A Freeper's Introduction to Rhetoric (Part 1, Introduction and the Argument From Ignorance)

Introduction to Logic | Irving M. Copi & Carl Cohen

[general_re]

Why post this? Because it's good to expand your mind. I've noticed that many posters are either unfamiliar with common logical fallacies, or are unsure of the details, and are thus unsure of how to respond or refute such arguments when they are presented, or are unable to recognize such fallacies in their own posts. And spotting such things is a useful skill, above and beyond simply arguing with other freepers - one who becomes familiar with informal fallacies will often be surprised and dismayed to learn just how often logical fallacies are employed by politicians. Spotting when someone is handing you a "bill of goods" is more than simply an academic skill - it's a virtual necessity in this day and age.

And so I thought it might be useful to present an authoritative collection of common logical fallacies, of the type often encountered on the web and elsewhere. These are derived from Chapter 6 of Copi and Cohen's excellent text, Introduction to Logic, 10'th edition - it is a preferred text for many introductory college logic courses, due to its relatively clear and accessible style. I plan for this to be an ongoing series, covering the fallacies that are exposed therein - although they list seventeen fallacies, and I intend to cover all seventeen, some sections are somewhat shorter than others, so I may decide to combine them into a single posting. Finally, I have, for the most part, eliminated footnotes from the sections, except where I deem them to be particularly useful.

As I said, I intend to post all the parts over the coming days, whether there's any expressed interest or not. I hope that freepers will find it worthy of discussion - feel free to post examples of fallacies spotted "in the wild", or ask questions of others, and so forth - but even if not, I think it will be useful as a reference for the future. If there does prove to be sufficient interest, let me know, and I will put together a ping list for future installments in this series.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Good post.

What have you done with general_re?

[general_re]

He's at work. I'll be commanding the keyboard for the day, until he gets back and I have to pretend I spent the day drinking out of the toilet.

signed,
general_re's dog

[general_re]

The next installment in the series will be the argument ad verecundiam, or the argument of appeal to authority.

[PatrickHenry]

PING. [This ping list is for the evolution side of evolution threads, and sometimes for other science topics. FReepmail me to be added or dropped.]

[PatrickHenry]

My humble contribution for the morning: a good listing of some common Fallacies.

[P.O.E.]

I sure wish thought, reason & logic would return to the zeitgeist instead of the emotional/attitudinal whines. I'm really getting tired of hearing liberals opine.

Would you be so kind as to ping me on the next installment?

[PatrickHenry]

This thread doesn't show up in my sidebar "Philosophy" list. Didn't you check that subject when you posted? Maybe you can ping the admin mod to add it. If you think you should.

[general_re]

Good list. The Nizkor list draws some distinctions that are not present in the material that will be on offer here - not that it won't be covered, but rather that this material is somewhat more general than is Nizkor. Copi and Cohen dicuss ad hominem in a general sort of way, for example, whereas Nizkor will often treat the many variations on the ad hominem argument as separate fallacies, naming and describing each variant. Anyway, Nizkor is very useful for the number and variety of examples it gives, even if there is some slight disagreement about how best to organize and categorize the various informal fallacies.

[general_re]

This thread doesn't show up in my sidebar "Philosophy" list. Didn't you check that subject when you posted?

I must have missed that - it looks as though the posting form has been somewhat revised of late, and I probably overlooked it.

Moderator: would you be so kind as to add "Philosophy" to the list of subjects for this thread?

[general_re]

You're in. And I agree, the liberal left does draw rather...liberally from the stock list of fallacies ;)

[general_re]

Hmmph. I tried hitting the "Click to add topic" link, but it won't let me add "Philosophy" myself - it just says "unknown:Philosophy".

[longshadow]

I plan for this to be an ongoing series, covering the fallacies that are exposed therein - although they list seventeen fallacies, and I intend to cover all seventeen,

One could imagine no greater present for this Holiday Season.... your generosity will not go unnoticed.

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[PatrickHenry]

When you post a new article, the 2nd box you fill in is "Topics," and there's a checkoff list of them, followed by things like "breaking news," and then there's a list of states. Anyway, Philosophy is one of those topics, and it's also one that a freeper can choose to list among his sidebar items. For this thread, I couldn't use the "add a topic" button either. I don't know what it's all about, but it's obviously different from the "topics" checkoff list when starting a thread. It's irrelevant here, but I always list my evolution threads in three topics: Philosophy, Misc., and Culture/Society.

[PatrickHenry]

Yet another List Of Fallacious Arguments. I observe that no two lists seem to be the same. There are probably more fallacies than could possibly appear in any one list, and it's not unusual for new fallacies to be identified and named. So this is far from a completed subject.

[general_re]

Anyway, Philosophy is one of those topics, and it's also one that a freeper can choose to list among his sidebar items. For this thread, I couldn't use the "add a topic" button either.

I think I know what the problem is - there's a difference in the topics list available in "News/Activism", which is the one you and I are familiar with, and the topics list here in "General Interest". Try it out - open two browser windows, one for News and one for Chat, hit "post" for both of them, and bring up the topic lists side-by-side. For whatever reason, "Philosophy" is not available as a topic here in General Interest - guess it's not something that freepers are "generally interested" in ;)

Anyway, that's why I missed it - it wasn't there in the first place...

[PatrickHenry]

Okay. I've never posted an article to Chat. (But I've had them moved into that dismal place.) You actually chose to start out here? Hee hee.

[general_re]

You actually chose to start out here? Hee hee.

I did. It was too dang inconvenient to monitor more than one forum before, for me and for most others, I think, which is why just about everything wound up in News - that's the forum most people chose to watch. But I'm guessing that I'm not alone in switching to the "all forums" view, which should hopefully make this place a bit less of a ghetto than in the past - it's a lot less invisible than it used to be if you switch over.