Essay on Logical Fallacies

In the essay I will discuss and give the examples of the logical fallacies, which are the errors in reasoning that are usually used to support arguments. Actually they are the “arguments” that have not enough support to appear good deductive arguments. There are three main categories of logical fallacies: fallacies of relevance, presumption, and ambiguity. Fallacies of relevance rely on premises that may seem to be relevant to the conclusion of the argument but in fact they are not. The major fallacies of relevance are:

1. Appeal to Fear

Appeal to Fear is a fallacy in which premises are not the evidences that support the conclusion but the motivations that are intended to make people believe that conclusion is true because of fear. Such premises are relevant not to the conclusion of the argument but to fears of a person. For example, imagine the situation when person “X” has known compromising evidences of the personal life of person “Y”. He uses them to blackmail person “Y” in purpose to get money. Person “Y” believes that it will be relevant to give money to person “X” because he afraid to be unmasked. However, this does not provide relevant evidence for the conclusion that person “X” deserves the money. Thus the premises are relevant to the fear of the person “X” to loose his dignity.

2. Appeal to Authority

Appeal to Authority or Fear Tactics is a fallacy in which premises are provided by a person who has not enough qualification and/or knowledge to give reliable premises in a specific subject. The conclusion could be true, but the fact that the person, who argued for the statement, is not an expert in a given field does not provide any relevant evidence to believe the conclusion is true. When people believe the conclusion is true thus they believe in authority of that person. Sometimes it is good reason to believe authorities but only when they are really experts in the subject matter in question. But I would like to give an example when the appeal to authority is a fallacy. For example, the president of the USA says that the terrorism is the biggest threat to the American people. We can either accept or reject this claim. It depends on how we believe in authority of the president in the given area.

The next fallacies are related to the fallacies of presumption which arise when an argument is based on a proposition that is assumed to be true but it is false or dubious.

3. Red Herring

Red Herring is a fallacy in which an irrelevant subject is introduced in order to divert attention from the argument or real issues. The irrelevant information is presented in such way that sounds as it is relevant to the real subject, but in fact it is not. For example, the subject of the question is the new regulation to reduce smoking among teenagers. The one speaker may claim that there are already too many regulations and that taxes are too high. Another may claim that when he starts smoking he was only 16 years old and that many his friends were smokers too. But all of these arguments are irrelevant to the main subject, which are will the regulation will help to reduce the number of the infant smokers and if there is a better way to reduce smoking among them.

4. Slippery Slope

Slippery Slope is a fallacy in which person claims that one event have inevitably follow from another without an argument for such a claim. For example, if one person looses the job, then by a gradual series of small steps through breaking up with his spouse, quarrelling with his friends, and starting of drinking, eventually he will commit the crime and get to a prison, too. And if he doesn’t loose his job the last event will also never happen. But in fact if the person looses the job it doesn’t mean that he will get to the prison. Or on the contrary, if he doesn’t loose the job it doesn’t mean that he will never get to the prison.

5. Hasty Generalization

Hasty Generalization is a fallacy in which the conclusion is based on insufficient arguments. For example the person states that in San Diego is always nice weather because the several times he/she was there it was sunny and the temperature was also perfect. Or another person claims that in Russia the most people like to drink vodka, because all of his friends from Russia drink it. In these examples, generalizations were made on the basis of little evidence: several days in San Diego and some friends from Russia. These evidences provide an insufficient basis for the conclusions they are used to support.

6. False Dilemma

False Dilemma arises when the person omits consideration of all reasonable alternatives. Or simply presents fewer alternatives than there are really are. For example the person chooses from going to the disco or to the restaurant in the evening. And he presents it as dilemma for him. But in reality there are more choices. He can go to sport club, to cinema, stay at home or to do something else. Another example, when person says that the evolution is an evidence of man’s creation. But he says nothing about other creation. And by that he uses false dilemma.

The last group of the logical fallacies is the fallacies of ambiguity. They arise when arguments are based on shifts in the meaning of words of phrases from their premises to their conclusions. I don’t discuss them in the essay. But it is important to know all the logical fallacies that we don’t make mistakes while arguing for or from the statement.

Bibliography:

• Copi & Cohen (1998). Introduction to Logic. Prentice-Hall, Inc.
• Michael C., (1995). Fallacy Tutorial Pro 3.0 from http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/
• Logical Fallacies in Everyday Use (2005) from http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/
• Engle, Morris S., (2000) .With Good Reason: An Introduction to Informal Fallacies, 6th Ed. New York: St. Martin’s Press