Base Rate Fallacy

Q.
What is Base Rate Fallacy, or Base Rate Neglect?

A.
Base rate fallacy, also called base rate neglect or base rate bias, is a formal fallacy. If presented with related base rate information (i.e. generic, general information) and specific information (information only pertaining to a certain case), the mind tends to ignore the former and focus on the latter. [1]

Wikipedia at

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_rate_fallacy

The last sentence: "the mind tends to ignore the former and focus on the latter." is the discussion of this article.

During the election campaign, we have a chat group which we discussed about the various propaganda of the political parties in the bid for the voters' attention.

Of course, there were numerous discontent on the issues of certain management of funds, the taxes and the unfairness among others. The pro-administration and opposition groups had various arguments. Both sides tried to validate their grounds and campaigned for the reasons of their supports and dissatisfaction of one over another.

The process of debate, if without moderator or scope can be both dangerous and damaging. This is the key reason that every debate or discussion need to be first given a theme and next allocated a time limit. Or else, the debate will easily get over heated, out of topic and end up in bad taste.

However, it is not this reason that base rate neglect is here for. The core of this so call psychological behaviour in our discussion is that the party(ies) in discussion (whether on the winning or losing side) tends to be myopic in its own view. This is a natural reaction of 'I am right, and you are wrong'. The party (especially the more dominant side) wants to attend victory, thus trying to out-do the other side. In-so-doing, self-professed fallacy is thus the culprit in causing failure in continual discussion.

For example, during the last State Election, the propaganda of the Opposition is to unite the various divides to attend a just and effective government. In fact, they always claim they are the just and effective but not the current administration - whichever government or country it may be. This is simple and easy to understand.

Some voters, after having evaluated the propaganda might vote in favour of the Opposition despite the fact that this propaganda actually did not appear similar to individual voter.

In order to give a 'base' to ease the discussion in this article, 'equality' is used.

Some voters may like the particular 'fight for equality' campaign but others may view this same campaign as 'lip service'. Yet, the overall picture of the campaign was successful because no census was taken for this 'fight for equality' campaign. In fact, the strategists who came out with these 'equality' tagline might have already known that it could never achieve such effect on certain voters, but yet went ahead with such tagline because there was no better option.

In fact, some thought that equality is important, some did not. Those did not had their reasons for not behaving the way it should because they have special rights, and equality did not sound favourable to them. Rather, it sounded detrimental to their existence!

This general information of 'not everyone is in favour of the equality' is in fact the root of the base rate fallacy. The earlier "equality is right" is 'specific information' and the latter "equality is not my preference" is 'generic or general information'.

In short, the strong feeling of 'equality is right' and the support for Opposition to fight for equality, blurred the judgment to a total outcome. The base - that not everyone view equality as 'equal', is neglected! Hence, the individual's view of the 'right' is facing against a bigger 'wrong'.

At this point, the outcome of the State Election proved that not everyone bought the propaganda of the Opposition. The overall voters in general discarded the notion that Opposition was fighting for their rights, and of course it was landslide victory for the government!

Hence, it is called 'Base Rate Neglect'. This neglect tends to draw its propagator to a fallacy - that what is not true (as it was imaginary and fictitious that everyone agreed with equality) now becomes the sole reason that this debate should be won!

This is psychological warfare in election. The Opposition would use tagline like "inequality" as emotional targets so that those who believe in these claims would firmly fight for the "rights" and discard the rationale thinking that not everyone agrees with such accusation.

But, again democracy is about everyone's right to an opinion, and cast a vote out of free choice. Despite, no man is an island. As a reasonable man on the street, especially in a society of many divides, realizing and having to accommodate the sentiment of the others is key to living in harmony.

This is especially so when the bigger populace is likely not going to buy the campaign of 'equality'. Therefore, to cast your vote for the winning candidate has to ride with the general sentiment. This is important. Or else, you will likely be a lone ranger, and nobody is going to hear your voice.

Remember, propaganda is cheap! The result of a wrong vote - thus the waste of it - is expensive!

Reflection
In Marketing, a FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) sale proposition has to appeal to the masses, not a specific group of segment. A slogan should be viewed as general as possible, thus not sub-selecting segment group. On the other hand, when position of a niche is selected - like a specialist product - its segment being identified - only then a specific slogan be used.

Ref:
Wikipedia search 'Base Rate Fallacy'
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