Is it the Perfectly Lazy Blog?

Retaliation by logical dissection of “The perfectly lazy Blog”

By Dr. Sohail Ansari

(The Perfect Lazy Blog

http://lazyperfectionist1.blogspot.com/2011/02/logical-fallacies-10-arguing-from-gaps.html)

(Excerpts (followed by my analysis) are from the piece of writing by some ‘great intellectual’ who rejects by the ‘logical arguments of his’ the Holocaust-denial arguments.)

            ‘I’m not really good with names, and as a result, I’m afraid I can’t for the life of me recall the name of the fellow who had this analysis done, but afterward, he was asked what he found and he responded by pointing out what he did not find: Zyklon B gas residue.  He therefore concluded that the brick in question must never have come into contact with such gas, therefore this building must never have been used this way, therefore the entire Holocaust must be a hoax.

            I got into the main problem with this conclusion in that video, but many so-called arguments which run afoul of logic and reason do so in more ways than one.  This is an example of the snapshot fallacy, and of affirming the antecedent, but also an example of the subject of this video.  You see, this character is trying to conclude something, not on the basis of evidence, but on the basis of lack of evidence.’

Lack of evidence is the evidence; for example a person died of the poison in milk. Lack of poison (poison is evidence) in milk exonerates milk and presence of it proves milk guilty. A fellow has put forward the absence of Zyklon B gas residue as the proof of the absence of Holocaust. 

‘Not knowing why the brick from a gas chamber lacks any Zyklon-B residue does not establish that the Holocaust is a hoax’.  

The sentence ‘Not knowing why bricks lacks any Zyklon-B’ clearly indicates the conviction on the part of the author that Zyklon B gas was used (this is a proven fact) but surprisingly bricks lacks any residue of gas. Here it is the interesting example of shifting the burden; one who believes that gas was used must find the reasons for its absence from brick; but one who believes that gas was not used proves his point by the lack of evidence( evidence is the presence of gas in brick). 

 ‘Another example I know of is religious, and it is the basis for all religious and theistic belief.  Picture for a moment a prehistoric setting.  A band of prehistoric human beings are just walking along, minding their own business and they pass a patch of bushes.  Just as they’re walking past, the bushes rustle.  Maybe it’s the wind.  Maybe it’s some kind of rodent digging a hole.  Or maybe it’s a predator preparing to pounce.

            Since these people don’t know which is the case, which assumption is the most prudent for them to make?  The third of course.  Better to err on the side of caution. Better to inadvertently take an unnecessary precaution than an unnecessary risk.

            Given the recurrence of this kind of scenario in a state of nature, we can conclude that, in prehistoric times, human beings who automatically made this assumption were favored by natural selection and survived to produce offspring who made the assumption as well, while those who didn’t fell victim to the predator in question and did not survive.

            Thus, evolution has spawned a race of humans who respond to the unknown by inferring a potentially-dangerous agent of some kind.  This is why children tend to fear the dark.  The dark conceals things from our reckoning’.

            

Fallacy of analogy:

What makes bushes rustle? It won’t be unknown for a long, if bushes rustle because of the wind; they must stop when wind stops, if bushes rustle because of rodents or predators so it will be known as soon as rodent or predator appears. People may get unafraid of the rustling of wind if it rustles always because of wind or always because of the rodent.

What darkness contains cannot be known as darkness is always unknown because it falls anew every evening; darkness when everything is fine may not cause fear but darkness when something sinister is expected may. Darkness is not same either; for example, darkness of jungle or darkness of unknown place are different from the darkness of one own room; and therefore reaction to them is different as well.    

            ‘Recently, I was exchanging e-mail with a Muslim fellow who tried to demonstrate god-existence to me by pointing to metabolic processes.  When death occurs, all of one’s metabolic processes don’t halt at the same time.  Some can take a few seconds, like lower brain activity.  Others can take several minutes, like the processes in the intestines.  There are even a few which can continue for days, like the growth of fingernails, toenails, and hair.  He asked me why this was the case.

            Now I have no doubt that a physiologist or a doctor could answer this question but I can’t.  Apparently, his answer to this is that God does it.

            Consider though.  What if all these processes did halt at the same time?  What would that indicate?  How would that be explained?  Observe that this “explanation” would work just as well in this case.’

When rational and reasonable criticism is impossible, one technique of propaganda works quite well: creating questions those can be proven silly through answers or quoting examples those appear silly defense of something. Existence of God cannot be proven as God is transcendental; consequently no example can work. One, however,   can analyze the effects of belief in God: compare hedonist, licentious and reprobate with pious and holy; and see who is more beneficial for a society. One who has the fear of accountability is always honest in his dealing with people; therefore, it is in our own interest to believe in God even we cannot prove His existence in a way one can prove things those can be proven through senses.  

            ‘Every fact in our possession is a fact we once did not possess’.  

Fact in our possession can sometime prove that a fact once we possessed is not a fact; for example, earth as the centre of the universe was no longer a fact once Galileo discovered the truth. Answer does not always conclusively close the question as answer is not necessarily being the right answer. Answer of the question ‘What is at the centre of universe?’ was proven wrong by Galileo, proving that fact in possession (earth is at the centre of universe) was not a fact.

‘Every question we are now able to answer we once couldn’t, and every question we don’t currently have the answer to we probably will one day’.  

Questions those are beyond the physical perception have no answers.

‘But in the process of finding those answers, we will find more questions.  Such is the nature of answers; they raise more questions.’ 

If it is always a case, I wonder what questions were raised when the  sun was found at the centre of the universe, perhaps questions such as ‘why sun is at the centre of the universe?’  ‘What would happen if sun refused to be at a centre?’ ‘What would happen if we manage to put earth at a centre and see sun follows earth or not?’ and so on.

‘Being human means never running out of questions; never having every answer; and that’s a good thing.  Because the moment we have every answer, the moment there are no answers left to seek, is the moment there are no discoveries left to make.’

Questions should be created by problems and answers must bring a meaningful difference in life; questions for the questions sake can prove questioner the silly lover of questions; for example, questions such as ‘how the life will be if we have two tongues because we have two ears?’; even after this question, one will still have the interesting discovery left to make: ‘Should we see as much from back as we see from front? If as much then we must get two eyes otherwise one eye will suffice at our back.

Not knowing the cause of a beloved canine’s death does not indicate murder.   

True, until and unless we single out a cause, we cannot say murder is a cause of death as murder is one of the many possible causes but if the cause of deaths is believed to be the gas in chamber and the and brick indicates the absence of it so it proves that no death occurred in a gas chamber.

‘Not knowing why the engine won’t run doesn’t make it gremlins’.  

Engine of a car never ran and it proved that people did not die because of the fault in the engine; not knowing why the engine did not run or why the gas was not used would not affect the conclusion.

‘Not knowing what’s on a certain part of the map doesn’t mean it’s dragons.’

It is different from knowing what is on a certain part of the map; for example, a person says that a certain part of the map has an ancient arrow and it proves that the map is 5000 years old; another person proves that a certain part of the map lacks an arrow; it is not knowing what is on a certain part but it is knowing what is not on a certain part of the map (it is knowing what brick does not contain; it is not knowing what is on a certain part of a brick).

‘Not knowing the processes which brought the Universe into existence does not consign us to accept the conclusion that it must be a god of some sort.’

Fine, but if God is not creator who else is? Answer is: we do not know and as long as we cannot find creator we must not give God the credit of creating universe. Let me tell you a brief story: A child invited his friend for the dinner; friend of his appreciated dishes but refused to believe the claim of a child that he had cooked them because it was something beyond a child. We must find someone except God who has power and capability to create universe and if we fail so we must assume that it must be God.

‘There is nothing intrinsically wrong with admitting it when you don’t know something.  There is something intrinsically wrong with denying it.  There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with not knowing something.  All it means is that you’re human. There’s nothing wrong with treating the unknown as the unknown.  Such, while not instinctive, is completely reasonable.’

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with admitting that we cannot know because it cannot be known; and there is something intrinsically wrong with denying transcendental. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with not knowing transcendental. All it means that we are humans. There is definitely something wrong with treating God as the absolutely unknown because though God can never be known through sense; God has revealed His will through His prophets and Holy Books. One must prove that all holy books are fabricated and all prophets are fictitious to treat God as absolutely unknown.

Not knowing something neither requires nor justifies the act of accepting the stories some folks just made up centuries ago.  Lack of knowledge equates to lack of evidence which can only be used to establish further lack of knowledge.  No structure may be erected on a foundation which consists of no thing more than a hole in the ground.  No sky-scraper can be built on thin air.

Due to lack of knowledge one accepts effect (holocaust) without a cause (gas) to establish further effects (international sympathy). One is really impressed by the wonders of the lack of evidence. Lack of evidence erects structure on a foundation which consists of nothing and builts sky scraper in thin air. Knowledge is knowing that proof has a lack of evidence and effect has a lack of cause.

The Perfectly Lazy Blog?

There is no effect without a cause; lazy man assumes apparently convincing reason to be a cause; for example, an old man dies of heart failure; and a lazy man without bothering to find out what was a cause says: ‘who would care to give poison to a man already old enough to die of heart failure: death must have been natural’.

Clever man creates confusion for a cause, so that all those people those know effect can never exactly know the cause.

Cleverest man creates a cause to create an effect to have intended effect; for example a cause (Zyklon B gas in gas chamber) effect (millions of innocent Jews died) and intended effect (international sympathy) and when someone uses up his intellectual shoe leather to pursue cause and finds it fabrication so it is:

‘You see, this character is trying to conclude something, not on the basis of evidence, but on the basis of lack of evidence.’

This is a perfect cleverest Blog.