CRITICAL THINKING QUIZ Flashcards
Appeal to Authority
- The authority (person, book, document, or an agency)
- Watch for statements such as “studies show”, “The american medical association supports”
Appeal to Fear
- X causes fear. Y has some relationship to X. Therefore Y is true
- “banks are too big to fail” example
Appeal to ignorance
- Something is not true because it has not been proven or something is true because it has not been disproven
- Remember that an “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence”
Appeal to Pity/Emotion
-Substitute pity for thought without demonstrating the appropriateness
Appeal to Natural Order
- What is “natural” is inherently good or right; What is “unnatural” is inherently bad or wrong
- “its as American as grandma and apple pie” example
Appeal to Casual Relationship
-Event A precedes Event B. Therefore A must have caused B
Appeal to Composite Grouping
-The (false) notion that what is true of parts will be true of the whole
Appeal to a Missing Conclusion
-A statement is described in such a way that the “unstated conclusion” should be inferred
Appeal to Confidence
-Proposing the proposition with such confidence that it seems right to the uninitiated
Appeal to Generalizability
-Drawing a broad conclusion from a small number of perhaps unrepresentative cases
Appeal to Denial of the Antecedent
- An argument based on “Jabberwock” thinking
- If A then B. Not A, therefore not B
Appeal to Denial of the Consequent
- If X is true then Y is true
- Y is false therefore X is false
Appeal to Primacy over Recency
-The opposite effect is termed the primacy effect (remembering or focusing on the first things heard or learned)
Appeal to Domino Effect
-Refers to a supposedly linked sequence of events where the time between successive events is relatively small
Appeal to the edge of the wedge, slippery slope, camel’s nose in the tent
-Essentially the suggestion that one step in a particular direction means the inevitable continuation of steps in that direction
Appeal to the Rhetorical Question
- Using a question to express a statement
- “Do you want the government controlling what you do in your uterus” example
Appeal to the reduction to the absurd
-A method of refuting an opponent’s claim by extending the logic of the opponent’s argument to a point of absurdity
Appeal to Selected Information
-Selective use of the facts in which you do not lie, just do not disclose important aspects of the truth
Appeal to setting up a strawman
-Distorting our opponent’s point of view so that it becomes easier to attack; thus we attack a point of view that does not really exist
Appeal to terminological clouding or obfuscation
- Hiding of intended meaning in communication, making communication confusing, willfully ambiguous, and harder to interpret
- Adding in big words etc
Appeal to the “you too” phenomenon
-A charge of wrongdoing is answered by a rationalization that others have sinned, or might have sinned
Appeal to loaded words or phrases
-Loaded with words and phrases have strong emotional implications and involve strongly positive or negative reactions beyond their literal meaning
Appeal to weasel word
- Instead of building bombs we were building “devices”
- Instead of killing, “capital punishment”
