: Or, All for the Best
is a French satirical novel written by(1694€“1778), first published in 1759. In
Candide, Voltaire satirizes the philosophical cult of the theory of
optimism, which was popularized by German philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm
Leibniz (1646€“1716).
The most notable and pervasive of the logical fallacies
in Candide is the idea developed by Leibniz and espoused by Doctor Pangloss
throughout the novel that "all is for the best." The logical fallacy is based on the
philosophical premise (wholly unsupported by fact) that everything happens for the best, even
the most horrendous and evil of occurrences, because out of all of the possible worlds in the
universe, God had chosen the one in which people lived at the time as "the best of all
possible worlds."
Another logical fallacy that Doctor Pangloss promotes
is that of false or questionable cause-and-effect.
"It is demonstrable," said he [Pangloss], "that things cannot be
otherwise than as they are; for all being created for an end, all is necessarily for the best
end. Observe, that the nose has been formed to bear spectaclesthus we have spectacles. Legs are
visibly designed for stockingsand we have stockings. Stones were made to be hewn, and to
construct castlestherefore my lord has a magnificent castle; for the greatest baron in the
province ought to be the best lodged. Pigs were made to be eatentherefore we eat pork all the
year round."
Doctor Pangloss falsely concludes that
one thing (noses) necessarily caused another (spectacles), simply because the two things are
associated with one another and therefore seem to form a cause-and-effect
relationship.
This logical fallacy is carried to the extreme in chapter 6,
"How the Portuguese made a Beautiful Auto-da-fe, to prevent any
further Earthquakes."
After the earthquake had
destroyed three-fourths of Lisbon, the sages of that country could think of no means more
effectual to prevent utter ruin than to give the people a beautiful
auto-de-fe; for it had been decided by the University of Coimbra, that the
burning of a few people alive by a slow fire, and with great ceremony, is an infallible secret
to hinder the earth from quaking.
The "logic"
which the Lisbon sages apply to the earthquake problem is the same cause-and-effect fallacy that
Doctor Pangloss applied to noses, legs, stones, and pigs.
Since the the
Lisbon sages believed that the earthquake happened after disbelievers committed sins, they
concluded that disbelievers should be burned to death in order to prevent them from sinning and
thereby prevent the earthquake from happening again.
In this same chapter,
Candide is whipped, and he watches as Doctor Pangloss is hanged.
Candide, terrified, amazed, desperate, all bloody, all palpitating, said to
himself:
"If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the
others?"