Critical Thinking - Recognizing False Statements
Critical Thinking
Ad Hominen
Attacking the arguer and not the argument.
Example: The Reverend Dr. Smith is a know Biblical fundamentalist, so her objections to evolution need not be taken seriously.
Argument from Authority
Example: President Richard Nixon should be re-elected because he has a secret plan to end the war in Southeast Asia ? because it was secret, there was no way for the electorate to evaluate it on its merits; the argument amounted to trusting him because he was President: a mistake, as it turned out).
Appeal to Authority
Example: A majority of doctors think that the morals of our young people have declined.
Attacking the Person
Most of the men who say war is wrong are cowards.
Argument From Adverse Consequences
Example: The defendant in a widely publicized murder trial must be found guilty; otherwise, it will be an encouragement for other men to murder their wives.
Appeal to Ignorance
The claim that whatever has not been proved false must be true, and vice versa.
Appeal to Force and Appeal to Pity (Motive in Place of Support)
When a person gets you to agree to something because s/he will be hurt if you don?t agree, this is an appeal to pity. If someone gets you to agree because s/he will hurt you if you don?t agree is an appeal to force.
Special Pleading
Often to rescue a proposition in deep rhetorical trouble.
Example: How can a merciful God condemn future generations to torment because, against orders, one woman induced one man to eat an apple? Special plead: you don?t understand the Divine Mystery of the Trinity.
Begging the Question (Counterfeit) ? assuming the answer
Example: We must institute the death penalty to discourage violent crime. But does violent crime rate in fact fall when the death penalty is imposed?
Observational Selection
Counting the hits and forgetting the misses.
Example: A state boasts of the Presidents it has produced, but is silent on its serial killers.
Statistics of Small Numbers
- a close relative of observational selection
Example: They say 1 out of every 5 people is Chinese.
Misunderstanding of the Nature of Statistics
Example: President Dwight Eisenhower expressing astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below average intelligence.
Inconsistency
Example: Consider it reasonable for the Universe to continue to exist forever into the future, but judge absurd the possibility that it has infinite duration into the past.
Non Sequitur (It Doesn?t Follow)
Our nation will prevail because God is great. But nearly every nation pretends this to be true.
Post Hoc
?It happened after, so it was caused by?
Example: Before women got to vote, there were no nuclear weapons.
Meaningless Question
Example: What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? But if there is such a thing as an irresistible force there can be no immovable possibilities.
False Dilemma (Distraction) ? Excluded Middle
?considering only the two extremes in a continuum of intermediate possibilities.
Example: If you?re not part of the solution then you?re part of the problem.
Short-term vs Long-term
? a subset of the excluded middle, but so important I?ve pulled it out for special attention.
Example: We can?t afford programs to feed malnourished children and educate pre-school kids. We need urgently to deal with crime on the streets.
Slippery Slope (Distraction)
?related to excluded middle
? occurs when we object to something on the grounds that if it is done, something else will happen or is likely to happen as a result, and then something else, and then something else, right down the slippery slope to a situation that is clearly undesirable.
Example: If we allow abortion in the first weeks of pregnancy, it will be impossible to prevent the killing of a full-term infant.
False Dilemma
Our attention is distracted by the thought of how horrible the situation is that threatens us (according to the argument). We do not attend to the question of whether all the steps down the slippery slope are really connected. The argument is structurally valid, except ?Either A or B? is not true.
Confusion of Correlation and Causation
Example: A survey shows that more college graduates are homosexual than those with lesser education; therefore education makes people gay.
Straw Man (Distraction)
?caricaturing a position to make it easier to attack.
? making your position appear strong by making the opposing position appear weaker than it actually is.
Example: Scientists suppose that living things simple fell together by chance ? a formulation that willfully ignores the central Darwinian insight, that Nature ratchets up by saving what works and discarding what doesn?t.
Suppressed Evidence or Half-Truths
Example: An amazingly accurate and widely quoted ?prophecy? of the assassination attempt on President Reagan is shown on television: but ? an important detail ? was it recorded before or after the event?
Weasel Words
Example: The separation of powers of the U.S. Constitution specifies that the United States may not conduct a war without a declaration by Congress. On the other hand, Presidents are given control of foreign policy and the conduct of wars, which are potentially powerful tools for getting themselves re-elected. Presidents of either political party may therefore be tempted to arrange wars while waving the flag and calling the wars something else ? ?police actions,? ?armed incursions,? ?protective reaction strikes,? pacification,? ?safeguarding American interests,? and a wide variety of ?operations,? such as ?Operation Just Cause.? Euphemisms for war are one of a broad class of reinventions of language for political purposes. Talleyrand said, ?An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public?.
Prejudicial Language (Motive in Place of Support)
Identifying a position using such words as ?backward? or ?na?ve? provides a motive for rejecting the position, and using such words such as ?progressive? and ?sophisticated? provides a motive for adopting a position, all without giving any evidence either for or against the position.
Affirming the Consequent (Counterfeit)
Example: If the economy is healthy, unemployment is down. Unemployment is down. So the economy is healthy.
Denying the Antecedent (Counterfeit)
If she loves you, she?ll marry you. She doesn?t love you. So she won?t marry you.
Equivocation (Counterfeit)
Insane people shouldn?t be punished. Someone who commits murder must be insane. So murderers should not be punished.
Sources:
The Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagen. Ballantine Books: New York, 1996, pp. ? 210-215.
Critical Reasoning by Jerry Cederblom and David W. Paulsen. Wadsworth Publishing Compan, 1982
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