In my post on why mass surveillance is not normal, I referenced how the Wikipedia page for the Nothing to hide argument labels the argument as a “logical fallacy.” On October 19th, user Gratecznik edited the Wikipedia page to remove the “logical fallacy” text. I am here to prove that the “Nothing to hide” argument is indeed a logical fallacy and go through some arguments against it.
The “Nothing to hide” argument is an intuitive but misleading argument, stating that if a person has done nothing unethical, unlawful, immoral, etc., then there is no reason to hide any of their actions or information. However, this argument has been well covered already and debunked many times (here is one example).
Besides the cost of what it takes for someone to never hide anything, there are many reasons why a person may not want to share information about themselves, even if no misconduct has taken place. The “Nothing to hide” argument intuitively (but not explicitly) assumes that those whom you share your information with will handle it with care and not falsely use it against you. Unfortunately, that is not how it currently works in the real world.
You don’t get to make the rules on what is and is not deemed unlawful. Something you do may be ethical or moral, but unlawful and could cost you if you aren’t able to hide those actions. For example, whistleblowers try to expose government misconduct. That is an ethical and moral goal, but it does not align with government interests. Therefor, if the whistleblower is not able to hide their actions, they will have reason to fear the government or other parties. The whistleblower has something to hide, even though it is not unethical or immoral.
You are likely not a whistleblower, so you have nothing to hide, right? As stated before, you don’t get to make the rules on what is and is not deemed unlawful. Anything you say or do could be used against you. Having a certain religion or viewpoint may be legal now, but if one day those become outlawed, you will have wished you hid it.
Just because you have nothing to hide doesn’t mean it is justified to share everything. Privacy is a basic human right (at least until someone edits Wikipedia to say otherwise), so you shouldn’t be forced to trust whoever just because you have nothing to hide.
For completeness, here is a proof that the “Nothing to hide” argument is a logical fallacy by using propositional calculus:
Let p be the proposition “I have nothing to hide”
Let q be the proposition “I should not be concerned about surveillance”
You can represent the “Nothing to hide” argument as follows:
p → q
I will be providing a proof by counterexample. Suppose p is true, but q is false (i.e. “I have nothing to hide” and “I am concerned about surveillance”):
p ∧ ¬q
Someone may have nothing to hide, but still be concerned about the state of surveillance. Since that is a viable scenario, we can conclude that the “Nothing to hide” argument is invalid (a logical fallacy).
I know someone is going to try to rip that proof apart. If anyone is an editor on Wikipedia, please revert the edit that removed the “logical fallacy” text, as it provides a very easy and direct way for people to cite that the “Nothing to hide” argument is false.
Thanks for reading!
- The 8232 Project
Not that I disagree, but Wikipedia requires specific criteria for sources. I am not sure that a book about it being a logical fallacy meets that criteria any more than a book about parenting could be used to prove how to parent a child.
Are there other Wikipedia pages that claim things to be logical fallacies that could be used to see what the burden of proof is for this claim?
Are there other Wikipedia pages that claim things to be logical fallacies that could be used to see what the burden of proof is for this claim?
I’m not sure, but I found something interesting:
One of Wikipedia’s examples of an affirmative conclusion from a negative premise (a formal syllogistic fallacy) is as follows: We don’t read that trash. People who read that trash don’t appreciate real literature. Therefore, we appreciate real literature.
The “Nothing to hide” argument can be written in a similar way: “I have nothing to hide. People who have something to hide are concerned about surveillance. Therefor, I should not be concerned about surveillance.”
I think this is still not a citable claim. You link to the affirmative conclusion from a negative premise which includes that statement, but that page is explaining what that is. Your other page is using a claim to prove a different topic.
The problem is that Wikipedia is not where you prove things. You need to cite somewhere else that proves it, and you need to do it in an impartial way.
For example, saying that ‘“If you have nothing to hide you shouldn’t fear surveillance from the state” is a logical fallacy’ and citing the book makes Wikipedia have that stance.
But in contrast, you could say that 'Critics argue that the argument “If you have nothing to hide you shouldn’t fear surveillance from the state” is a logical fallacy" then cite the book, this way the critic is the one with the opinion and not Wikipedia.
More citations of more critics would probably help too.
I’m not an expert on Wikipedia by any means, but I do see why someone may have considered this statement not belonging on Wikipedia.
Wikipedia has some info here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view
Also see the links at the top of that page about “Verifiability” and “No Original Research” as these are the three key things needed to allow the statement.
I do agree with you point and opinion, but that “logical proof” is one of the worst I’ve read.
The “Nothing to Hide” argument could be restated that way:
Axioms:
A1: Surveillance reveals hidden things
A2: If I have something to hide, I would be concerned if it’s revealed
Propositions
p: I have something to hide
q: I should be concerned about surveillance
We deduce from the axioms that p => q : “if I have something to hide I must be concerned about surveillance”.
The logical fallacy of the nothing to hide is to deduce !p => !q : “If I have nothing to hide I should not fear surveillance”. Which is a case of Denying the antecedent fallacy.
Another fallacy of the argument is that they suppose !p is true, which is a debunked fact.
What was wrong with your proof was that you used another human to disprove a fact about the first one. The I may not be switchable because the other human may not have the same axioms. Moreover, you statement was about “should” but if someone doesn’t do something they only should do, it’s not a contradiction
but that “logical proof” is one of the worst I’ve read.
😅 I’m not very experienced in proofs like these yet, as you can tell. Thank you for submitting your own proof, I greatly appreciate it!
You’re welcome :) to be honest it’s my first for this as well 😂, but I do have experience with math.
The one thing that ticked me with your proof, was about your phrasing. You were trying to prove !(p=>q) i.e. p^!q by a counter example, but your wrote “suppose we have p^!q”, which is already the thesis of the proof. So what you wrote is essentially “We will proof A is false. Suppose !A, then !A.” which is not proving !A. What you should have done is to remove the “suppose” part and say if p=>q then if I nothing to hide I should not be concerned, but I can have nothing to hide and be concerned, which is a contradiction. Then your proof would be somewhat correct but my last two arguments still hold. The issue could be solved woth some modals or quantifiers to express the different people.
people are missing the mark; the “not hiding” is an imposed narrative, a straw man argument and a false dichotomy, all in one.
the issue is not whether you have or don’t something to hide, as this “hide” part implies something inherently sinister. the issue is you being forced to share stuff you haven’t decided to do so.
when I’m not sharing the quality of my morning’s stool across all my social media outlets, it’s not something I’m hiding, it’s something I haven’t decided on sharing with the public. consequently, I don’t allow my software, hardware, service provider, government, or whoever-the-fuck to do it for me.
so what this false equivalency is doing is moving the onus from the evildoer to me, forcing me to explain why I don’t like what this fucker is doing. fuck him and the horse he rode in on.
Pregnancy, abortion seeking, sexual orientation of clergy, being trans, all have become matter of life and death level reasons for caring about privacy.
Ah, another one: insurance company might profile you as XYZ subcategory and discriminate against you.
“Yes but you know what data brokers are hiding from you?” I haven’t tried this one, but I will.
I usually respond to the phrase “I’ve nothing to hide” with the request to then provide me with the checking account number, the medical history, to let me read the email and chats, to tell me when you are going to be on vacation and the home. empty… these are exactly the things that these pages collect to sell. We don’t allow it in real life either, let alone online.
Surveillance advertising is a crime, period.
I know nothing about Wikipedia drama, but the term “logical fallacy” usually indicates a reasoning pattern and does not apply to specific arguments, regardless of how fallacious they may happen be. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
