FALACY OF CONCLUSIONS- by DJ.
Man by instinct evaluate facts and arrive at conclusions quite in consonance with his own interests, likes and dislikes. This seldom leads him to wrong decisions, which has no relevance to the ground reality. The learned Doctor was addressing a congregation of youths espousing the cause of non-alcoholism. To demonstrate his point the Doctor placed two glass jars on the table. One jar he filled with pure water and the other he filled with alcohol. As the audience watched on the Doctor put some worms in the pure water. The worms instantaneously swam around and appeared very active. Then he took some worms and put in the other jar containing the alcohol. In a few minutes all the worms in the second jar became motionless and dead. Then the Doctor explained that the worms in the second jar died because they could not withstand the poisonous nature of alcohol. He then concluded that human beings consuming alcohol regularly would face the fate of the worms in the second jar. He felt satisfied that he could hammer home to the youth the dangers the alcohol carry with it. When it came to reply to the toast, one of the students came to the dais and thanked the Doctor for his valuable advice. Then to the surprise of all, the student declared that he would make it a practice to take some alcohol before going to bed every day to ensure that all the worms inside his stomach causing stomach problems could be eliminated once and for all.From the above story it can be seen that we explain things quite in line with our interests and likes. In this process other aspects or factual positions will not find favor with our thinking process. We hear at times statements to the effect that the Holey Bible favors and encourages drinking habits. To support this line of thinking they quote Poulos Aposthalan who advises Themotheos to take some wine in addition to the water he drank so as to get relief from his tiredness and to rejuvenate his health. It has been conveniently forgotten that this advice was given at a period of time when there were limited medicines and wine was considered as a medicine to be consumed within the limits of prescription. Since it is convenient for holding to their drinking habits, they forget the fact that there are innumerous quotes in the Holy Books underlying the hazards of the alcoholic drinks.A few friends assemble to spent together a pleasant evening over a cup of tea. One of them exceptionally well dressed being congratulated by the others for his turnout. But the other instead of feeling happy and proud feels being made fun of. Instead of accepting the good remarks in a positive mindset, he questions whether he was not decently dressed every other day. Here the negative thinking process takes control of his evaluations and conclusions perhaps because of his inferiority complex which had the effect of spoiling the fine moments of the group.
With an intention to procure and read a specific book two different individuals goes to the entire book stores one after the other with little success. At the end of their futile efforts both of them analyses the situation according to their individual mindset. One feels that the book he was after was not a best seller. To support his rationale he thinks that the Book Stores have not ordered for that book for fear of dead stocks due to lack of readership and demand. A decision is taken based on this conclusion that the book need not be read. The other gentleman think that the book being a best seller is sold out like hot cakes from every bookshelf, which quite often happens with good books in heavy demand. Based on this conclusion he makes up his mind to search for the book elsewhere so that he does not miss the opportunity to read the same at the earliest opportunity. Such conclusions and decisions based on our line of thinking may turn out to be wrong conclusions and decisions at times.In view of the forgoing, to make life more meaningfuland the human relationships stronger and happier bondages we have to cultivate the habit of approaching decision making process as an honest attempt at factual assessment of every details before us. If we find our emotions controlling our thinking process we should immediately recognize it as a mental weakness and make sincere attempts to come out of the same. We should take the initiative to engage in communication with knowledgeable persons to enable us to gather the right information needed to make threadbare analysis and. factual assessment of the information collected from different sources. Decisions made based on such exercises would produce most favorable results in every sphere of our activity. Effective exercise at self-examination in this context includes the following.What is the rationale behind my thinking in a particular line instead of the other?How did I arrive at the specific conclusion? What evidence I have in support of my findings? Once we are able to answer these questions to our sincere satisfaction our assessments and decisions could not go wrong.