Lesson 4 - Fallacies

Question 1

Two types of fallacies

Answer 1

Fallacies of Relevance

Fallacies of Insufficient Evidence

Question 2

an argument that contains a mistake in reasoning.

Answer 2

Fallacy

Question 3

Arguments in which the premises are logically

irrelevant to the conclusion.

Answer 3

Fallacies of Relevance

Question 4

Arguments that though logically relevant to the conclusion, fail to provide sufficient evidence for the conclusion.

Answer 4

Fallacies of Insufficient Evidence

Question 5

“There is nothing so stupid as an educated man, if you get him off the thing he was educated in”

Answer 5

Will Rogers

Question 6

provides at least some reason for thinking that the second statement is true or false.

Answer 6

RELEVANT statement

Question 7

provides at least some reason for thinking that the second statement is true.

Answer 7

positively relevant

Question 8

provides at least some reason for thinking that the second statement is false.

Answer 8

negatively relevant

Question 9

provides no reason for thinking that the second statement is either true or false.

Answer 9

logically irrelevant

Question 10

FALLACIES OF RELEVANCE

Answer 10

Ad Hominem/Personal attack

Ad Misericordiam/Appeal to Pity

Attacking the Motive

Ad Populum/Bandwagon

Look Who’s Talking Straw Man

Begging the Question Red Herring

Scare Tactics Equivocation

Two Wrongs Make a Right

Question 11

arguer rejects a person’s argument or claim
by attacking the person’s character rather than
examining the worth of the argument

Answer 11

Personal Attack

Question 12

arguer criticizes a person’s motivation for
offering a particular argument or claim, rather than
examining the worth of the argument

Answer 12

Attacking the Motive

Question 13

arguer rejects another person’s argument

or claim because that person is a hypocrite.

Answer 13

Look Who’s Talking

Question 14

arguer attempts to justify a wrongful act

by claiming that some other act is just as bad or worse.

Answer 14

Two Wrongs Make a Right

Question 15

arguer threatens harm to a reader or listener and this threat is irrelevant to the truth of the arguer’s conclusion.

Answer 15

Scare Tactics

Question 16

arguer attempts to evoke feelings of pity or compassion, where such feelings, however understandable, are not relevant to the truth of the arguer’s

conclusion.

Answer 16

Appeal to Pity

Question 17

arguer appeals to a person’s desire to be popular, accepted, or valued, rather than to logically relevant reasons or evidence.

Answer 17

Bandwagon

Question 18

arguer misrepresents another person’s position to make it easier to attack.

Answer 18

Straw Man

Question 19

arguer tries to sidetrack his audience by raising an irrelevant issue, and then claims that the original issue has been effectively settled by the irrelevant diversion.

Answer 19

Red Herring

Question 20

arguer uses a keyword in an argument in two (or more) different senses.

Answer 20

Equivocation

Question 21

arguer states or assumes as a premise (reason) the very thing he is seeking to probe as a conclusion.

Answer 21

Begging the Question

Question 22

“The foolish and the dead alone

never change their opinion.”

Answer 22

James Russell Lowell

Question 23

Arguments in which the premises, though logically relevant to the conclusion, fail to provide sufficient evidence to support the conclusion.

Answer 23

Fallacies of Insufficient Evidence

Question 24

Fallacies of Insufficient Evidence

Answer 24

Ad Baculum/Appeal to Power

Ad Vericundiam/Appeal to Authority

Questionable Cause/False cause

Ad Ignorantiam/Appeal to Ignorance

Slippery Slope

False Alternatives

Weak Analogy

Loaded Question

Inconsistency

Hasty Generalizations

Composition

Division

Question 25

Citing a witness or authority that is untrustworthy.

Answer 25

Appeal to Authority

Question 26

one

appeals to force or the threat of force to bring

about the acceptance of a conclusion.

Answer 26

Appeal to Power

Question 27

Claiming that something is true because no one has proven it false or vice versa.

Answer 27

Appeal to Ignorance

Question 28

Posing a false either/or choice.

Answer 28

False Alternatives

Question 29

Posing a question that contains an unfair or unwarranted presupposition.

Answer 29

Loaded Question

Question 30

Claiming, without sufficient evidence, that one thing is the cause of something else.

Answer 30

False Cause

Question 31

Drawing a general conclusion from a sample that is biased or too small.

Answer 31

Hasty Generalization

Question 32

Claiming, without sufficient evidence, that a seemingly

harmless action, if taken, will lead to a disastrous outcome.

Answer 32

Slippery Slope

Question 33

Comparing things that aren’t really comparable.

Answer 33

Weak Analogy

Question 34

Asserting inconsistent or contradictory claims.

Answer 34

Inconsistency

Question 35

infers that something is true of the whole from the fact that it is true of some part of the whole.

Answer 35

Composition

Question 36

One reasons logically that something true of a thing must also be true to all or some of its parts.

Answer 36

Division