False Analogy
There are forms of logic that affect our thinking. For example, critical thinkers use the following forms in analyzing concepts or problems: cause and effect, classification and division, comparison and contrast, example, and analogy. There are others of course, but the purpose of this podcast is to issue a warning about carrying concepts beyond the boundaries of logic.
The scientific method is brilliant and has led to amazing insights into nature. In this podcast, I want to focus on analogy.
Analogy is a comparison between two things that are generally unlike but have similar characteristics. Analogy is part of our everyday language and is expressed in comparison and contrast, simile, metaphor, classification, and division.
Analogy often expresses itself in humorous exaggeration. For example, if someone says,
“I am famished. I could eat a horse.”
They are comparing themselves to vultures who feed on the dead, suggesting there is no end to their hunger. It is false, of course, but it is not taken literally. It expresses a feeling, not a reality.
We wouldn’t call the speaker a liar nor would we expect them to eat a dead horse. Much of our language is lighthearted exaggeration that teaches a separate truth.
However, we are in tune with each other and do not hold people to the literal meaning of their words.
But in this podcast, I want to bring to your attention the inherent dangers in patterned thinking. I specifically want to talk about the pitfalls of false analogy.
There are two kinds of analogy. One is literal and the other is figurative.
A literal analogy would be something like this.
“Paul’s head is higher than the ceiling.”
One can test the analogy by taking a tape measure and measuring the room from floor to ceiling. Let’s say the ceiling is 6’ 5”. For the statement to be true, Paul must be taller than 6’5”.
A figurative analogy would be something like this.
“Paul, my four-year-old, is as tall as an adult giraffe and weighs as much as a great blue whale.”
Even Goliath was only about 9 feet. An adult male giraffe may reach 18 feet. But no one accuses the proud mother of lying. They just assume that Paul at age 4 is perhaps a little taller than other boys of his age and a little overweight.
The fallacy of false analogy occurs when one carries a literal analogy too far or when one mistakes figurative analogy for a literal analogy.
False analogy is at the core of our political problems today.
The following are the dangerous analogies that are destroying our democratic republic.
1. Man is an animal.
2. Man is a machine.
3. Man is a biological robot.
4. Man is an accidental collocation of atoms.
Compare the above scientific views of man with the Christian view of man. The following is the foundation of the Christian view of man.
26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. (Genesis 1:26-27)
The above was written by Moses. Later prophets give us further insight into our relationship with God. We are taught that God is the father of our spirits
