Begging the Question
Taking for granted what is in dispute. Ex:
Arguing with a Christian on the existence of God - Saying they believe
God is a He because they are a Christian.
Denying the Antecedent
The mistake of deducing from 'If p then q' what would indeed
follow from 'If and only if p then q.
Also, invalid to argue if p then q, but not p, then not q"
The Naturalistic
Fallacy
Arguing the definition of an object
equals the truth of an object.
The
But-they-will-never-agree Diversion
Confound producing a proof with
persuading a person.
The But-
you-can-understand-why Evasion
Confusing understanding why an action took place as an
argument pro/con about the action
The Fallacy of Many
Questions
Making unwarranted assumptions in
the questions asked.
Ex1: Asking a single man when he stopped beating his wife
Ex2:
The Fallacy of
Pseudo-refuting Descriptions
The art of labeling an argument in a dismissive fashion
being used as an argument in and of itself.
Ex: Labeling an argument as a conspiracy theory without pointing out the
errors.
The Fallacy of the
Undistributed Middle
"All the particular specimens of any general class may
be described as the several tokens of the single type"
The Genetic Fallacy
Arguing that the antecedents of something must be the same
as their fulfillment. Ex: Abortion -
arguing that a fetus must really be a person because will become one.
Ex2: Creation arguments that because man is evolved from an
ape, he is an ape still.
Subset
: appeal to authority The appeal to
authority is a fallacy of irrelevance when the authority being cited is not
really an authority. E.g., to appeal to Einstein to support a point in religion
would be to make an irrelevant appeal to authority.
The
Logically-black-is-white Slide
The differences in an argument are one of degree, not kind
or principle, therefore it is really non-existent or unimportant. Edmund Burke " Though no man can draw a
stroke between the confines of night and day, still light and darkness are on
the whole tolerably distinguishable."
The No-true-Scotsman
Move
Avoid admitting that an objection brought against the truth
of some proposition to which they are themselves strongly committed does indeed
reveal that the proposition, at least as originally understood and maintained,
is false.
The Pathetic Fallacy
"Perhaps the simplest and most psychologically
satisfying explanation of any observed phenomenon is that it happened that way
because someone wanted it to happen that way"
The Heaper
Small steps do not make a great conclusion, i.e., adding one
more grain of sand to a sand pile will not turn it into a heap of sand.
The Subject/Motive
Shift
Starts by discussing the truth or
falsity of some proposition, goes to discussing the motive behind holder's
position. Ex: Assertion is considered as false because a
certain individual has presented it.
The UnAmerican
Fallacy
Example: House Committee on
Un-American Activities - a person must be a communist form the evidence that he
possessed some characteristic perhaps shared by all Communists, but not
peculiar to them."
The
Whatever-follows-must-be-the-consequence Fallacy
Cause and effect taken to extreme. -
The Masked Man Fallacy
It consists of arguing that because someone knows (or does
not know) something under one description; therefore, they must know it (or
therefore they cannot know it) as the same thing under another
description. Ex: morning star = evening
star = Venus.
The Gambler's Fallacy
The
gambler's fallacy is the mistaken notion that the odds for something with a
fixed probability increase or decrease depending upon recent occurrences.
Begging The Question
Begging
the question is what one does in an argument when one assumes what one claims
to be proving. Ex: We know God exists
because we can see the perfect order of His Creation, an order which
demonstrates supernatural intelligence in its design.
Argument From Ignorance (Argumentum
Ad Ignorantiam)
The
argument from ignorance is a logical fallacy of irrelevance occurring when one
claims that something is true only because it hasn't been proved false, or that
something is false only because it has not been proved true.
The Clustering Illusion
The
clustering illusion is the intuition that random events which occur in clusters
are not really random events.
The Divine Fallacy
The
divine fallacy is a species of non sequitur reasoning which goes something like
this: I can't figure this out, so God
must have done it. Or, This is amazing; therefore, God did it. Or, I can't
think of any other explanation; therefore, God did it. Or, this is just too
weird; so, God is behind it.
Post Hoc Fallacy
The
post hoc ergo propter
hoc (after this therefore because of this) fallacy is based upon the
mistaken notion that simply because one thing happens after another, the first
event was a cause of the second event. Post hoc reasoning is the basis for many
superstitions and erroneous beliefs.
Ex1: A solar eclipse occurs so you beat your drums to make the gods spit
back the sun. The sun returns, proving to you the efficacy of your action Ex2: You have a headache so you stand on your
head and six hours later your headache goes away.
The Regressive Fallacy
The
regressive fallacy is the failure to take into account natural and inevitable
fluctuations of things when ascribing causes to them.
The Pragmatic Fallacy
The
pragmatic fallacy is committed when one argues that something is true because
of the practical benefits of believing that it is true. In fact, the utility of
a belief is independent of its truth-value.
Communal Reinforcement Effect
Communal
reinforcement is the process by which a claim becomes a strong belief through
repeated assertion by members of a community. The process is independent of
whether or not the claim has been properly researched or is supported by
empirical data
The Placebo Effect
The placebo effect is
the measurable or observable effect on a person or group that has been given a
placebo treatment.
A placebo is an inert
substance, or "fake" surgery or therapy, used as a control in an experiment
or given to a patient for its possible or probable beneficial effect. Why an
inert substance, a so-called "sugar pill," or a fake surgery or
therapy would be effective, is not completely known.
However,
it may be that much of the placebo effect is not a matter of mind over
molecules, but of mind over behavior. A part of the behavior of a
"sick" person is learned. So is part of the behavior of a person in
pain. In short, there is a certain amount of role-playing by ill or hurt
people. Role-playing is not the same as faking, of course. We are not talking
about malingering here. The behavior of sick or injured persons is socially and
culturally based to some extent. The placebo effect may be a measurement of
changed behavior affected by a belief in the treatment. The changed behavior
includes a change in attitude, in what one says about how one feels, and how
one acts. It may also affect one's body chemistry.