Free Republic

With the California State of the State Address just weeks away, Capitol whisperers have divulged that a minimum wage increase will be included in Governor Schwarzenegger’s 2006 agenda, and that a preliminary proposal has tentative backing from the leadership of both parties. This is unfortunate news for working Californians because the minimum wage negatively distorts labor markets. The most well known distortion is the higher unemployment that results from minimum-wage laws. Setting the minimum wage above the level where employers and employees would have mutually agreed on labor services forces employers to cut back on the number of hires. This...

Amidst the fallout from the special election, there is a renewed discussion about governing from the Center. It is a mantra championed by many a consultant and some “moderates” – in both the Democrat and Republican Parties - that claim you have to be a centrist/moderate to win/succeed in California. Simply stated, that simply isn’t true. It is not true because in order to succeed, politicians must be well defined to attract voters because the “very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet.” Put another way, voters generally do not elect...

...The book begins with a discussion of the medical use of embryonic tissue and the debate over whether a blastocyst (which is a ball of a few hundred cells) is a person. This section is thoughtful, clearheaded and informed by developmental neuroscience. One fallacy Gazzaniga exposes depends on the common idea that graded differences block principled legal distinctions. In the version referred to as the fallacy of the beard, the logic goes like this: If we cannot say how long a man's whiskers must be to qualify as a beard, we cannot distinguish between a bearded man and a clean-shaven...

Question: Hi, I was wondering about a bioethical issue that's really important today- abortion. Most of the debate about abortion revolves around when life begins, so I was wondering when most scientist's believe that life begins, since you obviously would know more about this subject. You don't have to give your moral beliefs or anything, but I would just like to know when you think that life begins... Thanks! =) Amit Srivastava Answer 1: This is an important topic, but even (or especially) for a scientist you and I must realize that my "moral beliefs" will affect the kind of...

Thomas Sowell: The fallacy with 90 lives By THOMAS SOWELL, Creators Syndiucate November 20, 2004 Cats are supposed to have nine lives but fallacies must have at least ninety. Some notions will be believed, no matter how many times they have been refuted by facts. One of these seemingly immortal fallacies is the implicit assumption that our enemies have unlimited resources, so that our efforts at strengthening ourselves militarily are doomed to be self-defeating. At least as far back as the 1930s, the intelligentsia and others have warned against military spending as setting off an "arms race" in which each...

Based on the historical accounts of the existence Democracy (DEMS) and the true nature of the united states (a constitutional republic "Republicans"). It would seem that after 2000 years of abject failure the DEMS would find a new gig. Every democracy that has ever existed has devolved into a "mobocracy" and destroyed itself. The young in America are taught that the US is a Democracy. Unfortunately, this fallacy has been perpetuated since 1933 in the public education system and even reiterated ad nauseum in places of higher learning. Little if any attempt by the (gack) teachers to correct this grossly...

Referring to the fallacy discussions previously posted (and linked below) may be helpful before beginning. Among the following passages, identify those in which there is a fallacy; if there is a fallacy, analyze it, give its kind (whether relevance, or presumption, or ambiguity) and its specific name. Which is more useful, the Sun or the Moon? The Moon is more useful since it gives us light during the night, when it is dark, whereas the Sun shines only in the daytime, when it is light anyway. — GEORGE GAMOW (inscribed in the entry hall of the Hayden Planetarium, New York...

Composition The term "fallacy of composition" is applied to both of two closely related types of invalid argument. The first may be described as reasoning fallaciously from the attributes of the parts of a whole to the attributes of the whole itself. A particularly flagrant example would be to argue that, since every part of a certain machine is light in weight, the machine "as a whole" is light in weight. The error here is manifest when we recognize that a very heavy machine may consist of a very large number of lightweight parts. Not all examples of this kind...

Amphiboly The fallacy of amphiboly occurs when one is arguing from premisses whose formulations are ambiguous because of their grammatical construction. The word "amphiboly" is derived from the Greek, its meaning in essence being "two in a lump," or the "doubleness" of a lump. A statement is amphibolous when its meaning, is indeterminate because of the loose or awkward way in which its words are combined. An amphibolous statement may be true in one interpretation and false in another. When it is stated as premiss with the interpretation that makes it true, and a conclusion is drawn from it on...

FALLACIES OF AMBIGUITY The meaning of words or phrases may shift as a result of inattention, or may be deliberately manipulated within the course of an argument. A term may have one sense in a premiss, quite a different sense in the conclusion. When the inference drawn depends upon such changes it is, of course, fallacious. Mistakes of this kind are called "fallacies of ambiguity" or sometimes "sophisms." The deliberate use of such devices is usually crude and readily detected — but at times the ambiguity may be obscure, the error accidental, the fallacy subtle. Five varieties are distinguished in...

Accident and Converse Accident The fallacies of accident and converse accident arise as a result of the careless, or deliberately deceptive, use of generalizations. In most important affairs, and especially inpolitical or moral argument, we rely on statements of how things generally are, how people generally behave, and the like. But even where general claims are entirely plausible, we must be careful not to apply them to particular cases mechanically or rigidly. Circumstances alter cases; a generalization that is true by and large may not apply in a given case, for good reasons having to do with the special (or...

False Cause It is obvious that any reasoning that relies on treating as the cause of some thing or event what is not really its cause must be seriously mistaken. But often we are tempted to suppose, or led to suppose, that we understand some specific cause-and-effect relation when in fact we do not. The nature of the connection between cause and effect, and how we determine whether such a connection is present or absent, are central problems of inductive logic and scientific method. These problems are discussed in detail in Part Four of this book. Presuming the reality of...

FALLACIES OF PRESUMPTION Some mistakes in everyday reasoning are the consequence of an unjustified assumption, often suggested by the formulation of the argument. The reader, or listener, or even the author of the passage may be caused — through oversight or by deliberate design — to assume the truth of some unproved and unwarranted proposition. When such dubious assumptions buried in the argument are crucial for the support of the conclusion, the argument is bad and can be very misleading. Unwarranted leaps of this kind are called fallacies of presumption. In fallacious arguments of this kind the premisses are, again,...

Irrelevant Conclusion: Ignoratio Elenchi The fallacy of ignoratio elenchi (literally, false refutation) is committed when an argument purporting to establish a particular conclusion is instead directed to proving a different conclusion. The premisses "miss the point"; the reasoning may seem plausible in itself, and yet the argument misfires as a defense of the conclusion in dispute. Arguments in the sphere of social legislation frequently commit this fallacy; a program of a particular kind, designed to achieve some larger objective that is widely shared, is supported by premisses that do provide reasons to share the larger end, but that tell us...

The Appeal to Emotion: Argument Ad Populum This common fallacy and the two that follow it are so evidently fallacious that they require little explanation. In each case, the premisses plainly are not relevant to the conclusion and are deliberately chosen as instruments with which to manipulate the beliefs of the listener or reader. The argument ad populum, the appeal to emotion (literally "to the people," and by implication to the mob's easily aroused emotions) is the device of every propagandist and demagogue. It is fallacious because it replaces the laborious task of presenting evidence and rational argument with expressive...

Argument Ad Hominem The phrase ad hominem translates into "against the person." It names a fallacious attack in which the thrust is directed, not at a conclusion, but at the person who asserts or defends it. This fallacy has two major forms, because there are two major ways in which the attack can be personalized. Argument Ad Hominem, Abusive Participants in strenuous argument sometimes disparage the character of their opponents, deny their intelligence or reasonableness, question their integrity, and so on. But the character of an individual is logically irrelevant to the truth or falsehood of what that person says,...

The Appeal to Inappropriate Authority: Argument Ad Verecundiam In attempting to make up one's mind about some difficult or complicated question, it is entirely reasonable to be guided by the judgment of an acknowledged expert who has studied the matter thoroughly. When we argue that a given conclusion is correct on the ground that an expert authority has come to that judgment, we commit no fallacy. Indeed, such recourse to authority is necessary for most of us on very many matters. Of course, an expert's judgment constitutes no conclusive proof; experts disagree, and even in agreement they may err; but...

FALLACIES . . . arguments, like men, are often pretenders. — Plato It would, be a very good thing if every trick could receive some short and obviously appropriate name, so that when anyone used this or that particular trick, he could at once be reproved for it. — Arthur Schopenhauer WHAT IS A FALLACY? An argument, whatever its subject or sphere, is generally constructed in such a way as to prove that its conclusion is true. But any argument can fail to fulfill this purpose in either of two ways. One way it can fail is by assuming a...

DENIED! You never think it will happen to you, or somone you know. But you knew when the whole cockamamie "national instant check system with 3-day waiting period" was enacted, you had this nagging doubt in your mind, "What happens if these computers, powered by unstable operating systems, serviced and maintained by human beings, makes a mistake that affects an innocent man's life?" The Brady Bunch at the VPC are crowing about how effective the instant check and 3-day waiting period is at keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, and cutting down on "crimes of passion". But...

Also Known as: "You Too Fallacy" Description of Ad Hominem Tu Quoque This fallacy is committed when it is concluded that a person's claim is false because 1) it is inconsistent with something else a person has said or 2) what a person says is inconsistent with her actions. This type of "argument" has the following form: Person A makes claim X. Person B asserts that A's actions or past claims are inconsistent with the truth of claim X. Therefore X is false. The fact that a person makes inconsistent claims does not make any particular claim he makes false...