Logical Fallacies

for wroblewski 10 honors

rhetoric

art and technique of using language persuasively to influence beliefs, attitudes, or behavior.

-uses skills of metaphor, analogy, irony

ethos

credibility, authority

logos

logic, reason

pathos

emotions

disinformation

fake stories that are PURPOSELY shared

misinformation

fake stories that are ACCIDENTALLY shared

logical fallacy

a mistaken belief based on an unsound argument

sound argument

well-proven, no reason errors

unsound

flawed argument

slippery slope

a course of action that will create a chain reaction which will lead to an undesirable outcome(s)

ad hominem

when a person verbally attacks another person based on their character rather than of the position they are taking in an argument

tu quoque

to argue that someone does or takes part in what they are criticising

hasty generalization

when a person makes a claim based on little to no evidence

anecdotal

similar to hasty generalization, but specifically using small personal knowledge to make big conclusions

false dichotomy

tries to force a conclusion, by not giving or implying a full list of alternatives. It typically gives two options, when there are many more possibilities.

faulty analogy

assumes that two things are alike in many ways, just because they are alike in a few ways.

anachronistic

judges something of the past by today's standards

non-sequitir

something that does not logically follow and doesn't make sense in context

complex question

a question crafted to exclude any possible legitimate response, by having an answer or assumption already in the question.

example: attorney asking murder suspect "is the murder weapon where you left it?"

circular reasoning

argument that assumes what its trying to prove is true.

red herring

avoids opposing arguments by presenting an unrelated point

straw man

attacks an inaccurately represented argument and weaker opposing argument

self contradiction

argument presents two points that cannot both be true

correlation does not equal causation

false assumption that one related event is the cause of another