en-us 2026 A weblog for the Fallacy Files website. http://www.fallacyfiles.org/ Here are two headlines from about a year apart: "Heat claims more than 175,000 lives annually in Europe, latest data shows" & "Over 62,700 Deaths Associated with Record-breaking Heat During the Summer of 2024 in Europe".... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive062026.html#06142026 In a couple of previous entries, I explained how to use Venn diagrams to solve certain types of logic puzzle. In this one, I'll show how you can do so with Euler diagrams instead. I've previously explained the difference between these two types of diagram, so I won't do so again. Let's begin with an easy example; try to solve the following puzzle with any method you please, or none at all. Here are the clues:... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive062026.html#06042026 Woodpecker Woods (WW) is an ornithological nature preserve especially for woodpeckers. All but six of the woodpeckers in WW are Red-headed Woodpeckers. All but six of the woodpeckers in WW are Hairy Woodpeckers. All but six of the woodpeckers in WW are Red-bellied Woodpeckers. There are no other types of woodpecker in WW. How many woodpeckers are there in WW?... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive052026.html#05312026 The previous entry in this series concerned the bizarre and troublesome spread of phantom references, that is, citations to works that do not actually exist. Zombie citations are different from phantom ones: the latter are citations to works that never were, whereas the former are references to works that once were, but are no more, that is, a zombie citation is to a scholarly work that has been retracted. Like a zombie, a retracted work once lived but has now died, and it wants to eat your brain.... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive052026.html#05242026 There are two types of lies: lies of commission and lies of omission. A lie of commission is what we usually think of when we think of a lie, namely, an intentional untruth. Such lies violate the requirement when testifying under oath of speaking "the truth...and only the truth". In contrast, a lie of omission is the failure to tell a truth when it is required, as in testimony, where it violates the further requirement to speak "the whole truth". In other words, lies by omission are what are called "half-truths". Now, most of us are not lying by omission when we hold our tongues about something, because we are neither under oath nor otherwise required to tell the full truth. Journalists, in contrast, have a duty not to report by half-truths. It's not the job of reporters to hide from their readers what's really happening, but to describe it accurately.... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive052026.html#05132026 Opening a book at random, I found the following sentence: "That summer, in the hot cities where poor families lived in cellars and drank infested water, the children became sick in large numbers."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive052026.html#05062026 "The third assassination attempt on President Trump's life this weekend has reignited a debate between Left and Right about where political violence in America comes from. The Right points to the assassination attempts on the President, the murder of Charlie Kirk, the rise of Islamist terrorism, the rabid violence of the George Floyd riots, the elevation of political violence fan Hasan Piker to celebrity status in the Democratic Party, and the recent polling showing that the more liberal a person is, the more likely they are to support political violence."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive052026.html#05022026 Here's a puzzle for you: what's wrong with the following passage? "In 'The Making of the President 1964' (New York, 1965), Theodore White came to the conclusion that quotations had been utilized unfairly against the Republican candidate. ... Harvard economist and former ambassador to India John Kenneth Galbraith sharply dissented from White's...view. ... But Margaret L. Coit, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of a biography of John C. Calhoun, who had reviewed the White book elsewhere, wrote the 'Times' to take sharp exception to Galbraith's point of view."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive042026.html#04192026 "There is no foreign institution with which, in any basic sense, [the American presidency] can be compared, because, basically, there is no comparable foreign institution. The President of the United States is both more and less than a king; he is, also, both more and less than a Prime Minister."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive042026.html#04152026 A wretch may retch, you may feel wretched while retching, and reading "The Wretched of the Earth" may make you retch, but not all who retch are wretches.... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive042026.html#04042026 A reader writes to ask: "If I ride my bicycle one mile at thirty miles per hour (MPH) to the top of a hill, how fast will I have to coast down the other side for a mile to average sixty MPH for the whole two-mile trip? A friend told me ninety MPH but I can't get the math to work. Help!" Can you solve the reader's problem? http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive042026.html#04012026 "Science is going to be critical for tackling the big challenges that our society faces. ... We need it operating at its best to tackle these problems and, while science might look like a well-oiled machine spitting out findings to those glancing at it from the outside, it looks more like a clunky old engine prone to breakdown to those of us on the inside. ... In the pages ahead I am going to show how science, rather than being immune to the passions and politics of the outside world as it is meant to be, is shaped by these influences and increasingly being threatened by them. This is to all of our detriment. Yet, just because this is the way things have been does not meant this is the way they must remain. By studying how science has gone wrong in the past (and is going increasingly wrong today) we can learn how to keep it from going wrong in the future."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive032026.html#03192026 In previous entries, we've looked at how scholarly works--or non-scholarly works trying to pass as scholarly--can have too few notes or too many. Now, it's time to turn to the ways in which individual notes can mislead.... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive032026.html#03082026 There are two problems with the following headline: "Marine reserves help mitigate against climate change, say scientists"... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive032026.html#03052026 Every month, "Victor Timm's Mystery Magazine" conducts a survey of its readers to determine their most popular mystery writers. The list is ordered from one to five from favorite (1) to least liked (5). The same five writers, including Brand, made the list this month as last month, but each was in a different position. For instance, Christie rose in this month's rankings from last month. If you add together the digits of the positions from last month and this month, then the sum for Armstrong is seven, Christie's is eight, Doyle's is six, and Edwards' is five. From the information above, can you determine the positions of the top five mystery writers for both months? http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive032026.html#03032026 "The conspiracists work hard to give their written evidence the veneer of scholarship. The approach has been described as death by footnote."... http://www.fallacyfiles.org/archive022026.html#02092026