Objectives and Readings for Part 5

In this section we learn about fallacies. A fallacy is a typical mistake in reasoning.

When you are finished with this section, you should be able to identify instances of all the following fallacies:

Accident (Appeal to a saying)
Ad hominem
Appeal to general belief
Appeal to ignorance
Appeal to inappropriate authority
Affirming the consequent
Bandwagon arguments
Begging the question
Circular reasoning
Compatibility with all states of affairs
Composition
Continuum fallacy
Denying the antecedent
Division
Equivocation
False dilemma (false dichotomy, black and white fallacy)
False, misleading, dubious analogy
Gambler's fallacy
Hasty generalization
Impromptu definition (persuasive definition, definitional dodge)
Inconsistency and special pleading
Inference based solely on temporal succession (the post hoc fallacy)
Inference from a correlation to a causal link (the correlation fallacy)
Innuendo, loaded words
Irrelevant emotional appeal (appeal to popular but irrelevant attitudes and emotions, such as appeal to fear, guilt, vanity, pity, patriotism, etc.)
Loaded or complex question
Objectionable vagueness
Poisoning the well
Pooh-pooh fallacy
Quibbling
Slippery slope
Straw man

Conway and Munson, chapters 5, 6, and 7
- Do as many exercises (CM p. 125-129) as you can, especially on Chapter 7!
Schick and Vaughn, Appendix (summary list of informal fallacies)
The Fallacies of Composition and Division
More info on inconsistency
On special pleading (Special pleading is a kind of inconsistency. People who commit the fallacy of special pleading claim that a rule of thumb that applies to everyone does not, however, apply to them, because of their special circumstances. But if the rule really applies to everyone, it does apply to them.)
On poisoning the well
Another account of poisoning the well
On compatibility with all states of affairs
On quibbling
On objectionable vagueness
For further reading: Online resources for informal fallacies
- On fallacies of relevance (irrelevant emotional appeals, ad hominem, appeal to questionable authority, appeal to ignorance, etc.)
- On fallacies of presumption (accident, false cause, begging the question, complex question, etc.)
- On fallacies of ambiguity (equivocation, amphiboly, composition, division, accent)
- Excellent general site on fallacies ("The Fallacy Files")

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