During the first week of class, we discussed informal fallacies. An informal fallacy is defined as a logical mistake. Five of the informal fallacies discussed were equivocation, ad hominem, straw man, appeal to authority, and secundum. Each of these fallacies is comparable to what happens in everyday life conversations. Through analyzing, one should be able to determine how these logical mistakes connect with our everyday lives. Equivocation is a fallacy known for having two meanings of an ambiguous word over the course of an argument. The example used during lecture expressed that a feather is light, but light can 't be dark. Therefore, the feather can 't be dark. In this example, light is used as an adjective and a noun. When stating that the feather is light, one is making reference to the weight of a feather, not the color of the feather. The interpretation of the feather can be confusing because one can think that when expressing that the feather is light it is describing the color of the feather. Therefore, if you know the color of something is light, it can’t be dark as well. Equivocation is used when arguing; it goes to show that when …show more content…
Appeal to authority is a fallacy where an assertion is deemed true because of the position or authority of the person asserting it. When learning about this fallacy, I immediately reverted to my childhood. Any time my parents or an older family member told me something, I believed it because I automatically thought it had to be true because of them being older. That 's not the case; something isn 't always true because of the position or authority a person has unless they have concrete evidence to support their points. Appeal to authority fallacy also correlates with attending lecture; you can’t automatically believe everything your professor says is true if he or she doesn’t have supporting material for the point they are trying to
In a persuasive essay, these are excellent forms of appealing to the audience and guiding them to follow the line of thinking Worthen has. She begins with an anecdote to introduce her struggle as a professor, drawing the readers from the very beginning. With the readers reeled in, Worthen is able to explain how professors understand lecturing to truly be. She emphasizes how they have the best intentions for their students, wanting to push them harder and further than they could imagine. Worthen tied her evidence with every argument that she posed to her reader. Her use of expert opinions stand out due to her frequent use of them. She interviewed an array of professors, along with a student to help emphasis how lecturing has really expanded their horizons of teaching and learning, respectively. Although the evidence may seem a bit faulty due to it strictly coming from her opinions, she does an excellent job tying it with the expert onions she has gathered from different professors. Worthen also gives a student input to help validate all these ideas from the perspective of a former
In the play The Crucible many characters use different rhetorical fallacies, and one of those characters being Reverend Hale. Hale comes is as an expert on witchcraft to help this small village in their new found problem. He interviewed everyone had made an allegation against people in the village and everyone who was said to be involved with witchcraft. When Reverend Parris comes to take Elizabeth Proctor into cusditoy after Abigail Williams says that Mrs. Proctors sprit was sent to stab her, Hale says, “Nonsense! Minister, I have myself examined Tituba, Sarah Good and numerous other that have confessed to dealing with the Devil. They have confessed it” (Miller 68). He is using the hasty generalization by drawing up a conclusion with insufficient
An example is “For instance, swine and humans are similar enough that they can share many diseases” (Dicke and Van Huis 345). The authors create a Hasty Generalization fallacy by concluding that because humans and swine are similar, they share diseases. Furthermore, this makes the audience feel lost because the authors do not provide evidence of how “swine and humans are similar” (Dicke and Van Huis 345). Similarly, the author says that “Because insects are so different from us, such risks are accordingly lowered” (Dicke and Van Huis 345). Again, the author fails to provide a connection between how the risk of getting an infection is lowered because humans and insects are different. The authors also create a Hasty Generalization fallacy because they conclude that the risk of humans getting infected is lowered just because insects and humans are different. In summary, the use of fallacies without providing evidence and makes the readers feel
A straw man fallacy, in its most lucid form, is executed when a person not only disregards an opponent’s counterarguments, but also distorts them into exaggerated versions of themselves in the interest of making them easier to refute. In many cases, the adversary’s arguments are skewed to such a severe point that they wind up being completely different than what the adversaries were actually fighting for; however, this is all for the convenience of the proponent. An innumerable amount of politicians and authors are infamous for using this problematic method of disproving opposing arguments, even notable celebrities like George W. Bush. The straw man method of persuasion is a proficient way to make a personal stance sound factual, but it
Donald Trump posted a YouTube video offering President Obama $5 million dollars to produce his collegiate records and individual passport application (O’Connor, C., 2012). When contacted by Forbes magazine in response to this offer, Trump professed that the offer was extended due to the voters knowing so very little about the president’s personal background. Further stating, his motives were in the best interest of President Obama based on the current state of suspicion surrounding his presidency and this would all questions to rest (O’Connor, C., 2012). This is an example of the ad hominem reasoning fallacy and how the persuader focuses on personally attacking the individual (Larson, C., 2013, p. 245). The statements called president’s background and character into question. The objective of persuader was to further discredit the president in the upcoming 2012 presidential election. The response of the president and White House was predictable based on the oppositional views and past responses to other similar claims and requests (Larson, C., 2013, p. 245). Donald Trump committed an ad hominem when he launched a character assassination of President Obama by introducing meaningless perceptions of character flaws in an attempt to divert votes as well as bring attention to his upcoming show (O’Connor, C., 2012).
All of our interactions within this world hold a certain degree of influence that we do not often think twice about. In certain occupations this influence and power can be seen and understood. A college professor, for example, may or may not be aware of his or her influence on a student’s opinion. Professors are in a position in which they can persuade or influence a person’s opinion. Because students often find trust in what their professor is saying, it is easy to succumb to their views, beliefs, or opinions. Not all students can be persuaded so easily, however over a decade of a teaching a professor has likely influenced thousands of studen...
Gaining the credibility in a speech can be difficult at times and can test even the best speakers ability to keep the crowds attention and respect. One of the ways to keep credibility with a crowd is practicing and applying appeal to ethics. Which is defined as winning the favor of the audience by showing strong credibility in the speaker (Merriam-Webster). One of the best speeches that exemplifies the usage of appeal to ethics is Patrick Henry’s “Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death” speech where he addresses an issue of war at the revolutionary convention. Henry through appeal to ethics developed his credibility and wanted the people listening at the convention to believe they can’t sit and do nothing instead they have to get their hands dirty and fight.
Lot of people do not have ability to disobey the authority. In Milgram’s experiment, we can see that few people were nervous to give high voltage shocks. Despite, their nervousness and morality they listened to the authority to continue long after even though the learner was not responding. Perhaps the teachers obeyed because they have a sense of obligation to their duty. This is just the whole idea of completing the job that’s given to you. Some people have a fear of being perceived as rude. In general, people want to present themselves in a best way possible, hence people obey authority despite of ethical notion in the back of their minds. If there was not a society wide stereotype of scientists, I would suppose that the teachers would had
Fallacies, in terms of logic, are forms of flawed thinking. They are obstacles—weeds in the garden of the mind, which can be difficult to distinguish from the plants if not closely observed. The nature of fallacies falls in with our nature as human beings—they do not like to be discovered and plucked any more than we like to be the ones to admit that we are incorrect. Accepting responsibility for our actions, and in this case fallacies in our thinking, is the first step to change. Thus, if we can overcome our human pride and admit our flaws to ourselves, we are then empowered to correct them. Therein lies the value of examining these fallacies, which is an important component of studying critical thinking.
Flannery O’Connor is best known for her Southern Gothic writing style and grotesque characters. Dorothy Tuck McFarland states that “O’Connor created bizarre characters or extreme situations in order to attain deeper kinds of realism” (1). This writing style is seen in Flannery O’Connor’s short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. Flannery O’Connor uses many techniques to gain the reader’s attention and keep them captivated. One way that O’Connor does this is by revolving her stories around symbols and integrating religious elements into her works. O’Connor is widely recognized for incorporating her Catholic faith into her stories. “She was a devout Roman Catholic, with a Southern upbringing” (Whitt 1). There are many types of ways to interpret “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. One method is by using formalist criticism. Formalist criticism exists when a reader can approach, analyze, and understand a story by using elements like the setting and symbolism.
These faults in our reasoning are called cognitive errors. These errors can lead to logical fallacies and mistakes. Some examples of cognitive errors are: snap judgment, remembering the hits-forgetting the misses, confirmation bias, power of suggestion, and the link between cognitive errors and logical fallacies. All of these can lead to actions that are misinterpreted and unplanned. These can subconsciously affect perceptions and thought processes.
Logical fallacies. A logical fallacy is dependent on flawed logic. The connection to the 2016 election is one of the Democratic Party candidates, Bernie Sanders. Sanders uses a faulty comparison for his free college plan. He compares countries like Sweden and America to develop his plan, but the countries are very different and this comparison is inaccurate and misleading. He should be using countries like Europe to compare to America because they have more in common. Sander’s believes that in a developing country such as America, education should be a right for everyone no matter their social class. However, his logic is flawed because he is basing his logic off of countries like Sweden whose population consists of 9 million while the United
"If you’re one of those Christians who thinks you can just sit this one out and let God take care of it, I got some bad news for you."
2. Getting caught up in the “intentional fallacy” means that the critic becomes fixated on
In their essay, ‘The Intentional Fallacy’ (1946), William K. Wimsatt Jr. and Monroe C. Beardsley, two of the most eminent figures of the New Criticism school of thought of Literary Criticism, argue that the ‘intention’ of the author is not a necessary factor in the reading of a text.