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Topic: Texas sharpshooter fallacy

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	TEXAS SHARPSHOOTER FALLACY : Encyclopedia Entry
		The Texas sharpshooter fallacy is a logical fallacy where information that has no relationship is interpreted or manipulated until it appears to have meaning.
		The meaning arrived at by the fallacy is typically something the interpreter wishes to be true, but which cannot be confirmed with scientific trials, and would be interpreted differently by someone who was neutral.
		The fallacy is related to the clustering illusion, which refers to the tendency in human cognition to interpret patterns in randomness where none actually exist.
	www.bibleocean.com /OmniDefinition/Texas_sharpshooter_fallacy (444 words)

	Logical fallacy - Open Encyclopedia (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-15)
		A logical fallacy is an error in logical argument which is independent of the truth of the premises.
		Recognizing fallacies in practical arguments may be difficult since arguments are often structured using rhetorical patterns that obscure the logical connections between assertions.
		Fallacies are used frequently by pundits in the media and politics.
	open-encyclopedia.com /Fallacy (1868 words)

	Texas sharpshooter fallacy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		The Texas sharpshooter fallacy is a logical fallacy where a cluster of statistically non-significant data is taken from its context, and therefore incorrectly believed to have a common cause.
		The fallacy is closely related to the clustering illusion, which refers to the tendency in human cognition to interpret patterns in randomness where none actually exist.
		Attempts to find cryptograms in the works of William Shakespeare, which tended to report results only for those passages of Shakespeare for which the proposed decoding algorithm produced an intelligible result.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Texas_sharpshooter_fallacy (367 words)

	Logical fallacy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		A logical fallacy may mean nothing more than a fallacy or it may mean an error in deductive reasoning, i.e., a formal fallacy.
		In the latter case, it is a flaw in the structure of a deductive argument as opposed to an error in the premises.
		Recognizing fallacies in everyday arguments may be difficult since arguments are often embedded in rhetorical patterns that obscure the logical connections between statements.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Logical_fallacy (879 words)

	Introduction to Argumentative Fallacies
		Converse Fallacy of Accident: To treat an essential property of a certain kind of thing as though it were inessential or temporary; to forget or omit in the conclusion of an argument a circumstance or assumption that was essential to the truth of a premise, even if that assumption was only implicit.
		Fallacy of Composition: To assume that, because all the members of a group or parts of a whole have a property, the whole or the entire group must itself have that property.
		Texas Sharpshooter's Fallacy: To assume that random clusterings within a data set represent an underlying causal phenomenon, when in fact clusters are inevitable in a random distribution: a distribution that evenly covers a data space without bunches or clusters is not, in fact, random.
	people.vanderbilt.edu /~nat.vaprin/fall.html (3766 words)

	Logical fallacy
		As we illustrate with various examples, fallacies may also may exploit the emotions or intellectual or psychological weaknesses of the interlocutor.
		However, the interlocutor may believe some acts of killing are not wrong, for instance those carried out in self defense or in legitimate warfare; from the point of view the interlocutor, James commits the logical fallacy of begging the question.
		In the first case, the interlocutor is essentially conceding the point to James and in the second case James is not much better off than he was before he formulated the argument, since he now has to prove a more general assertion, one which is likely harder to prove.
	www.brainyencyclopedia.com /encyclopedia/l/lo/logical_fallacy.html (1833 words)

	Dr Smith's Logic Page
		Fallacies of Ambiguity and Fallacies of Grammatical Analogy.
		This is the "fallacy fallacy" of arguing that a conclusion is false because it has been presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
		The Texas sharpshooter fallacy is the name epidemiologists give to the clustering illusion - the clustering illusion is the intuition that random events which occur in clusters are not really random events, i.e, finding a statistically unusual number of cancers in a given neighborhood--such as six or seven times greater than the average.
	www.candleinthedark.com /informal.html (17499 words)

	Texas sharpshooter fallacy - Education - Information - Educational Resources - Encyclopedia - Music
		The Texas sharpshooter fallacy is a logical fallacy where a cluster of statistically non-significant data is taken from its context, and therefore thought to have a common cause.
		The fallacy is closely related to the clustering illusion, which refers to the tendency in human cognition to interpret patterns in randomness where none actually exist.
		One should be cautious not to dismiss a set of events which may have a shared underlying physical cause as being due to "fallacy." For example, engineers were aware of a problem with burnt o-rings that form the inter-segment seals for the solid rocket boosters for the Space Shuttle prior to the Challenger accident.
	www.music.us /education/T/Texas-sharpshooter-fallacy.htm (461 words)

	Logical Fallacy: Non Causa Pro Causa
		This is the most general fallacy of reasoning to conclusions about causality.
		However, inferring a false causal relation is often just a mistake, and it can be the result of reasoning which is as cogent as can be, since all reasoning to causal conclusions is ultimately inductive.
		Instead, to be fallacious, a causal argument must violate the canons of good reasoning about causation in some common or deceptive way.
	www.fallacyfiles.org /noncause.html (416 words)

	Logical fallacy at opensource encyclopedia (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-15)
		A logical fallacy is an error in logical argument or reasoning which is independent of the truth of the premises.
		Recognizing fallacies is often difficult, but it is important to be able to do so.
		Some fallacies are used frequently by pundits in the media and politics.
	wiki.tatet.com /Fallacy.html (1428 words)

	“Texas sharpshooter” fallacy
		He then draws a bullseye target round the bullet hole and claims to be a sharpshooter.
		The Texas sharpshooter paints the bullseye around the bullet hole AFTER firing the shot.
		The Texas sharpshooter thinks that a significant non-random event has occurred (he hit the bullseye using skill).
	www.stevehornsc.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk /Texas/SharpshooterExplain.htm (513 words)

	Re: Dramatic increase in overdoses linked to antidepressants
		Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy Type: Non Causa Pro Causa Etymology: The Texas sharpshooter is a fabled marksman who fires his gun randomly at th e side of a barn, then paints a bullseye around the spot where the most bullet holes cluster.
		Therefore, agent A causes disease D. Exposition: This fallacy occurs when someone jumps to the conclusion that a cluster in s ome data must be the result of a cause, usually one that it is clustered around.
		Exposure: This fallacy lives up to its striking name because the Texas sharpshooter ta kes a random cluster, and by drawing a target onto it makes it appear to be caus ally determined, as if the Texan were shooting at the target.
	www.pahealthsystems.com /message336374.html (702 words)

	The Business Innovation Insider: The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy (and Dick Cheney...)
		The story of this Texas shooter seems to have given its name to a fallacy first described in the field of epidemiology, which studies the way in which cases of disease cluster in a population...
		This fallacy lives up to its striking name because the Texas sharpshooter takes a random cluster, and by drawing a target onto it makes it appear to be causally determined, as if the Texan were shooting at the target.
		Or, in the case of Dick Cheney, the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy might go something like this: "The number of terrorists in Iraq is greater than would be expected by chance.
	www.businessinnovationinsider.com /2006/02/the_texas_sharpshooter_fallacy.php (559 words)

	Texas-sharpshooter fallacy
		The Texas-sharpshooter fallacy is the name epidemiologists give to the clustering illusion.
		Politicians, lawyers and some scientists tend to isolate clusters of diseases from their context, thereby giving the illusion of a causal connection between some environmental factor and the disease.
		The term refers to the story of the Texas sharpshooter who shoots holes in the side of a barn and then draws a bull's-eye around the bullet holes.
	skepdic.com /texas.html (164 words)

	Re: Dramatic increase in overdoses linked to antidepressants
		The Texas sharpshooter is a fabled marksman who fires his gun randomly at the
		fallacy first described in the field of epidemiology, which studies the way in
		This fallacy occurs when someone jumps to the conclusion that a cluster in some
	www.pahealthsystems.com /printthread.php?threadid=336374 (545 words)

	December 2004 Archives: Home Theater Blog \| Home Theater News & Reviews
		If you caught my DWIN TransVision 3 review, then you know I’m pretty enthusiastic about their projectors, but hey now their releasing one I might actually be able to afford.
		Suggested retail value for the system is $6,495 and it’s slated to be available in April of 2005.
		Without going into some spiel that would likely leave me looking like an audiogeek, suffice to say speakers are no more important to the end result of a home theater system than the Pirelli’s on a Porsche.
	www.hometheaterblog.com /hometheater/2004/12 (3606 words)

	Physics 3333 / CFB 3333 Lecture 36
		There is one more pattern to mention - the Texas Sharpshooter fallacy.
		In this flawed approach, the sharpshooter goes out and carefully shoots at a spot on the side of a barn, then locates the center of the pattern and paints the bullseye right over it!
		This relates to the technique of making "ballpark" estimates, which are rough calculations using rounded numbers to get an idea of the magnitude of a result.
	www.physics.smu.edu /~scalise/P3333sp04/lecture36 (738 words)

	Marin County has highest breast cancer rate in U.S ( Are abortions or Vegan diet the cause ? ) (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-15)
		In epidemiology, the clustering illusion is known as the Texas-sharpshooter fallacy.
		Kahneman and Tversky called it "belief in the Law of Small Numbers" because they identified the clustering illusion with the fallacy of assuming that the pattern of a large population will be replicated in all of its subsets.
		In logic, this fallacy is known as the fallacy of division, assuming that the parts must be exactly like the whole.
	www.freerepublic.com /focus/f-news/610285/posts (2245 words)

	The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy
		The Texas sharpshooter is a fabled marksman who fires his gun randomly at the side of a barn, then paints a bullseye around the spot where the most bullet holes cluster.
		This fallacy occurs when someone jumps to the conclusion that a cluster in some data must be the result of a cause, usually one that it is clustered around.
		The cluster may well be the result of chance, in which case it was not caused by anything.
	www.fallacyfiles.org /texsharp.html (340 words)

	Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy - EvoWiki
		This page is part of the EvoWiki encyclopedia of fallacies.
		The name comes from a fictitious Texas "sharpshooter" who fires a gun into the side of a barn, then draws a bullseye around the bullet hole.
		This is fallacious because it assumes that evolution had the goal of producing that particular structure.
	wiki.cotch.net /index.php/Texas_Sharpshooter_Fallacy (353 words)

	Availability heuristic (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-15)
		In this case, being asked to imagine the outcome actually made participants view it as less likely.
		Taking advantage of the availability heuristic in reasoning may commit the fallacy of misleading vividness.
		This phenomenon was first reported by psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, who also identified the representativeness heuristic.
	www.worldhistory.com /wiki/A/Availability-heuristic.htm (653 words)

	The Claremont Institute - Taking the Tort Reform Fight to the Trial Lawyers
		Jurors are deciding that penalizing those who had nothing directly to do with manufacturing asbestos is a far cry from justice.
		This spring, a jury in Fort Worth, Texas, generated headlines when it found against claimants who asserted that floor tile gave them cancer.
		Jurors concluded that the tile showed no greater release of asbestos than that which occurs in the air over the average city.
	www.claremont.org /writings/040712meroney.html (750 words)

	Vivid Kira (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-15)
		The logical fallacy of misleading vividness involves describing some occurrence in vivid detail, even if it is an exceptional occurrence, to convince someone that it is a problem.
		Though misleading vividness does nothing to support an argument logically, it can have a very strong psychological effect because of a cognitive heuristic called the availability heuristic.
		It would probably kill you and be much worse than being shot." This fallacy is a kind of hasty generalization when an inductive generalization is a necessary premise and a single (albeit vivid) example is not sufficient to support such a generalization.
	www.wwwtln.com /finance/197/vivid-kira.html (747 words)

	The Hindu Business Line : Of clustering illusions
		The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy is a closely related concept.
		It derives its name from a Texan who fires his gun randomly at the side of a barn.
		This fallacy is used to describe clustering illusions in epidemiology, a branch of medicine that studies transmission and control of disease.
	thehindubusinessline.com /iw/2004/08/29/stories/2004082900591400.htm (348 words)

	Tucson Weekly : currents : Cancer Wars
		They illustrate the argument with the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy, which goes like this: A stranger claiming to be a dead-on shot, able to hit any target, "proves" his skill by taking a random shot at the side of a barn.
		Then he goes and draws a target around the bullet hole, points out that his bullet is right in the middle of the target, and declares that this proves he's a sharpshooter.
		In this analogy, the bullet corresponds to a group of cancer cases; the circle around the hole is the area and period of time in which the cases appeared.
	www.tucsonweekly.com /gbase/currents/Content?oid=oid:53523 (5633 words)

	The Hindu Business Line : Of clustering illusions
		The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy is a closely related concept.
		It derives its name from a Texan who fires his gun randomly at the side of a barn.
		This fallacy is used to describe clustering illusions in epidemiology, a branch of medicine that studies transmission and control of disease.
	www.thehindubusinessline.com /iw/2004/08/29/stories/2004082900591400.htm (348 words)

	[blml] MI or CPU?
		I really don't see the point and I don't know which country "invented" the rule of coincidence.
		But I can assure you I know sufficient statistics to be aware of and avoid the fallacies you imagine and I trust that so do my fellow Directors.
		> > In my opinion, the only valid use of The Rule of > Coincidence (a use which avoids The Texas Sharpshooter > Fallacy) is not to compare a single lucky coincidence > by a pair against a field of multiple pairs, but rather > to compare multiple lucky coincidences by a single > pair.
	www.amsterdamned.org /pipermail/blml/2005-April/022400.html (603 words)

	TheAgitator.com: The Book of Fallacies: Comments
		This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial NoDerivs 2.5 License.
		The Adam Smith Institute offers a handy index of logical fallacies often used in argument.
		Of course, I'm a bit upset since my favorite fallacy, The Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy didn't make the Adam Smith Institute's list.
	www.theagitator.com /archives/014670.php (274 words)

	Creationism versus Scientific Evolution Theory: Debating - Search Database
		So when the creationist cries "a perfect bullseye", it means nothing.
		The Texas Sharpshooter fallacy (so named because the fallacy was first described as a Texan sharpshooter painting a bullseye around the hit rather than an archer)
		Key word searches always look for all of the search words, ie- Boolean "AND".
	www.creationtheory.org /Database/Article39 (342 words)

	LOGICAL FALLACY FACTS AND INFORMATION
		Fallacy_of_many_questions (also called ''complex question'', ''fallacy of presupposition'', ''loaded question'' or ''plurium interrogationum'')
		Lump_of_labour_fallacy (also called ''the fallacy of labour scarcity'')
		Logical Fallacies Online edition of Madsen Pirie 's Book of the Fallacy
	www.bluestarbase.com /logical_fallacy (738 words)

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