A soft reminder to always be looking for logical fallacies: This quote was smushed into an opinion piece about OpenGL:
Blizzard always releases Mac versions of their games simultaneously, and they’re one of the most successful game companies in the world! If they’re doing something in a different way from everyone else, then their way is probably right.
It really does surprise me how often people do things like this.
“I guess it’s just a genetic flaw in humans,” said Amichai Shulman, the chief technology officer at Imperva, which makes software for blocking hackers. “We’ve been following the same patterns since the 1990s.”
Blizzard always releases Mac versions of their games simultaneously, and they’re one of the most successful game companies in the world! If they’re doing something in a different way from everyone else, then their way is probably right.
This isn’t an example of a logical fallacy; it could be read that way if the conclusion was “their way must be right” or something like that. As it is, the heuristic is “X is successful and Y is part of X’s business plan, so Y probably leads to success”.
If you think their planning is no better than chance, or that Y usually only works when combined with other factors, then disagreeing with this heuristic makes sense. Otherwise, it seems like it should work most of the time.
Affirming the consequent, in general, is a good heuristic.
Within the context of the article, the bigger form of the argument can be phrased as such:
DirectX is not cross-platform
OpenGL is cross-platform
Blizzard is successful
Blizzard releases cross-platform software
It is more successful to release cross-platform software
It is more successful to use OpenGL than DirectX
This is bad and wrong. As a snap judgement, it is likely that releasing cross-platform software is a more successful thing to do but using that snap judgement to build bigger arguments is dangerous.
As it is, the heuristic is “X is successful and Y is part of X’s business plan, so Y probably leads to success”.
But Y doesn’t lead to success. If I say, “Blizzard is successful and making video games is part of their business plan, so making video games probably leads to success,” something should be obviously wrong. Why would it be true if I use “always releases Mac versions of their games simultaneously” instead of “makes video games”?
If you think their planning is no better than chance, or that Y usually only works when combined with other factors, then disagreeing with this heuristic makes sense. Otherwise, it seems like it should work most of the time.
As far as I can tell, the emphasized part is the whole reason you should be careful. Picking one part out of a business plan is stupid. If you know enough about the subject material to determine whether that part of the business plan is applicable to whatever you are doing, fair enough, but this is a judgement call above and beyond the statements given in this example.
Affirming the consequent, in general, is a good heuristic.
A soft reminder to always be looking for logical fallacies: This quote was smushed into an opinion piece about OpenGL:
Oops.
It really does surprise me how often people do things like this.
This is a quote from someone being interviewed about bad but common passwords. Would this be labeled a semantic stopsign, or a fake explanation, or …?
Fake explanation—he noticed a pattern and picked something which can cause that kind of pattern, without checking if it would cause that pattern.
This isn’t an example of a logical fallacy; it could be read that way if the conclusion was “their way must be right” or something like that. As it is, the heuristic is “X is successful and Y is part of X’s business plan, so Y probably leads to success”.
If you think their planning is no better than chance, or that Y usually only works when combined with other factors, then disagreeing with this heuristic makes sense. Otherwise, it seems like it should work most of the time.
Affirming the consequent, in general, is a good heuristic.
Within the context of the article, the bigger form of the argument can be phrased as such:
This is bad and wrong. As a snap judgement, it is likely that releasing cross-platform software is a more successful thing to do but using that snap judgement to build bigger arguments is dangerous.
This is an example of an appeal from authority and fallacy of division.
But Y doesn’t lead to success. If I say, “Blizzard is successful and making video games is part of their business plan, so making video games probably leads to success,” something should be obviously wrong. Why would it be true if I use “always releases Mac versions of their games simultaneously” instead of “makes video games”?
As far as I can tell, the emphasized part is the whole reason you should be careful. Picking one part out of a business plan is stupid. If you know enough about the subject material to determine whether that part of the business plan is applicable to whatever you are doing, fair enough, but this is a judgement call above and beyond the statements given in this example.
Maybe, but it is still a logical fallacy.