THINKER'S ALMANAC - July 17

Subject:  Burden of Proof - Russell’s Teapot

Event:  Dorothy Kenyon cleared of false accusations, 1950

After the end of World War II, many began to fear that Communists were infiltrating the American government.  Capitalizing on these fears, Senator Joseph R. McCarthy of Wisconsin began to make accusations, saying he had a list of Communists working in the State Department.  

In 1950, the U.S. Senate formed a committee to investigate McCarthy’s claims.  The first case brought before the committee was that of Dorothy Kenyon (1888-1972), a judge and activist.  Although Kenyon was on the record as being anti-communist, McCarthy claimed she was a member of a number of organizations that served as communist fronts.  In reality, several of the communist organizations that McCarthy named did not even exist.  

McCarthy’s tactic in the case against Kenyon is a logical fallacy called the Argument from Ignorance (also known as the Appeal to Ignorance).  This fallacy is committed when someone asserts that because a claim has not been proven false, it is, therefore, true.  For example, imagine if someone asserts the following:  There is no evidence that UFOs are not visiting Earth; therefore, we can conclude that UFOs do exist.

The key to correcting the Argument from Ignorance fallacy is to focus on the burden of proof.  In our court system, for example, the burden of proof is on the person who makes the claim.  Therefore, if your friend claims that UFOs exist, or if the State charges you with a crime, they have the burden of proof and must support their claim with evidence.  

In the case against Dorothy Kenyon, the members rightfully recognized that McCarthey had no proof to support his claim and did not allow the case to become a witchhunt by allowing McCarthey to shift the burden of proof.  All charges against Kenyon were dismissed on July 17, 1950.  Despite McCarthy’s attempted smears against her, Kenyon continued to work into her 80s for the public good.  She worked with the ACLU to promote women’s rights and also worked to provide legal services to the poor. 

  Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Writing in 1952, the philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) used an analogy involving a teapot to illustrate the Argument from Ignorance: 

If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. 

The lesson from Russell’s teapot and from the life of Dorothy Kenyon is to retain a healthy skepticism about the world and to pay attention to who is making claims and, therefore, who is responsible for the burden of proof.

Challenge:  Mind the Thinking Gap

Create a public service announcement (PSA) for one of the following logical fallacies.  Include a clear definition, examples, and a warning of why this type of erroneous thinking is dangerous.

Straw Man, Slippery Slope, Hasty Generalization, Begging the Question

Sources:

1-Cox, Elizabeth.  Can You Outsmart the Fallacy that Started a Witch Hunt?  TED-ed Oct 26, 2020.

2-Russell, Bertrand.  “Is There a God?” unpublished article for Illustrated magazine, 1952.