ABSTRACT
The habit of data-lean generalization is infectious. Data-lean generalization may be ludicrous but it belongs to a deeper stratum of consciousness than that which generates general statements. It is an essential part of the cognitive equipment that enables us to navigate a complex and confusing world; which is why it is not confined to drunks in the lounge bar with lager-fuelled delusions of omniscience or French thinkers. Human life, especially contemporary human life, obliges people to be professors of data-lean generalizations. Life without evidence-lean beliefs would be difficult indeed - and impoverished. Over-generalization begins with the need to make general sense of the particulars, in the endeavour to make the world intelligible. Intelligence is no safeguard against the propensity to absurd generalizations. Indeed, if the history of French philosophy in the second half of the twentieth century is anything to go by, a high IQ only makes things worse.
