Statistical Fallacies III: Volvo Fallacy

For more information on the Volvo fallacy, see:
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/volvofal.html

And special thanks to TrueNorth15
http://www.youtube.com/TrueNorth15

Music:
Volvo Driving Soccer Mom
by Everclear

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• statistics
• statistical
• fallacy
• fallacies
• volvo
• anecdotal
• anecdote
• volvofallacy
• anecdotalfallacy

[hunniebee173]

Fabulous! Nice job boys! <3 ya both!

...and just for you javi, *chomp*

[CousinoMacul]

<3333333

*bite*

[magicalhats15]

I think you're missing an important aspect of the problem. Suppose all other things are equal, and I ask my friend his opinion--and after hearing it I say "never mind, I'm going to buy the Volvo anyway." Now, this creates negative value, because my friend no longer believes I trust his opinion, and so by ignoring it I have strained our relationship. Given this insight, I think it is obvious that my friend's opinion is the tiebreaker.

[mickflyuk]

Interesting explanation.

Could you do something on the Israel/Palestinian situation, whereby groups firing random missiles into towns are 'good guys', according to the media, and all Palestinians are 'refugees' even though most of the original refugees are long dead.

Is the media and the general public being misled, or am I reading the statistics wrong?

[MistahJ77]

yes.. anecdotal evidence, while it shouldn't necessarily be discounted in every case (as the basis for further research), doesn't carry much weight. it's strange, but most people have a difficult time with this concept (evident by the number of people that believe in ghosts and UFOs).

[cecilyhayes]

Awesome!

[rozeboosje]

Excellent work, Javier!

[BallofJustice]

I think this is probably the most prevasive yet of all the fallacies in this series so far. In the book Freakanomics this is also mentioned quite a bit.

[sheepwshotguns]

well done, this is a fallacy i think we have all fallen to many times.

[VerbalDoeKint]

I love everclear.

Great video Javier.