Hey, welcome back!
Ok, the new fallacy we’re talking about today might sound like Greek, but really it’s Latin, lol…it’s called “post hoc ergo propter hoc” which, when translated means ”after this, therefore, on account of this”. I know that’s a mouthful, and this fallacy is often shortened to Post Hoc, which means “after this”; or it’s also sometimes called False Cause. You’ll see why in a minute.
The Post Hoc fallacy is concluding that since X happened before Y, then X had to have caused Y.
A lot of superstitions actually come from this fallacy: I put my sox on my right foot first and my left foot second and we ended up winning the game, so I’m going to do it that way before the next game, too! Was the order I put my socks on REALLY the reason we won the game? Not likely, but I’d like to believe it was.
Here’s a real example that happened to me: One of the first elections I was able to vote in was when Bill Clinton was first elected into office. At the time, I lived in Wisconsin, and obviously, the election happened during the winter. Well, in Wisconsin, the winters are pretty rough…there’s a lot of lake effects coming off of Lake Michigan, causing lots of snow and dull, dreary skies. Well, the saying that was going around was this: It’s been 20 days since Clinton got into office and the sun hasn’t shone once…It’s been 35 days since Clinton was elected and the sun still has yet to appear.
The fallacy here is that because Clinton got elected and then we had a run of cloudy days, therefore, Clinton’s election must have caused the dreary weather! Lol! I was in college at the time and hadn’t learned about this Post Hoc fallacy, but even then, I knew this line of reasoning didn’t make any sense. The weather was gray & dreary b/c that's what it was always like in Wisconsin during the winter! It would have been like that regardless of who had won the election!
Based on this example, you can also see why this fallacy is sometimes called the False Cause fallacy. It’s attributing a false cause to a certain outcome. You may also have heard the phrase “Correlation isn’t Causation” That’s pretty much the same thing we’re talking about here. It’s saying that just b/c two things seem to be related, it doesn’t mean that one caused the other.
Here’s the problem with this error in thinking: it’s based on an assumption that may not be correct. And remember what we said about ideas back in episode 4? All action is the result of ideas. If you don’t test your ideas to see if they’re really true, you’re going to take action on something that’s either harmlessly inaccurate, or, worse, dangerously wrong.
Let me give you another example of a meme I saw last year during the olympics: US Women’s Soccer Team at the Olympics. One picture shows them kneeling during the National Anthem before the game started, and the next picture shows them losing in the Olympics. I don’t remember exactly what the caption says, but the gist of it was making the conclusion that the reason they lost in the Olympics was because they had knelt during the National Anthem. Now, I’m not a fan of kneeling during the Anthem, but this meme was definitely committing the Post Hoc fallacy. Is it really true that kneeling is what caused them to lose? Maybe the other team was just better than them! Maybe they were just ‘off’ that day. Maybe they were jetlagged or the coach was bad, I have no idea. Guess what…teams lose, and there are a lot of reasons it happens. But just b/c this one thing happened first, doesn’t mean it CAUSED the latter.
Question to ask yourself: Is it really true that this is the thing that CAUSED that outcome or could there be another more likely cause? *repeat*
I am so glad you’re joining me in learning how to think well! Next time, we’ll be talking about a fallacy called the Ad Hominem attack.
Remember: When you learn HOW to think, you will no longer fall prey to those who are trying to tell you what THEY want you to think and it all starts with asking one simple question: “Is that really true?”
