[SEQ RERUN] The Fallacy of Gray

MinibearRex

Today's post, The Fallacy of Gray was originally published on 07 January 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

Nothing is perfectly black or white. Everything is gray. However, this does not mean that everything is the same shade of gray. It may be impossible to completely eliminate bias, but it is still worth reducing bias.

Discuss the post here (rather than in the comments to the original post).

This post is part of the Rerunning the Sequences series, where we'll be going through Eliezer Yudkowsky's old posts in order so that people who are interested can (re-)read and discuss them. The previous post was But There's Still A Chance, Right?, and you can use the sequence_reruns tag or rss feed to follow the rest of the series.

Sequence reruns are a community-driven effort. You can participate by re-reading the sequence post, discussing it here, posting the next day's sequence reruns post, or summarizing forthcoming articles on the wiki. Go here for more details, or to have meta discussions about the Rerunning the Sequences series.

Today's post, The Fallacy of Gray was originally published on 07 January 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):

Nothing is perfectly black or white. Everything is gray. However, this does not mean that everything is the same shade of gray. It may be impossible to completely eliminate bias, but it is still worth reducing bias.

Thinking about the title of the post: why is gray a fallacy?

I don't think the intended meaning of the title The Fallacy of Grey is "grey is a fallacy". I think it's a much nicer sounding name than "the fallacy of concluding that because things are shades of grey instead of black and white, that they are all equivalent".