Episode #1042

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        What's the Word

        Eco

        Name That Logical Fallacy

        I’m currently attempting a thru hike of the Pacific Crest Trail, and I’m in the Sierras currently and it is recommended that people car try an ice axe for the snowy areas so people can self arrest if they fall. I have heard a lot of people say they won’t bring an ice ax into the Sierras because they “don’t know how to use it anyways”. This feels like they are mostly trying to convince themselves that they don’t need to spend the money on an ice axe and they don’t need to carry the extra weight. But this argument of “I don’t want to bring it because I don’t know how to use it” feels like a logical fallacy to me. Though it is true that there are more effective ways to use an ice ax than others, it does feel like its main use is relatively simple in its design. The best analogy I can think of for this argument is like if you were in a boat and someone didn’t know how to swim well and had never been shown how to use a personal flotation device (PFD). So you hand them a PFD without any explanation on how to use it. The person then looks at the PFD and looks at you and says, no thanks, because I don’t know how to use the PFD perfectly I would just rather not have it with me. What logical fallacy do you think this would be? Alex Smith

        Science or Fiction

        Skeptical Quote of the Week.

        “What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.” – Werner Heisenberg