LOGICAL FALLACIES

LOGICAL FALLACIES

1. A logical fallacy is a flaw in reasoning - illusions/ tricks of thought

2. ARGUMENTUM AD HOMINEM is against the person, and not the person’s statements/ideas. The arguer attacks a person’s motives or character, not what he/she wrote or said - name-calling territory.

   • Ad Hominem is not fallacious against statements by those whose with vested interest in deception

3. Readers who can identify logical fallacies will be able to see the flawed reasoning used

4. ARGUMENTUM AD ANTIQUITATEM - ar argument based on tradition or antiquity. It is not logical that the fact of people always having done something intrinsically warrants continuing to do it

5. POST HOC ERGO HOC - means “After this, therefore because of this” ie. reasoning that because X happened before Y, then X must have caused Y - correlation does not imply causation

6. Straw Man is refuting an exaggeration or caricature of someone’s argument, not the real argument

7. TU QUOQUE - "you too” - in rhetoric one commits an error in logic - and defends it by rejoining that the opposition did the same

8. ARGUMENTUM AD NAUSEUM - argument to the point of nausea