Hoyle's Fallacy, sometimes called the junkyard tornado, is a term for Fred Hoyle's statistical analysis applied to evolutionary origins, in which he compares the probability of cellular life evolving to the chance of a tornado "sweeping through a junkyard" and assembling a functional aeroplane. Similar observations predate Hoyle and have been found all the way back to Darwin's time.
Read more about Hoyle's Fallacy: Hoyle's Statement, Details, Analysis, Reception
Famous quotes containing the words hoyle and/or fallacy:
“When in doubt, win the trick.”
—Edmond Hoyle (1672–1769)
“I’m not afraid of facts, I welcome facts but a congeries of facts is not equivalent to an idea. This is the essential fallacy of the so-called “scientific” mind. People who mistake facts for ideas are incomplete thinkers; they are gossips.”
—Cynthia Ozick (b. 1928)