No. 21 Appeals to Authority and the Crowd
Appeal to Nature
In Turkish: Doğaya Başvurma Safsatası
It’s natural, so it’s good. So is the poisonous mushroom.
Picked them in the forest, all natural. Natural can’t hurt you.
If they’re natural, lovely, I’ll fry them up tonight.
Snakes are natural too, Dursun. Let’s ask someone who knows mushrooms.
What is it?
Taking the fact that something is natural as proof that it’s good, healthy or right, and the fact that something is artificial as proof that it’s bad. Nature isn’t a well-meaning brand; snake venom, arsenic and hurricanes are natural too.
The pattern
- X is natural.
- Therefore X is good / safe / right.
Why it fails
The word “natural” gives a warm feeling: clean, innocent, old. Advertisers know this. But naturalness tells you nothing about contents; it doesn’t say what a plant does, only where it came from. And there’s a definition problem: is bread natural? Vaccines? Glasses? A stitched wound? The line gets drawn wherever it suits the speaker.
How to spot it
- The word “natural” stands where the evidence should be.
- “Artificial”, “chemical”, “synthetic” are used as insults without saying what they mean.
- Nature’s harmful side (poison, disease, cold) never gets a mention.
What to say
“What does being natural change? What’s in it, what does it do?” Recall nature’s bad examples: mushrooms, snakes, floods. Then return to the real question: “What’s the evidence it works?”
When it’s not a fallacy
Naturalness sometimes does carry information: saying a food is unprocessed or free of additives is a concrete claim with meaning. The known effects of things used for a long time are information too. The fallacy is putting “natural” on its own in place of evidence.
Examples
- Ads“100% natural ingredients.” Poison ivy is 100% natural.
- Health“Medicine is chemical, herbs are natural.” The active ingredient in the herb is a chemical too; the dose just isn’t known.
- Family“People used to live without vaccines.” The ones who lived, lived; the others didn’t.
- Shopping“A natural stone bracelet balances your energy.” The stone is natural; the claim isn’t.