11-8-90 Thursday. George [Herbert Walker] Bush is in trouble again, this time for “comparing” Saddam Hussein (the Iraqi president) to Adolf Hitler. In a televised speech, Bush said that Hussein had gassed his own people (the Kurds)—“something even Hitler didn’t do”. Well! Political pundits and social critics have jumped all over Bush. How dare he compare Hussein to Hitler! To do so is to make light of the atrocities Hitler committed, for, as bad as Hussein is, he’s not in the same ballpark as Hitler. They’re as different as night and day. Much as it pains me to defend Bush, he’s right (that is to say, innocent) about this one. To say that Hussein and Hitler are alike in one respect, or even that Hussein is worse than Hitler in some respect, is not to say that they’re alike in other respects or that, on balance, Hussein is worse than Hitler. From the fact that mice and elephants have hearts, it hardly follows that mice and elephants are the same size, or that they have many or most things in common. Why are people so stupid? Why do they jump to ridiculous conclusions from the most innocuous of statements? They reason as follows:
1. Bush said that Hussein did something bad that Hitler didn’t do.
Therefore,
2. Bush believes that Hussein is worse than Hitler (from 1).
3. Hussein has done only a few bad things.
Therefore,
4. Bush believes that Hitler did only a few bad things (from 2 and 3).
People begin with Bush’s statement and jump to the conclusion that he trivializes Hitler’s monstrous actions. The problem is that proposition 2 is ambiguous. It could mean either
2a. Bush believes that Hussein is worse than Hitler in one respect.
or
2b. Bush believes that, on balance, Hussein is worse than Hitler.
Proposition 2a follows from 1, but 2a and 3 do not entail 4; hence, on the first interpretation, the reasoning is fallacious. Proposition 2b, together with 3, does entail 4, but 2b does not follow from 1; hence, on the second interpretation, the reasoning is fallacious. So either way the reasoning is fallacious. The person making the argument trades on the ambiguity of proposition 2 to reach his or her desired conclusion. Public discourse is in a bad way, as this example shows.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 