List of fallacies | Hacker News Reader

List of fallacies

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59 pointsJoelMcCracken23 comments

This reminds me of my "Critical Thinking" class in college. The teacher split us into groups and had us prepare for debates. We were allowed to choose our own topic.

People in my group wanted to debate topics such as "Adam Sandler is funny". I was hoping for something with a little more... meat. Having done debate in high school and being able to tell that most people in class didn't really know what a debate looked like, I emailed the teacher and volunteered to do a short debate (with another student who was willing) that would allow the class to see a structured debate and allow me to debate something not stupid.

Somehow my teacher took it to mean I didn't like my group or the class - I tried apologizing but it just spiraled bizarrely out of control. In one of the last emails he let me know that 1) He had been teaching for a long time and knew what he was doing 2) the leaders of the school trusted him to teach this class so he must be doing something right and 3) no one else was "complaining" and were giving him high marks on instructor reviews.

I think I responded with something along the lines of 1)Appeal to Experience 2)Appeal to Authority 3)Appeal to Popularity.

Keep in mind this is the class that actually TEACHES logical fallacies.

I found pages on Bias more useful. They are in the See Also section. Particularly Cognitive Biases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

For me they are easier to use in everyday conversation.

As a sort of mental housekeeping, it's nice to review pages such as this or the list of cognitive biases (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_biases) on occasion.

Also awesome.

Thanks for posting this! This is one of my favorite articles on the web. (Doh! why didn't I think of posting it.) If only the advocates on different sides of important issues could learn to adhere to these principles.

I blame the low and ever-dropping level of journalism for the low level of political discourse today. Reporters, commentators, and moderators encourage using logical fallacies instead of calling out their use.

Here's an article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky on someone who brought the ad hominem attack to the level of genius. And of course he is widely celebrated today.

> If only the advocates on different sides of important issues could learn to adhere to these principles.

This is an idea better in theory, than in practice. You don't know frustration until you meet someone with poor logic skills, who drops fallacies like crazy, and then responds to your (sound) counter-arguments with 'strawman!' or 'ad-hominem!' or 'red herring!'.

I agree with your base assertion fallacy.

You do realize that you just straight-up insulted Alinsky without attacking any specific arguments, or presenting any evidence, right? Was that for irony?

Alinsky advocated the process of isolating and demonizing ideological opponents. Sorry, I thought the article included that key piece of information. It may have the last time I read it. That is a problem with presenting Wikipedia articles as evidence. They can change at any time.

And, BTW, the Fallacies List article has really grown too big from what I considered its best version several years ago.

Yes, it seems to be missing the part you were looking for. It is referenced in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_for_Radicals , which at the bottom includes the classic line "pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." In general, as that page shows, his approach was in the end nothing more than "The ends justify the means" and the employment of logical fallacies for the consumption of the public has definitely been used by his disciples.

(Yes, he writes some verbiage trying to cloak the fact that he completely believes "the ends justify the means", but in the end that's all it collapses to.)

> "The ends justify the means"

Of course the ends justify the means. What else is there to justify the means?

The real issue is that the means produce the ends. How often do good ends come from bad means?

I looked for, but couldn't find a fallacy that seems like it would fit this - Fallacy of fallacy: Because someone is making a fallacious argument their conclusion is automatically incorrect. E.g.,

Arguer 1: "My opponent is a rapist, therefore his assertion that 2 + 2 = 5 is wrong."

Arguer 2: "You're argument is fallacious (ad hominem), therefore 2 + 2 really does equal 5."

Did anyone see this sort of fallacy in the list. Or should I add it to the wiki page?

It is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_fallacy

Thanks. Not sure how I missed it.

Looks like this one is already on there: "Argument from fallacy: if an argument for some conclusion is fallacious, then the conclusion is fallacious."

Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_fallacy

I'd err to caution you about this kind of thinking, namely because people who spend careful time memorizing the names of fallacies rather than spending that time, explaining to other people with whom they're debating where they were mislead, tend to be assholes whose arguments boil down to spouting ad homenim, no true scotsman, Loki's wager, etc. Which is a more pretentious way of saying 'u r wrong' and being generally allienating the people with whom you're trying to converse. And yes this is from personal experience.

Also something of interest is: http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html

If there are more people interested in reading about this kind of stuff in a more organized way, I can wholeheartedly recommend Keith Stanovich's Robot Rebellion ( http://books.google.com/books?id=VRsgtSBMh0YC&printsec=f... )

There is a fair amount of literature on the topic, varying from science popularization to "too hard". Right now I'm plowing through Thinking and Deciding, by Johnathan Baron. It's pure gold, but it's also the driest read in a long time.

My girlfriend is studying for the LSAT and I've been helping her a bit. It's been a great lesson in logical reasoning. (I'm definitely sending her this page. She'll love it.)

She's not a native English speaker and she excels at logical reasoning (aced a couple classes at university.) Meanwhile, I (an English major in school) excel at parsing (English) language, but my logical skills, while proficient, are nevertheless lax.

What I find illuminating in helping her is how much language works to obscure logic in argumentation. At the same time, I have discovered I have a tendency to often ignore key logical signals and just jump to whatever method suits me. As an English major, I have a particular weakness for analogies.

For the record, I vote for the Fundamental Attribution Error (a bias rather than a fallacy) as the most interesting obstacle to consensus.

http://www.forevergeek.com/2005/05/38_ways_to_win_an_argumen...

This may be interesting as well.

These are incredibly useful in discussions. Especially so in formal debates.

Logical fallacies allow one to quickly categorize and counter flawed arguments.

True, but this is only as useful as the ability of the audience to follow one's argument. As we can see from politics, emotion frequently trumps reason. Logic aspires to arrive at the truth; rhetoric aims to win the argument, with or without the facts on its side.

If-by-whisky is the most entertaining fallacy. Amazing speech. :)

So what? It's easier to lie saying only the truth and omitting some part of it, or not even omitting anything, but not saying it frequently enough.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence

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