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Chapter Seven: Informal Fallacies
An informal fallacy is a mistake in reasoning that cannot be shown to be invalid
formally with a truth table or a Venn diagram or other logical tool. This chapter
includes a list of them with a short definition and two or three examples of each
fallacy.
1. Abusive ad hominem: Insulting someone instead of responding to their
position,
Your opinion is worthless because you’re just a student.
(The fact that someone is a student doesn’t mean that their opinion is bad.)
I suppose it is natural that someone as stupid as you would support the X Party.
(It just insults the person instead of explaining why it is a bad idea to support
Party X.)
2. Circumstantial ad hominem: Assuming that someone’s views are a function of
their interests.
The provost says that the university has to raise tuition but he works for the
university so he would say that.
(The fact that the provost works for the university does not mean that the claim is
false.)
You are bound to say that because you work for Party X and that is what you are
paid to say.
(Party supporters may be expected to support the Party’s positions but it does not
follow that they are wrong.)
3. Tu quoque (hypocrisy): Pointing out that a critic does exactly what they are
criticizing you for.
“You say we should study hard but you didn’t study hard when you went to
university.”
(The fact that your professor didn’t study hard does not mean that the advice is
bad.)
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Child to parent: You say I shouldn’t smoke but you smoke like a chimney.
(The fact that the parent smokes may actually give them insight into why smoking
is bad.)
4. Appeal to Force: A threat instead of evidence.
Gangster: “Nice business you got here. It would be a pity if anything happened to
it. We sell insurance.”
(The gangster is implicitly threatening the business owner with arson or
vandalism if they don’t pay up.)
Teenager to parent: “If you don’t let me go out with my friends, I am going to
lock myself in my room and play heavy metal really loud.”
(The teenager is threatening their parent with music the parent hates in order to
get their way.)
If you continue to teach the theory of evolution, we will cut the funding for
schools.
(The government is trying to influence the curriculum by threatening teachers
with loss of money to do their jobs if they don’t agree.)
4a. Appeal to fear: Playing on people’s fears instead of presenting evidence.
If you continue to teach the theory of evolution, people will end up acting like
animals.
(Someone is trying to discourage the teaching of evolution by making people fear
that teaching it will lead to morally undesirable consequences.)
If we do not build a wall along our southern border, we will be swamped by
immigrants, many of whom are criminals.
(The speaker is trying to get support for building a wall by causing people to fear
criminals.)
5. Appeal to Pity: Saying that we should do or believe something because
someone will be unhappy otherwise.
We should give them the job because they really need the money.
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(The fact that someone needs money is not relevant to whether they can do the
job, let alone whether they are the best candidate.)
You should go on a date with them because it would make them happy.
(The fact that someone else would be made happy does not mean that you would
be, and you may have good reasons not to want to date them.)
6. Appeal to popularity (bandwagon): Saying we should believe something
because lots of other people do.
That is the most popular religion, so it is bound to be true.
(The most popular religion is not always the same religion, and it’s the number of
people who accept it may be unrelated to its truth.)
Political party X is the most popular, so it must have the best policies.
(Popularity is no guarantee of quality, so its policies may not be the best.)
7. Accident: Taking a widespread truth too far.
“Turkeys are birds, so who would have thought that they could not fly.”
(The fact that most birds fly does not mean that they all do and turkeys are too
heavy to fly.)
Education is good for you, so you should take that astrology course.
(Education is good but astrology is nonsense, so it is not worth studying even
though there are courses in it.)
8. Hasty generalization: Making a statistical generalization without using a
representative sample that is also large enough.
Several people I spoke to were critical of the government’s policy, so most
citizens are liable to be critical of it.
(Several people are not enough people for a sample. As a rule of thumb, assume
that a good sample has at least 1000 individuals in it. A sample of 1000
individuals is enough no matter how big the target population. It is enough in
both Canada and the USA even though the USA has ten times as many people.)
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Everybody is in favour of legalizing marijuana. After all, everybody in this class is.
(The members of this class may not be representative of the overall population. A
sample is representative when it resembles the target population in all the ways
that matter. Often, pollsters try to get a representative sample by getting a
random sample, where a random sample is one in which everyone in the target
population has an equal chance of being included in the sample.)
9. Composition: Inferring that a whole has a characteristic because its parts
have the characteristic.
Each grain of rice is light. So, the bag of rice is light.
(Obviously, one grain is light but many of them can be very heavy.)
Sessional lecturers earn less than deans, so sessional lecturer pay is a smaller
percentage of the budget than pay for deans.
(Each individual sessional lecturer earns a fraction of what a dean earns but there
are far more sessional lecturers than deans, so the total is greater for sessional
lecturers than deans.)
Every family has to spend less money, so the government should spend less money
too.
(Politicians actually make this argument. In fact, if individuals are spending less,
the government should spend more for the sake of the economy as a whole,
because one person’s spending is another person’s income.)
10. Division: Inferring that parts have a characteristic because the whole has
the characteristic.
It is a great library, so every book in it is great.
(The quality of a library depends on how extensive is its collection of books. An
extensive collection of books can contain some real stinkers.)
Lawyers have been defending clients for 300 years, so these lawyers must have
centuries of experience.
(Lawyers as a group may have been in business for three centuries, but no
individual practitioner has, so no individual lawyer has that much experience.)
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11. Straw man: A fake argument that is substituted for the real argument
because it is easy to knock down.
The NDP say they’re in favour of proportional representation. But it would be
chaotic if every crazy political party actually got seats in parliament.
(Proportional representation does not necessarily mean that every party gets into
parliament. In some systems, parties have to get a minimal proportion of the
vote, so really marginal parties are excluded.)
“We should do more to ensure that the work of the students is evaluated fairly.”
“I do see how inflating grades will benefit them at all.”
(The first speaker is arguing for fairer evaluation while the second assumes that
the first is arguing that grades should just be increased, which is a different
matter.)
12. Irrelevant conclusion (Missing the point): The evidence does not really
support the conclusion.
That medication is very cheap, so it can’t be effective.
(The cost of a medication is no indication of its effectiveness. Most effective
medications become cheaper when their patent runs out and generic types
become available.)
Democracy has problems, so we need a dictatorship.
(Democracy does have problems but we do not solve them by eliminating
democracy entirely. We would just have different and worse problems under a
dictatorship.)
13. Red herring: Diverting someone’s attention from the real issue by pointing
out a side issue.
“Environmentalists are against developing the tar sands. But people need jobs.”
(The fact that people need jobs is irrelevant to the environmental reasons for and
against developing the tars sands and mentioning it gets people talking about a
different issue entirely.)
Why are you so miserable? You just have a cold. There are thousands of people
in hospital who have cancer or heart disease who have a right to be miserable.
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(Just because other people are worse off than you are, it doesn’t mean that you
don’t have a problem.)
14. Appeal to ignorance: Claiming that something is true because no one has
shown that it is false.
“Ghosts exist. You can’t prove that they don’t.”
(It is up to the person who claims that ghosts exist to provide evidence. The fact
that no one has disproved their existence does not mean that they must exist.)
“The accused must be guilty because they have not been able to provide an alibi.”
(It is not up to the accused to prove their innocence; it is up to the accusers to
prove that they are guilty.)
15. Slippery slope: Contending that if we do one thing, it will inevitably lead to
further, undesirable consequences, even if the first step is not very serious.
“If we put up with littering, we’ll put up with loitering, and that will lead to
looting.”
(The fact that people are messy and like to hang out in public does not mean that
they will smash windows and steal things from shops.)
If we allow gay marriage, we will have to permit polygamy, adult-child marriage,
and even human-animal marriage. Where will it end?
(Allowing gay marriage in Canada has not resulted in those further developments.
And it won’t. For one thing, neither children nor animals are capable of consent;
and, for another, the reasons for rejecting polygamy are not reasons to reject gay
marriage—see the case of Hyde v Hyde and Woodmansee, 1867, which is the only
case in which it is declared that marriage is between a man and a woman, and
which also describes marriage as being between two persons.)
16. Loaded Question: Asking a question with a presupposition that has not
been argued for.
Are you going to continue to cheat on exams?
(The question presupposes that you have cheated even though there is no
evidence that you have ever cheated.)
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Are you telling lies about me again?
(The question presupposes that you have told lies about me in the past even
though there is no evidence that you have ever done so.)
17. False dilemma: Assuming that there are fewer alternatives than there
actually are.
“You will get either 100% or zero on the midterm. Since you won’t get 100%,
you’ll surely fail.”
(There are 99 points between zero and 100 and you could get one of those marks
instead.)
Unless you go to university, you will never have a job.
(Lots of people who do not go to university nevertheless have successful careers.)
18. Equivocation: Using one word or phrase which has two different meanings.
“The right turn is not the right turn.”
(“Right” can mean either “Correct” or “Right-hand,” so the statement is not a
contradiction but can mean that the correct turn is not the right-hand turn.)
Derek Bentley was with another robber, who had a pistol. They were being
pursued by a policeman who demanded the gun. Bentley said: “Let him have it.”
The other robber shot the policemen. Bentley was hanged for murder.
(“Let him have it” could mean, colloquially, “Shoot him,” or, more literally, “Give
the policeman the gun.”)
19. Amphiboly: A sentence that has more than one meaning because of the way
it is grammatically constructed.
“I ate the ice cream in the freezer.”
(This could mean that I ate the ice cream that was in the freezer or that I ate it
when I was in the freezer.)
Canadians shoot more ducks than Americans.
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(This could mean either that more ducks are shot by Canadians than by
Americans or that Canadians shoot both ducks and Americans and shoot more of
the former.)
20. Fallacious Appeal to Authority: Relying on the testimony of an “expert”
who is dishonest or deluded, who lacks the relevant expertise, or who has not
used their expertise properly.
We are able to rely on the authority of others when 1) they are not lying and are
not deluded, 2) when they have the relevant expertise, and 3) when they use their
expertise appropriately. Institutions exist to ensure that approved experts have
all these characteristics.
“The 2020 American election was stolen and I know this because Donald Trump
says so.”
(All the evidence shows that the election was fairly conducted and that Trump is
either lying or deluded, so you can’t rely on his testimony.)
“Joe was on a holiday in Japan for two weeks and he says that the Japanese
culture is more refined than Icelandic culture, so it must be true.”
(Two weeks on a holiday is not enough time to understand a culture, let alone
make comparisons. Joe lacks relevant expertise.)
“A physician working for the Ethyl Corporation concluded that leaded gasoline
was harmless because it could not be detected in urine or feces.”
(The physician had the relevant expertise but they did not use it appropriately
because lead stays in the body and they did not check that possibility.)
21. Begging the question: A circular argument that relies on what it is
supposedly proving. It is like the rule Repetition in natural deduction. The
arguer just repeats themselves but disguises the repetition by using different
words, or in some other way.
“The accused is guilty. He would not have been arrested if he weren’t guilty.”
(The police are not perfect and the fact that someone has been arrested does not
prove that he is guilty. Innocent people are arrested sometimes.)
“The Bible is the Word of God, which makes it completely reliable. We know this
because the Bible says so.”
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(This amounts to saying that the Bible is reliable because the Bible says it is
reliable, which is circular.)
22. Faulty analogy: A comparison between two things that fails because a
relevant difference is ignored.
Our relationship to others is like our relationship to our future selves, so it is
irrational to care about our future selves but not to care about others (Thomas
Nagel).
(Relevant difference: We become our future selves but we do not become other
people.)
There is more mercury in flu vaccines than in contaminated fish, so the flu
vaccine is more dangerous to health than contaminated fish.
(Relevant difference: The mercury in vaccines is ethyl mercury while the
mercury in fish is methyl mercury.)
Exercise 7.1 What is the name of the fallacy? Why is it a fallacy?
1. Indian food is good. So is Chinese food. And everyone loves French cuisine.
So, combining them all for the banquet is a great idea.
2. Every administrator is efficient, so the administration at this university is
efficient.
3. Scientists claim that our new treatment for cancer is unproven. What they
really mean is that we are challenging their monopoly on the provision of medical
treatment.
4. Everybody is going, so the concert is bound to be great.
5. Some people say that drones with cameras invade our privacy, but they’re fun
to fly and give you a new perspective on the world.
6. The government says that they have to increase fines for speeders to
encourage road safety but nobody really understands why they are so strongly
opposed to people driving cars.
7. Are you still hanging around with delinquents and drug addicts?
8. That speaker has got to be wrong about the problems in Substandardistan,
because he’s never lived there.
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9. The average man is stronger than the average woman so Rowan Atkinson (the
scrawny comedian) must be stronger than Lulu Zhou (the Olympic champion
weightlifter).
10. It was unfair that the professor said that my term paper was bad. I checked
the grammar, spelling, and formatting before I handed it in.
11. Doctors are allowed to look up difficult diagnoses in their medical textbooks,
so students should be able to look up tough test questions in their texts.
12. The importance of the airline industry to the nation’s economy cannot be
underestimated. If the major airlines fail, America itself will fail. If America fails,
then Western civilization is doomed. Thus, we act now to save the major airlines
from bankruptcy.
13. He’s in jail. And innocent people don’t go to jail. So, of course he’s guilty!
14. I am either the best or the worst tennis player in the world.
15. Either evolution happened by total chance or God created every kind of
animal individually. One didn’t happen. Therefore, the other did.
16. It is OK to plug in one computer in the classroom. If it is OK to plug one in, it
should be all right to plug in two. There’s no point at which it becomes wrong, so
running an electricity line from the classroom to my house is fine, too.
17. All the French movies I have seen have been boring, so that new one is liable
to be boring too.
18. Either people love durian, or they hate it. He doesn’t hate it, so he must love
it.
19. Using a computer is like using a typewriter, and I can use a typewriter, so I
can use a computer.
20. Joe’s Diner is the restaurant in Saskatoon for people who really like good
food, because its customers are all gourmets.
21. It is unfair to charge R. Kelly with sex crimes. Think about all the people who
like his music.
22.. The test is difficult. Therefore, every question on the test is difficult.
23. Every player is good, so they will make a great team.
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24. Amstrad makes the best computers. It sells more than any other company.
25. Mugger: You should hand over your money. If you don’t, I will shoot you.
26. No individual human being causes enough carbon emissions to bring about
global warming so the human race does not create enough.
27. It is all very well to complain about global warming but the weather is perfect
for a picnic.
28. It is OK to skip classes. You haven’t shown that it isn’t.
29. It’s a good navy, so all its ships are good.
30. You have to lend me the money. I have been sick. I have lost my job. I will
lose my house if you don’t.
31. Amphiboly: Roger Smith was reported killed in Toronto by the National Post
Newspaper. What a bunch of murderous reporters!
32. Ad hominem: Peccadillo couldn’t have been a great painter. He was a Nazi
Communist who stole from his friends, cheated on his wife, and abandoned his
children.
33. Appeal to pity: The department should hire Smith. His partner already works
here, he would have to move elsewhere to find work, and both of them would be
unhappy.
34. Hasty generalization: All my friends got COVID despite being vaccinated, so
obviously the vaccine doesn’t help anybody.
35. Composition: All of the soldiers are very muscular, so it must be a strong
army.
36. Division: The typical Canadian is a hockey fan, so Brian must be a hockey
fan.
37. Appeal to ignorance: Nobody has shown that there are no cockroaches in the
apartment, so it must be infested with the horrible insects.
38. Loaded question: Why don’t you have any groceries? Have you stopped
shoplifting?
39. False dilemma: The choice is between a police state and anarchy, the lack of
any protection for the ordinary citizen is unacceptable, so the former is our only
option.
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40. Straw person: Some members of the board of directors for this organization
have said that we have to hire an accountant but that is an unacceptable option
because we should not falsify our financial records.
41. Ad baculum: You had better not park there again or I will slash your tires.
42. Red herring: The evidence that vaccines prevent infection must be wrong.
Mandatory vaccination is a violation of liberty that puts us on the road to
communism.
43. Slippery slope: We must not permit divorce because , if we do, marriages will
break up, children will lack the protection of the family, and predators will take
advantage of the situation to abuse the unprotected children.
44. Equivocation: They say he’s an animal in bed, so he must change into a
werewolf when he has sex.
45. Hasty generalization: Both cases of the disease occurred in people who live
in brick houses, so the bricks must cause the disease.