Last Friday, I woke up to see that Donald Trump’s horrifying ramble about injecting disinfectant had gone viral. Before I even got out of bed, I grabbed some cartoons of a scientist and Trump from the Cranky Uncle book and posted the following cartoon:
Earlier this week, I outlined a method for analyzing misinformation: first, analyze whether the argument is logically valid. Next, if it’s not logically valid, add any unstated assumptions that make the argument valid. Finally, check if the premises are true. Today, Adam asked the following question:
I noticed the disinfectant debunking identified the fallacy as jumping to conclusions. While this one again identifies the fallacy as jumping to conclusions but then goes on to find the missing premise and identifies the fallacy for that premise. Why does the disinfectant fallacy remain at jumping to conclusions?
I confess, I read that comment and thought, why *didn’t* I go on to identify the missing premise and identify the fallacy in the argument? Why didn’t I practice what I preach?
The generous answer is that the suggestion of injecting disinfectant is so ridiculous, it doesn’t bear critical thinking analysis. But that conclusion is, well, jumping to conclusions! The more accurate and harsh answer is haste and laziness – I rushed out the cartoon without taking the time to systematically think through the argument. That was an oversight (and demonstration of the universal human condition that we overwhelmingly tend towards fast, automatic thinking rather than slow, rational thinking).
So let me attempt to redress that oversight by taking a more systematic deconstruction and analysis of Trump’s statement. The first step is to deconstruct the statement into an argument structure, consisting of premises and conclusion:
The next step is to assess whether this argument is logically valid: if the premise is true, does it follow logically that the conclusion is true? The answer is no: this argument is logically invalid. Just because disinfectant kills COVID on hard surfaces does not necessarily mean it will cure COVID inside our bodies. So we need to add any unstated assumptions or hidden premises to this argument, in order to make it logically valid.
Looking closer at this second premise, we see that yes, disinfectants would kill viruses in our body. The problem, however, is that it would also kill our bodies! This extra premise commits the fallacy of oversimplification. It fails to take into account why disinfectants are effective – because they’re indiscriminate destroyers. They not only kill viruses, they also kill human cells.
I love that I was challenged to apply my own critical thinking methodology to the disinfectant argument. It demonstrated that people are absorbing this critical thinking approach and following my own advice led to deeper thinking about this argument. So please keep challenging me and I also welcome suggestions of analogies that help visualize the bad logic in misinformation!
Tom Burns
Wasn’t Trump talking about light as a disinfectant? Are you jumping to conclusions by talking about injecting liquid disinfectants?
John Cook
If I was misrepresenting Trump’s words, it would be a straw man fallacy (which is included in our FLICC taxonomy). But you can read the whole transcript here. Trump first talked about light, then transitioned to disinfectants as an alternative solution. Just prior to this in the briefing, they were talking about disinfectants as liquids, such as bleach.
Adam
My question about disinfectant debunking cartoon sparked the post above, thank you for your response.
I have a follow up question about the jumping to conclusions fallacy. The flow chart in a previous post (https://crankyuncle.com/critical-thinking-about-covid-19-lowered-expectations/) suggests that this fallacy is possible even after adding the missing premise. Would you be able to point me to some examples where an argument commits the jumping to conclusions fallacy even after adding the missing premise?
As for parallel arguments, things have to go pretty extreme with Trump’s disinfectant fallacy. I was thinking of going nuclear: a H-bomb produces a tremendous amount of heat when detonated so it would be interesting to look into denoting H-bombs in our cities during winter?