Ixby Wuff

A fallacy is an error in reasoning. That is, it is a piece of bad logic. Just as it is a good idea to avoid eating bad food, it is also a rather good idea to avoid bad reasoning. Unfortunately, bad reasoning is all too common—it pours out of the tele

A fallacy is an error in reasoning. That is, it is a piece of bad logic. Just as it is a good idea to avoid eating bad food, it is also a rather good idea to avoid bad reasoning. Unfortunately, bad reasoning is all too common—it pours out of the television and infests the web like an army of venomous spiders. Perhaps even worse than the fallacies inflicted from the outside are self-inflicted fallacies. These can lead people to make poor decisions about matters great and small.

Fortunately, there is a defense against bad reasoning, namely knowledge. This concise book provides the reader with definitions and examples of forty-two common fallacies—the knowledge a person needs to defend herself in a world awash in fallacies. This short book is not intended to be a handbook on winning arguments or a text on general logic.

The book contains the following fallacies:

Ad Hominem

Ad Hominem Tu Quoque

Appeal to the Consequences of a Belief

Appeal to Authority

Appeal to Belief

Appeal to Common Practice

Appeal to Emotion

Appeal to Popularity

Appeal to Fear

Appeal to Flattery

Appeal to Novelty

Appeal to Pity

Appeal to Popularity

Appeal to Ridicule

Appeal to Spite

Appeal to Tradition

Begging the Question

Biased Generalization

Burden of Proof

Circumstantial Ad Hominem

Fallacy of Composition

Confusing Cause and Effect

Fallacy of Division

False Dilemma

Gambler’s Fallacy

Genetic Fallacy

Guilt by Association

Hasty Generalization

Ignoring a Common Cause

Middle Ground

Misleading Vividness

Peer Pressure

Personal Attack

Poisoning the Well

Post Hoc

Questionable Cause

Red Herring

Relativist Fallacy

Slippery Slope

Special Pleading

Spotlight

Straw Man

Two Wrongs Make a Right

Two Wrongs Make a Right
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