False equivalence

False equivalency means that you think (or are told) two things should have equal weight in your decision-making. If one opinion has solid data supporting it, but the other opinion is conjecture, they are not equivalent in quality. 

False equivalence leads people to believe two separate things are equally bad, or equally good. A look into how damaging this thought process is can be found in Isaac Asminov's article, "The Relativity of Wrong." Asminov wrote, "When people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together. The basic trouble, you see, is that people think that ‘right’ and ‘wrong are absolute; that everything that isn't perfectly and completely right is totally and equally wrong.”

Stephanie Sarkis writing in Forbes