Anatomy of a Lie

     I frequently spend too much time scanning the headlines in Google News. In my defense, I will claim that it can serve a purpose as the propositions that appear in the mainstream news media may provide useful material for debunking in this blog.
    This morning, my attention was gotten by the headline "Arizona's rugged individualism poses barrier to mask rules." 
     The article, dated July 19, 2020, was unsurprisingly written from a "consensus" point of view: that wearing masks can mitigate the spread of the virus. Many Arizonans, the article claims, don't agree with mask-wearing because of their individualist (read "selfish") culture.
     OK, I thought, cultural differences are "de gustibus non est disputandum," and the writer wants to attract attention by pandering to his readership's prejudices. I could write a similar essay that denigrated the subjective preferences of his readership if a large corporation like ABC would pay me to do it. It's all part of freedom of speech and the marketplace of ideas.
      Then I came across this statement: 

"...the state [Arizona] has become one of the world’s top hot spots for the spread of the coronavirus."

     Whoa. Am I living in one of the top hot spots for the spread of the coronavirus? I consulted what I take to be an authoritative source for coronavirus statistics in Arizona: the Arizona Department of Health Services website's "Data Dashboard."
    There are various statistics provided on the Dashboard, but the one that relates to "hot spot for the spread of the coronavirus" must surely be "Confirmed COVID-19 Cases by Day." According to the bar graph, there was a peak of reported cases on June 29 (5,396). The daily number of reported cases has been falling precipitously since then, and the number for July 19 (yesterday) was 30.
     So how can I be living in a top hot spot for the spread of the coronavirus when the Confirmed Cases by Day are falling precipitously? It depends on the metrics for "hot spot for the spread of the coronavirus." In the article, we are not told what these metrics are, so we'll have to guess.
     Here are the latest statistics on new cases on either July 18 or 19, depending on last day reported, for randomly-selected states:

California: 9,329
New York: 519
Pennsylvania: 683
Florida: 10,508
Texas: 7,300
Arizona: 30

     So obviously, Arizona is not a "hot spot" in terms of absolute numbers. Must be some sort of ratio, like cases per 100,000 population. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1109004/coronavirus-covid19-cases-rate-us-americans-by-state/

Cases per 100,000 population (top four in US)
Arizona = 1973
New York = 2091
New Jersey = 1990
Louisiana = 1973

     Gosh, Arizona is in the top four states as of July 20. But wait; this number 1973 seems to be based on the total number of cases since the start of the pandemic! Can an aggregation of cases over a period of several months support the statement "...the state has become one of the world’s top hot spots for the spread of the coronavirus?"
     It seems misleading, to say the least, to say that Arizona "has become" a hot spot based on counting cases that happened in the past when current case numbers have fallen precipitously. One could perhaps have made such a statement two weeks ago, but at this point in time, it's a misrepresentation.

Thanks Again to Sheriff Lamb

     We read in the Arizona City Independent of June 24, 1990 the headline “Lamb still opposes Ducey's stay-at-home order” subtitled “Even as he is diagnosed with COVID-19.”

While ostensibly a reporting of facts, it seemed to me that the authors of the article were trying to suggest something. The use of the word “even” in “Even as he is diagnosed with COVID-19” implies that the fact that Sheriff Lamb was diagnosed with COVID-19 should cause him to reconsider his previous stance on Ducey's stay-at-home order.

     Let's look at how this line of reasoning plays out in syllogistic form:

---Lamb opposed Ducey's stay-at-home order

---Lamb contracted COVID-19

---Therefore, Lamb should retract his opposition to the stay-at-home order

     Obviously, this makes no sense. Since the authors of the article didn't make a clear argument, I can of course be accused of attributing to them an argument they never intended (straw-manning). However, I believe their use of the word “even” in the subtitle of the article justifies an attempt at trying to reconstruct an argument that uses the fact of Sheriff Lamb's contraction of COVID-19 to impugn his stance on the stay-at-home order.

     Let's try again.

---Lamb oppose Ducey's stay-at-home order

---As a result, people in Pinal County were infected with COVID-19

---Lamb was one of those people

---Therefore, Lamb should retract his opposition to the stay-at-home order

     There is an unstated assumption: if people had obeyed Ducey's stay-at-home order, there would have been no COVID-19 infections. I don't believe many would try to defend this proposition. Clever people would likely put it in a milder form: “if people had obeyed Ducey's stay-at-home order, there would have been fewer COVID-19 infections.” But in that case, we can no longer link Sheriff Lamb's opposition to the stay-at-home order to his COVID-19 infection, as he might have been infected no matter what his stance had been.

     There is also the matter of the assumption that the danger of COVID-19 infection warrants the abrogation of individual rights of self-ownership and property. I've dealt with this topic in several recent blog posts and so will not repeat myself at this time.

     In any case, I'd like to thank Sheriff Lamb for his continuing courageous stance on the COVID-19 hysteria.