brain Dunning emphasized on pseudoscience beliefs in modern world like psychic readers, tarot card readers, medical supplement products in the market, ancient believes etc. He tries to aware the modern societies of the dangers of these pseudoscience products that does nothing more than having you waste your money on these. He provides his understanding and knowledge of these believes and denotes them as “Red Flags” and appeals the society to remain alert from them. Some examples of “Red Flags” are, Appeal to authority, Ancient wisdom, Red herring, Proof by verbosity, confusion of causation and correlation etc. I would be focusing on the “Confusion of Causation and Correlation” red flag, because this is the most prevailing pseudoscience in the present society.
“Confusion of Causation and Correlation” is a logical fallacy by which we assume that the two things that happened together have a cause and effect relationship.
If two things tend to occur at same instance of time, there is a high possibility that people will believe them to be inter-related. Dunning also provides few examples of “Confusion of Causation and Correlation” in his video, e.g. it is believed that autism in young children is caused by vaccination, but the reality is that the age at which a child is supposed to get vaccine, autism becomes apparent at the same age too. Therefore, unknowingly, some people have developed a cause and correlation between autism and vaccination. There is a product named “Hollywood 48 hours Miracle Diet”, that is in the market for quite a long time, at least more than a year. This supplement claims to have you lose 10 pounds of your weight in just 2 days. Isn’t that sounds great? Almost every person who has gained some weight wants to lose it, and what could be a quicker method than this? My cousin thought the same and tried this self claimed “miraculous” product which costs him $20 just for a single 32oz. bottle. He came to me the next weekend and told me that he lost 6 pounds in just one week, not 10 pounds in 2 days, but still better than nothing. He loved this product and also told his friends to buy one too. It is just great how they advertise their products to catch the customers. I looked up on their website and I saw some catchy …show more content…
lines written on their page to attract the customers like “Want to make a splash in sexy swimsuit in just 2 days?”, “Over 15 million bottles sold”, “Lose weight naturally, while you cleanse, detoxify and rejuvenate your body” or “the secret of Stars!”. All they leave behind is the main part, which they do not highlight in bold letter like those above lines. When I looked down on the details and usage of product, I was amazed to see how they make a fool out of people. The users of this product are advised not to consume heavy food, alcohol beverages, while using this product. Moreover, they ask you to drink at least 8 glasses of water daily, maintain a consistent healthy diet plan and exercise regularly. If that is what their requirements are, then who needs a supplement? If someone is eating a healthy diet, drinking lots of water, reduces alcohol consumption and exercises regularly, he/she will be losing some weight, doesn’t matter whether they are taking any supplement or not. The same thing I explained to my cousin and asked him to stop drinking his “miraculous” drink and try the same usage routine they want you to maintain for one week and see the result. After one week when I asked him that does it made any difference, he said, he was such an idiot for taking that supplement and wasting his money, because he lost the same amount of weight he was losing while using that. Then he understood that it was not the product that caused it, it is the routine, the diet, the exercise you do and follow that makes a difference. That was a clear example of “Confusion of Causation and Correlation”, as my cousin believed that weight loss happened when he used the drink, but he ignored the fact that he started on a balanced diet and started doing exercise, which he never did before. There are countless examples of such products nowadays, because we, the people like things quick and easy. These companies make profit out of this thinking. Also, if we look at the products carefully, we could find that these products are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
We need to be aware of these, what Dunning calls “Red Flags”.
There are so many products out in the market with big labels claiming to do amazing miracles, but just aims at getting money out of your pocket. Science has developed a lot and we need to keep up with it and start understanding the facts rather than just keeping up with the beliefs. FDA is putting every single effort to make sure that the citizens consume a better product. We need to have faith in them and appreciate the work they are putting in. If an event takes place, first look onto the scientific side of that, why did it occurred and then make any assumptions rather than straight away assuming that it happened because of another event taking place somewhere. Believe me you will save a lot of money which you are spending on these ineffective products, and will be remaining healthy and secure of the side-effects of these
products.
Works cited
“48 hour Miracle Diet-32oz. bottle”. Hollywood Diet. Sunset Health Products Inc. web. 13 September2010. <http://www.hollywoodcookiediet.coiom/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=28>
Here be Dragons- An Introduction to Critical Thinking. By Brian Dunning. Creative Commons Attribution. 13 September 2010. <http://herebedragonsmovie.com/>