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GENERAL PAPER: LOGICAL FALLACIES

1 Ad Hominem [Latin, meaning directed to or against the person]
(a) The Abusive Ad Hominem
Takes the form of saying that what someone says is false or not
to be believed because that person has a bad character or set
of habits [attacking the character of the person rather than
the principles he or she stands for]
(b) The Non-abusive Ad Hominem
Has the form of saying that what someone says is true or to be
believed because that person is such a nice person.
(c) The Circumstantial Ad Hominem
[i] Appeals not to the person’s character but to the person’s
circumstances to support the claim that what that person
is saying is true or false.
[ii] Attacking the character and the reputation of a
position’s supporters.
e.g. 1: [Abusive Ad Hominem]
(a) “The public should not take seriously Dr Mason’s plan for
upgrading county health services. He is a recovering alcoholic
whose second wife recently divorced him.”
- the attack on Dr Mason’s character says nothing about the
quality of his plan.
- Sometimes a connection exists between a person’s private
and public lives for example, a case of conflict of
interest. But no evidence of such a connection is given
here.
(b) “You should not trust Jones’s testimony because he is an
alcoholic.”
- It might be true that Jones is an alcoholic, but at the
same time in this case he might be telling the truth. If
he came running to tell you and told you that your house
was on fire, it would not be wise to dismiss his
statement simply on the grounds that he is an alcoholic.
He may, at this moment, be sober (or even inebriated) and
have important news for you. You need to check out the
truth of his claim.
[i] “I’m certainly not going to vote for Proposition 16 in the next
election. I just looked at the election pamphlet and
discovered that the big oil companies are in favour of it.
There must be something in it for them”
[ii] “You cannot accept Ms. Smith’s testimony about keeping the
system of tenure at the university. After all, she is a
tenured professor and has a vested interest in keeping tenure.”
- The fact that Ms Smith is a tenured professor should not
be used to dismiss her testimony regarding keeping the
system of tenure at the university. What has to be
assessed are the reasons she gives for keeping it. Her
argument and not her position as a teacher is relevant to
the truth of the conclusion.
[iii] Here is another example of the circumstantial ad hominem
fallacy, this time in an advertisement for Shalimar perfume
showing an intimate couple in Indian garb.
“The inspiration for this classic fragrance came from the
story of a man who loved a woman so deeply, that when she
died, every fiber of his being was devoted to creating a
monument to her memory. Twenty thousand men laboured
daily for twenty-two years to fashion marble into . . .
the Taj Mahal. The garden where their love grew was
called the Garden of Shalimar.”
- The perfume is being recommended on its name alone, which is
connected with an exotic garden in Agra, India. The name of
a perfume provides no reason for determining its quality or
for you to purchase the product.
2 Begging the Question
The writer essentially is arguing in a circle, assuming that a point
is true without proof and drawing a conclusion based on it.
Stated still another way, the writer assumes to be true that which he
or she is supposed to prove.
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The tactic asks readers to agree that certain points are self-
evident when they are not.
e.g. 1
Who is the best person to censor controversial articles in the campus
newspaper?
o In phrasing the question like this, he writer begs the question,
assuming without proof that censorship of the campus newspaper is
necessary in the first place.
e.g. 2
During a murder trial, if a prosecuting attorney asks the jury,
“Does it make sense to release this murderer so he can commit the
same atrocities again and again?”
o she begs the question, since the very purpose of a trial is to
prove whether the defendant actually committed the murder.
e.g. 3
Detergent ad: “If you want miraculously white clothes, use Soapy
detergent. It’s a washday miracle!”
e.g. 4
If you can’t trust your doctor, whom can you trust?
e.g. 5
Teenagers should be prevented from having abortions. After all, a
girl wouldn’t get pregnant in the first place if she wasn’t allowed
to terminate her mistake.
o In the last instance, the writer replaces one debatable assumption
with another equally debatable one: The option of having an
abortion leads to unwanted pregnancies.
o Therefore, the writer assumes but does not address the idea that
removing abortion as an option will solve the teenage pregnancy
problem.

3 Cause-and-Effect Fallacies
3 common fallacies rest on assumed cause-effect connections.
a) False Cause – which results when the cause cited is
either irrelevant to the effect or is so remote, so far back
in time, that its link with the present is only tenuous at
best.
e.g. 1
“During the 1992 election, President George Bush took credit for
playing decisive role in the breakup of the Soviet Union. His
opponent, Bill Clnton, responded, “Mr Bush’s taking credit for the
breakup of the Soviet Union is like the rooster’s taking credit for
the dawn.”
e.g 2
“American essayist Calvin Trillin observed facetiously that the Gulf
War finally ended when President Bush learned to pronounce Iraqi
president Saddam Hussein’s name correctly.”
e.g. 3
“I knew I should have cancelled my tennis match today. My
astrological forecast warned me not to engage in anything
competitive. No wonder I lost.”
e.g. 4
“It is obvious that Sam Anderson would grow up to be an ax murderer.
According to an interview I read, he was subjected to a rigid toilet-
training regime when he was a toddler.”

b) Questionable Cause – a writer may identify a single reason to

explain a complex situation – whether good or bad – when, in
fact, other reasons may be accountable.
e.g. 1
Many studies have found that college students who attend class
regularly receive better grades than those who attend sporadically.
- One explanation is that regular attendance ensures that
students are exposed to ideas in the classroom, but this may
not wholly account for higher grades. They may result from
better study habits and discipline; further, it is likely that
better-disciplined students are also likely to be disciplined
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enough to get up in time to make their classes. Thus, the
statement that exposure to ideas causes higher grades can be
termed a questionable cause because other factors may affect
one’s academic achievement, at least as measured by his or her
GPA.

c) Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc – which in Latin means “after this,
therefore because of this.”[taking what are mere coincidences
to be the causes].
- It suggests that, because event B occurred after event A,
event A caused event B. It assumes that because two events
occur close together in time, the first must cause the second.
The cause-and-effect relationship is based on a coincidence
whereby one event is assumed to have caused a second one.
- This fallacy normally follows the following thinking
pattern: X precedes Y
Therefore X causes Y
e.g. 1
Thus a man may say,
“Soon after I saw Jane, I had severe stomach ache.
Jane must have caused my trouble and she must be a witch.”
e.g. 2
If you break out in hives after eating jalapeno peppers for the first
time, you might logically connect the two events. But the hives may
have been caused by something different – an allergic reaction to
something else you ate or to something in the environment, contact
with a plant, even stress. To form a good inductive argument, you
would have to eat jalapeno peppers tow or three more times and break
out in hives each time before you could conclusively connect the two.
e.g. 3
Frank may notice that after he changed from cologne A to cologne B,
Susie started paying attention to him. He might then conclude that
the change to the new cologne is what caused Susie to have an
interest in him. But in fact, the two events may have no causal
connection at all; it may be that she noticed him for the first time
because when she recently dumped her old boyfriend, Frank was sitting
across the table from her.
e.g. 4
The Post Hoc fallacy accounts, which focuses on the time dimension of
one thing following another, is the source of many of superstitions.
[a] “Poor John! He walked under a ladder this morning, and at noon
he met with an accident. It’s unlucky to walk under a ladder.”
- If you walk under a ladder and are hit by a bus 10
minutes later, it would be fallacious to argue that the
accident occurred because you were foolish enough to defy
the superstition of walking under a ladder.
[b] A broken mirror does not mean that seven years of bad luck will
ensue.
[c] Stepping on cracks in the sidewalk will not break your mother’s
back.
[d] How many times have you played a game with a pair of dice, and
the rolls were not going your way? So you blew on the dice,
and, wonder of wonders, the number you needed came up. So what
did you do the next time you rolled? My guess is that you blew
on the dice again – and hence committed the fallacy!
e.g. 5
Certain causation cannot be so simply irrationally determined.
- Night follows day but night is not caused by day.
- Similarly, lightning does not caue thunder even though it
flashes before the thunder roars.
Yet many people commit this fallacy unconsciously, and crooked
thinkers who use this trick find as they do with other tricks, a lot
of simple-minded victims.

4 Bandwagon (Appeal to Numbers)

The Appeal to Numbers occurs when a statement it thought to be true
because many people believe it.
e.g. 1
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“Many people today believe in angels. In a recent poll 64 percent
reported they believed in angels, and 46 percent believed they had
some experience of angels. This is the reason I believe that angels
exist.”
o The argument, however well intentioned, is fallacious: many people
could be wrong in their beliefs.
o Not too many centuries ago most people believed that the sun went
around the earth, but the fact that most believed this provides no
evidence for how the solar system functions.
o Appeals to numbers or mass appeal are irrelevant because the
premise is not about the topic found in the conclusion but about
the beliefs of those who consider the conclusion. But unless the
conclusion is likewise about those beliefs, persons’ beliefs are
irrelevant in determining whether some opinion is or is not true.
o At the same time, you should be aware of the persuasiveness of
such arguments. The fact that everyone is doing it provides a
powerful motivator for thinking that something is true or for
purchasing a product.
o People – especially young people – do not like to be odd, unusual,
or left out. Because they do not want to stand out from their
peers, they often demand or purchase socially acceptable products.
Recognizing the fallaciousness of appeals to numbers is a first
step to convincing people that such arguments should be resisted.

5 Ad Populum
An attempt to appeal “to the people” and their presumed common values
an emotions may be another diversionary tactic designed to advance or
oppose arguments unfairly.
This tactic often uses what are called “God-words” (pro-, help,
family, etc.) and “Devil-words” (anti-, greed, mean-spirited, etc.)
e.g. 1
Think of an erring politician who says,
“Americans are a generous people who hold no grudges, and I am sure
they will forgive me!”
e.g. 2
In “Offering Euthanasia Can Be an Act of Love”, Derek Humphry implies
that opponents who compare mercy killing to Nazi exterminators are
guilty of using both a faulty analogy and an argument ad populum.

7 Straw Man
A type of informal fallacy committed by any argument where the view
of an opponent is misrepresented so that it becomes vulnerable to
certain objections.
 The distorted view may consist of a statement or a group of
related statements (i.e., a position or a theory).
 Typically, the straw-man argument ascribes to an opponent some
views that are in fact a distortion of his actual views. These
misrepresentations may be extreme, irresponsible, or even silly
views that are easy to defeat.
 The opponent’s position, then, becomes a “straw figure” that can
be easily blown away.
 But to refute that position is, of course, not at all to disprove
the person’s actual position.
 This can be seen in the Box below which outlines what’s going on
in straw man arguments.
What’s Going On in a Straw Man Argument?
1. A straw man argument attempts to raise an objection O against
a certain
view, call it V.
2. But the argument misrepresents V as being in fact W, where W
is vulnerable to the objection O.
3. The argument concludes by rejecting V on the basis of O.
But does O really undermine V? It seems not. After all, O is an
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objection only to W, a distorted rendering of V, not to V itself.
e.g. Imagine two rival political candidates, one of whom is trying
to undermine the credibility of the other by arguing
1. My opponent’s international policy is: Wait for foreign
permission before acting.
2. Waiting for foreign permission before acting is inconsistent
with promoting our national security and our right to act in
our own self-interest.
3. Both promoting our national security and our right to act in
our own self-interest are reasonable.
4. My opponent’s international policy is unreasonable.
Suppose that there is, in fact, no evidence that the opponent
actually holds the view ascribed to her in the first premise; then
what? = a straw man argument

To detect (and avoid) a fallacy of this sort, the rule is to check

whether an argument’s reasons against a certain view can really count
as reasons against that view.
Some writers are tempted merely to dismiss contrary positions without
taking them seriously. They make those positions as weak as possible
and then easily refute them. This kind of reasoning is called the
Straw Person/Man Fallacy.
o You might think of the story of the Three Little Pigs; in it the
wolf easily blew down the pig’s house constructed from straw.
This tale illustrates the approach some take to others’ positions.
o If by weakening their arguments you misrepresent those who
disagree with you, you have created a straw person argument that
may be easy to refute.
o Your refutation may seem persuasive at first to your readers, but
it both violates the integrity for which critical thinkers strive
and destroys the ultimate goal of critical thinking: to arrive at
the truth.
o So, when you consider the views of others, treat them with
integrity; present their views in their strongest form possible
and then proceed with your critique of them.