Section 4 Flashcards
fallacy of relevance
a bad argument that has no bearing on the claim
ad hominem fallacy
“against the man”; instead of responding to argument, one attacks the person against their idea directly.
genetic fallacy
arguer critiques the origin of a claim rather than the claim/argument itself (eg. oh you get that bad idea from your dad.)
straw figure fallacy
arguing the weakest version of the opponents argument while ignoring the strongest. (fighting with a straw man vs a real person)
red herring vs straw figure
red herring is changing topic. straw figure is changing other persons argument.
irrelevant appeal
anything that is not relevant to the argument at hand.
equivocation
when the same word is used to describe different premises. (eg kids are headache, aspirin fixes headache, aspirin makes kids go away xxx)
formal fallacy
has to do with structure
informal fallacy
has to do with content
appeal to ignorance
lack of evidence on one side of an argument does not prove the other side to be true.
slippery slope
when one event is said to lead to another event (usually disastrous) via a chain of other events. conclusion is usually unlikely, even if each individual piece is more likely to happen.
texas sharpshooter
drawing a bullseye around your conclusion and picking evidence based on said conclusion instead of coming to a conclusion based on evidence you already have. a type of bias. aka the fallacy of cherry picking.
post hoc
just because one thing happened after another, does not mean that the first thing caused the second thing. eg just because B rode your bike last doesn’t mean that he is the reason your chain is busted.
hasty generalization
aka jumping to conclusions. when one generalizes about a group and does so without evidence or too small of a sample. eg seeing two rotten tomatoes out of 100 and assuming they are all rotten
fallacies of presumption
when an argument rests on an unjustified assumption.
black and white/false dilemma fallacy
assumed that without good reasoning, that there are only two options;that it is black or white.
burden shifting
shifting the burden of proof onto the other arguer when it is your job to do so. (eg. you did this unless YOU can prove that you DIDNT)
syllogism
two premise, one conclusion. eg. i like all veggies. carrots are veggies. therefore i like carrots. premises support each other
immediate inferences
one premise, one conclusion. eg. i like all veggies. so, there aren’t any veggies that i don’t like.
independent support
when the premises support the conclusion itself
conjoint support
when the premises don’t support the conclusion without the help of other premises. the premises support each other.
the general specific pattern
two premises where one is a generalization and the other is a specific claim under the umbrella of that generalization.
use a bracket in mapping when considering …
conjoint support
negation test
helps to see if premises are independent or conjoint. makes inferences the opposite to see if the claim still makes sense. if it does make sense, then the inference is independent. if it falls apart, it is conjoint.
hidden assumptions
pieces of an argument that are not explicitly stated, but are rather assumed. refer to lesson 4.5 for examples.
