Are generalizations useful?

[SallyNow]

Good. Bad. Sometimes. Maybe. I don't know; you've blown my mind, man! I just don't know what to think anymore. Am I even really typing this? Or is this just all in my head? Is this real? Is that real? Woooaaaahhh

 

[cantata]

Generalisations are fine if a) they are supported and do not contain value judgements, and b) it is acknowledged that they are generalisations.

"Dogs have four legs" is a reasonable generalisation.

"Women are too emotional" is not.

 

[Mling]

This was your post:


I don´t understand where there´s a generalization in either of the sentences.
I don´t understand the dichotomy presented in the latter sentence.

There isn't. There isn't. It was a set up for a cheap shot.

 

[TooCurious]

or are they all prejudiced and should be disregarded?

Generalizations can be useful, but that usefulness is limited. Useful generalizations are most often observable, supported, and free of unnecessary subjectivity or judgment. One of the most important points to remember when dealing with generalizations is that they are not universal truths, and should not be treated as such--for instance, generalizations involving the words "all" or "never," unless they pertain to some mathematical truth about triangles or something, are probably not very useful. Better generalizations involve words like "many" and "often," because those words involve an understanding that there are exceptions to the general statement.

An attractive young woman walking alone in a bad part of town...

Bad generalization, or is she an idiot?

What do you mean by not clearly enough?

I'd like to take a stab at answering this, and say that "not clearly enough," in this case, refers to a grammatical structure that does not convey what you seem to have wanted it to convey. The first sentence fragment, "An attractive young woman walking alone in a bad part of town..." describes a scenario; it does not contain a generalization. The second line asks the reader to decide whether the generalization that the previous line does not contain is a bad one, or whether instead the woman in the scenario is an idiot. This is a false dichotomy.

I will attempt to infer the generalization that you attempted to convey in your scenario; please correct me if I guess incorrectly, and supply the actual generalization on which you would like us to pass judgment.

It seems that you are saying, "Imagine an attractive young woman walking alone in a bad part of town. Without knowing anything more about the situation, would it be fair to generalize that this is a foolish action on her part, and that by extension she is an idiot?"

My response to this would be: Not enough information. In a number of cases, it might be a fair description of the situation. On the other hand, I can think of several scenarios in which she is not an idiot. For instance, the young woman might be a police officer, or a black belt in aikido, or an ex-Marine. She might have no choice but to be in this part of town--maybe she was in a car accident in which her cell phone was damaged, and she has to find a garage or a pay phone.

Thus, we can neither say that the generalization is a bad one, nor that she is an idiot. It isn't a bad generalization because, in a plurality, perhaps even a majority of cases, it is accurate. We do not, however, know if it is accurate in this particular case. Thus, the correct answer is, "Not enough information."