Just because many people do or accept something, doesn’t mean it’s true, right, or healthy. The old “everyone else is doing it” fallacy-since others seem to agree with it, it must be right. (But it’s up to you to decide whether her bringing you coffee outweighs the cost of her borrowing your car.) 7. If you’re not okay with your sister borrowing your car, focus on that-not the fact that she brought your coffee.
Red herring logical fallacy book how to#
How to avoid it: Try not to let yourself get distracted by irrelevant details or topics. They may direct the focus to a topic that’s easier for the speaker to address.Įxample: “I know you didn’t want me to borrow the car, but look, I brought you coffee!” Red herrings serve to distract an audience and shift their attention away from the original topic, often toward a false conclusion.Ī red herring is typically a fact or idea that has little relevance to the real issue. Ask yourself what else could have caused event B. How to avoid it: Don’t jump to conclusions just because you notice a correlation between two events. While two events may occur at the same time or close together, that doesn’t mean that one causes the other.Įxample: “This morning I drank orange juice and now I have a headache. It’s important to keep this fallacy in mind when evaluating data. This is also usually based on just one or a few observations. It assumes that because B happens after or around A, then A must cause B. Post HocĪ post hoc fallacy confuses correlation with causation. Or if someone presents you with just two options, think critically about what other possibilities exist. How to avoid it: Resist the temptation to oversimplify a problem by presenting just two possible solutions. This is another fallacy that is commonly used in politics to polarize the public and push them into supporting controversial policies.Įxample: “Vote for Senator Smith or endure four more years of higher taxes.” The reality, however, is that there are many more options and compromises that can be made. These are usually extreme and polar opposite of one another, so only one appears acceptable. In a false dichotomy, the arguer presents just two solutions to a problem.
Address the strongest counterargument they could present, not a weaker version of it. How to avoid it: Be generous to your opponents. When presented as such an exaggeration, of course the opposition’s position sounds inappropriate and is much easier to attack. Most in favor of gun control do not advocate taking away every citizen’s guns, but enforcing more regulations on how guns are bought. Here, the opposition’s argument is weakened by being overstated. That’s not constitutional because it strips away your Second Amendment rights!” And pushing over a straw man is hardly impressive!Įxample: “The opposition wants to take away all of your firearms. The straw man argument is when you anticipate your opponent’s counter-argument, but present a weak version that can easily be torn down. How to avoid it: Don’t make generalizations based just on a handful of cases. I tried three restaurants and wasn’t impressed.” While the claim might be true in one or a few specific cases, there is no sufficient evidence that it’s true in every case.Įxample: “The food in Rome isn’t that good. Hasty GeneralizationĪ hasty generalization is when a broad claim is made based on just a few examples, and not substantial proof. Address the facts or circumstances of the situation without attacking the speaker. How to avoid it: Remember to focus on the argument, not the person making it. Instead of logic, this fallacy relies on personal attacks that are not relevant to the discussion at hand.Īd hominems are frequently used in politics-although not considered ethical arguments, they’re often successful at distracting the public from the real issues.Įxample: In the courtroom, a prosecutor brings up the defendant’s lack of steady employment in order to raise questions about the defendant’s credibility. The ad hominem fallacy is the classic case of attacking your opponent instead of her arguments. Here are 15 of the most common logical fallacies with examples to help you avoid using them in future discussions. In this post, we’ll break down some of the most common logical fallacies so you’ll know what to avoid in order to make your arguments and discussions stronger. Many times they’re used accidentally, but they can also be used to deceive or mislead audiences. Logical fallacies are common errors in reasoning that undermine the logic of an argument. Have you ever experienced the frustration of debating with someone whose arguments just weren’t logical? Or perhaps you’ve been disappointed by how easily some of your own arguments have been dismantled by others.Ĭhances are, you (and many of the people you’ve argued with) have used logical fallacies.
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