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0 pointslutusp13y ago0 comments

> Then you just stand up and point out that TSA never caught a single terrorist ...

Your conclusion doesn't follow from your premise -- you're using flawed logic. What would you think of an oncologist whose patients never contract serious, life-threatening cancer? Is he ordering unnecessary tests and procedures on people who aren't really sick, or is he catching all the cancers so early that they're never life-threatening?

See the point? I'm certainly not arguing one way or another about the TSA, just that your argument contains a very serious logical flaw. Maybe terrorists, knowing about the TSA, won't take the risk of going near an airport.

> ... so there's no reason to believe it would have handled this incident.

Flawed argument, flawed conclusion.

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3 comments · 1 top-level

flyinRyan13y ago· 2 in thread

>What would you think of an oncologist whose patients never contract serious, life-threatening cancer?

Since the science tells us that his methods reduce the rate of cancer (all metrics we can test to a degree), I'd think he's doing good work.

TSA, on the other hand, has been been called out by many actual security professionals for having shit practices that don't actually work. They're basically pulling a rain man scam and people like you are buying into it because you think there's no way to prove it hasn't magically stopped something we didn't even hear about. Actual professionals who don't have money invested in one conclusion or the other are saying it isn't helping anything.

lutuspOP13y ago

> TSA, on the other hand, has been been called out by many actual security professionals for having shit practices that don't actually work.

Yes, that's true, but (a) those "professionals" have no better logical basis than you do, and (b) this doesn't change the fact that you were using flawed logic, my only reason for posting. The fact that there haven't been any terrorist arrests at airports doesn't mean what you seem to think.

> They're basically pulling a rain man scam ...

This is counterproductive. It might be true, it might be false, but it doesn't follow from the evidence. Again, I'm not taking a position on the TSA, only the logic.

> Actual professionals who don't have money invested in one conclusion or the other are saying it isn't helping anything.

Name one who is using an argument more scientific than "they haven't caught any terrorists!" And again, this is not about whether the claim is true, this is about the basis for deciding whether it's true.

flyinRyan13y ago

Actually you're wrong. At least one security expert has written up pretty good critiques of why the screening can't actually be doing anything.

Also, there are other ways terrorists could hurt us that would be much easier to exploit than getting on a plane. Why has this never been tried? There is just no reason to believe TSA is doing anything useful. The burden of proof lies with them and their extraordinary claims that they're somehow keeping us safe with their bullshit ineffective procedures.

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