Notes about the chapter

Chapter 9

• A rival cause is a plausible alternative explanation that can explain why a certain outcome occurred.

1. When to look for rival causes

• Having good reason to believe that the writer or speaker is using evidence to support a claim about the cause of something.

• cause: to bring out, make happen, or affect

2. The pervasiveness of rival causes

• Detecting rival causes can help us better react to causal conclusions encoutered in our everyday personal relationships, past or ongoing world events, and results of research studies.

3. Detecting rival causes

• Can I think of any other way to interpret the evidence?

• What else might have caused this act or these findings?

• If I looked at this event from another point of view, what might I see as important causes?

• If this interpretation is incorrect, what other interpretation might makes sense?

4. The cause or a cause

• Fallacy: Causal Oversimplification: Explaining an event by relying on causal factors that are insufficient to account for the event or by overemphasizing the role of one or more of these factors.

5. Confusing causation with association

• Fallacy: Confusion of cause and effect: confusing the cause with the effect of an event or failing to recognize that the 2 events may be influencing each other.

• Fallacy: Neglect of a Common cause: Failure to recognize that 2 events may be related because of the effects of a common third factor.

6. Confusing "After this" with "Because of this"

• Fallacy: Post Hoc: Assuming that a particular event, B, is caused by another event, A, simply because B follows A in time.

• When many rival causes are found, factual claims about the causes of events are weakened.

• Things to consider:

1. Many kinds of events are open to explanation by rival causes.

2. Experts can examine the same evidence and discover different causes to explain it.

3. Most communicators will provide you with only their favored causes; the critical reader or listener must generate rival causes.

4. The more rival causes there are, the less certain a causal claim is.

5. Generating rival causes is a creative process; usually such causes will not be obvious.

• New fallacies related to causal reasoning.