{Reason in Science [continued]}[13th September 1989]

[Redbook6:250-251][19890913:0927b]{Reason in Science [continued]}[13th September 1989]

19890913.0927

[continued]

The same problem* appears to arise in the review [photocopied into the ms] on the left.** In the first paragraph,*** the problem lies in the use of ‘cause’.

If I understand the statistics aright, in any large group of heavy smokers, compared with non[-]smokers, twice as many will die from heart disease caused by heavy smoking and ten times as many will die from lung cancer caused by heavy smoking. Therefore heavy smoking is more likely to cause – ie be “the” (or a) cause of – a lung cancer than of a heart disease, ie 10/2 times more likely in fact, on the assumption that there are no other causes at work. The fact that three times as many smokers die of self-induced coronary illness than die of lung cancer shows merely that that there are other causes at work.

To put it another way, the statistics suggest that if you persuade a [heavy] smoker to give up smoking he will reduce his chances of lung cancer death by about 10 times and his chances of heart disease death by about 2 times. As the former represents a greater improvement in chance of survival than the latter, government campaigns are not (in this respect) misconceived.

(I admit that the issues are not quite so clear to me as in the previous example).*

*[See last previous entry]

**[Review: Rational views of irrationalists, Stuart Sutherland, New Scientist, 09091989]

***’Perhaps Aristotle’s most egregious error was to define “man” as a “rational animal”.**** Consider the following information: in Great Britain more than 200,000 people die each year from heart disease, while about 40,000 die from lung cancer. Heavy smoking approximately doubles one’s chance of dying from heart disease, and increases the chance of dying of lung cancer by a factor of about 10. Most people will conclude that smoking is more likely to cause cancer than heart disease and indeed both in Britain and elsewhere government campaigns against smoking have been largely based on this assumption. But it is false. If one takes into account the greater frequency of heart disease, then for every smoker who brings lung cancer on himself or herself there will be about three who die of self-induced coronary illness.’

****{And didn’t Aristotle say: ‘ανθροπος φυσει πολιτiοκον ζωον’ – ‘Man is (by nature) a political animal’? {– Politics} (Oxford Dict[ionary] of Quotations)}

– Yes, but apparently he also said ‘Man is a rational animal’ – Aristotle, ‘Ethics’ (Penguin) – Introduction <891214/13>.

[Or did he say that Man had a rational principle in addition to the instinctual life he shares with other animals, which was taken up by scholastic philosophy as man being a rational animal?]

[continues]

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