Catch-23

Most of us are familiar with the term Catch-22. It originated from the book with the same title and it is used colloquially to refer to an impossible logical dilemma. Wrongfully, most people understand catch-22 to be a no-win (lose-lose) situation. While the difference should be obvious to some,others have a harder time recognizing which one is which.

An example of a no-win situation (and therefore, NOT a catch-22) would be for example, a woman who sees her son being beaten up by the father. If she calls child protection services, her son will be taken away from her—but if she does nothing, the child will continue to be beaten up. Regardless of the choice the woman takes, the outcome will be unfavorable.

This is not the meaning of “Catch-22”. As explained by Joseph Heller—the author of the book Catch-22— it refers to an impossible logical dilemma. In the book, John Yossarian, who is the main character, doesn’t want to fly in combat, so he seeks to be declared “unfit to fly”. If you are declared “unfit to fly” you are grounded and not allowed to fly in combat missions or otherwise. For someone to be declared “unfit to fly”, they must be willing to take unreasonably dangerous missions. However, the only way to be declared “unfit to fly”, such person must first ask for an evaluation. But if a pilot requests an evaluation, they are regarded as sane, and therefore “fit for flight”. If the pilot does not request an evaluation, he will never get one. This way, there is no possible way to be declared unfit to fly. As you can see, there is no way a pilot can be declared unfit to fly. This is a true catch-22.

I thought it was important to make this distinction so that there are no misunderstandings as you read what follows. My term, Catch-23 is based on the impossible dilemma of catch-22, but it refers to faulty reasoning to which many religious people succumb. I’m going to focus in religion which is the topic where I hear it the most, but it is not exclusive to it.
Catch-23 is the rearranging of reasoning, according of the outcome, in order to fit a certain prejudice, belief or idea. It is impossible to argue against a catch-23 because regardless of the outcome, it is impossible to prove wrong. In fact, when using catch-23, any outcome constitutes “proof” of the argument. This faulty logic might be difficult to point out, because the argument is intuitively correct.

Example 1

When looking at a healthy beautiful baby a person might say: “Look at this baby’s perfection. This is proof that God exists”.

Or

When looking at a baby with a debilitating disorder a person might say: “Look at this baby’s misfortune. This is proof that God works in mysterious ways”.

Example 2

After leaving a certain church, a man who used to do relatively well loses his job, loses most of his money and becomes gravely ill. Someone might argue that God is punishing him for leaving the church.

Or

That same man who does relatively well quits the church. Soon afterwards, he gets a great job, starts making lots of money and becomes very successful. Someone might argue that the devil is trying to keep him away from God.

As you can tell from both examples—regardless of the outcome—the argument for God is valid. It is a catch-23. This sort of logical fallacy is very common in conspiracy theories, in which absence of evidence is evidence itself. This is why arguing against conspiracy theorists is so difficult. If there was evidence that could be produced to support their claim, they would point to it. Since they don’t have any evidence because they believe it is a cover up or something of the sort, it is evidence for their claim.

Catching a catch-23 in regular conversation might be a little more challenging than it seems. Precisely because of the way it is constructed, an argument that can never fail is quite appealing. It is used often in rhetoric by both, the people who know are using it, and by those who probable don’t realize it.

In the scientific method, it is of extreme importance to use a null hypothesis. When I first learned about the null hypothesis, I did not really understand why it was so significant to recognize which way you could disprove your argument. In fact, many authors argue that when you are doing Science, you should always look to disprove your hypothesis (prove your null hypothesis), instead of trying to prove your hypothesis (disprove your null hypothesis). Working this way, it is less likely to commit a Type I or Type II error, since you are trying to prove yourself wrong and not the other way around. When using a Catch-23 there can be no null hypothesis because any outcome would prove the hypothesis. Of course, most rhetoric that contains a Catch-23 is not based on Science, or rational thinking for that matter.