Quote from the Handbook of Fallacies: (bolds mine)
"* PROOF BY SELECTED INSTANCES
Richard Feynman: "Many years ago I awoke in the dead of night in a cold
sweat, with the certain knowledge that a close relative had suddenly died. I
was so gripped with the haunting intensity of the experience that I was
afraid to place a long-distance phone call, for fear that the relative would
trip over the telephone cord (or something) and make the experience a self-
fulfilling prophecy. In fact, the relative is alive and well, and whatever
psychological roots the experience may have, it was not a reflection of an
imminent event in the real world. After my experience I did not write a
letter to an institute of parapsychology relating a compelling predictive
dream which was not borne out by reality. That is not a memorable letter.
But had the death I dreamt actually occurred, such a letter would have been
marked down as evidence for precognition. The hits are recorded, the misses
are not. Thus human nature unconsciously conspires to produce a biased
reporting of the frequency of such events. If enough independent phenomena
are studied and correlations sought, some will of course be found. If we
know only the coincidences and not the unsuccessful trials, we might believe
that an important finding has been made. Actually, it is only what
statisticians call the fallacy of the enumeration of favorable
circumstances." (Counting the hits and ignoring the misses.) "
I think that sums it up nicely. But hey, we can always use more "despite the total lack of evidence, I just think it must be true," contentions clouding the image.
gekko
"* PROOF BY SELECTED INSTANCES
Richard Feynman: "Many years ago I awoke in the dead of night in a cold
sweat, with the certain knowledge that a close relative had suddenly died. I
was so gripped with the haunting intensity of the experience that I was
afraid to place a long-distance phone call, for fear that the relative would
trip over the telephone cord (or something) and make the experience a self-
fulfilling prophecy. In fact, the relative is alive and well, and whatever
psychological roots the experience may have, it was not a reflection of an
imminent event in the real world. After my experience I did not write a
letter to an institute of parapsychology relating a compelling predictive
dream which was not borne out by reality. That is not a memorable letter.
But had the death I dreamt actually occurred, such a letter would have been
marked down as evidence for precognition. The hits are recorded, the misses
are not. Thus human nature unconsciously conspires to produce a biased
reporting of the frequency of such events. If enough independent phenomena
are studied and correlations sought, some will of course be found. If we
know only the coincidences and not the unsuccessful trials, we might believe
that an important finding has been made. Actually, it is only what
statisticians call the fallacy of the enumeration of favorable
circumstances." (Counting the hits and ignoring the misses.) "
I think that sums it up nicely. But hey, we can always use more "despite the total lack of evidence, I just think it must be true," contentions clouding the image.
gekko
"Life is sacred and you are not its steward. You have stewardship over it but you don't own it. You're making a choice to go through this, it's not just happening to you. You're inviting it, and in some ways delighting in it. It's not accidental or coincidental. You're choosing it. You have to realize you've made choices."
-Michael Ventura, "Letters@3AM"
-Michael Ventura, "Letters@3AM"