Fallacy
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
Illustration: The Heart Has Its Reasons (c.1887) by Odilon Redon, a phrase from the Pensées by Blaise Pascal
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"Some hold that we can only define a term in terms of a synonym or like term, for example, one cannot reduce ethical terms to naturalistic terms. G. E. Moore calls this the naturalistic fallacy. This is a mistake. On a naturalistic theory of ethics such as that of John Dewey, if ethical terms are to make any sense or have any relevance, they must be defined in terms of naturalistic terms. To believe one can only define a term in terms of itself or its synonyms is to commit the circularity fallacy. Thus, the naturalistic fallacy is not a fallacy, but only the failure to understand how definitions work. It is a definist's fallacy."--Emotion in Aesthetics, page 181, Warren A. Shibles, 1995 |
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A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning, or "wrong moves" in the construction of an argument. A fallacious argument may be deceptive by appearing to be better than it really is. Some fallacies are committed intentionally to manipulate or persuade by deception, while others are committed unintentionally due to carelessness or ignorance. The soundness of legal arguments depends on the context in which the arguments are made.
Fallacies are commonly divided into "formal" and "informal". A formal fallacy can be expressed neatly in a standard system of logic, such as propositional logic, while an informal fallacy originates in an error in reasoning other than an improper logical form. Arguments containing informal fallacies may be formally valid, but still fallacious.
See also
Lists
Concepts
- Aporia
- Anti-pattern
- Argumentation theory
- Argument map
- Association fallacy
- Cognitive bias
- Cognitive distortion
- Critical thinking
- Demagogue
- Evidence
- Fallacies of definition
- False premise
- False statement
- Illusion
- Inference objection
- Inquiry
- Jumping to conclusions
- Lemma
- Mathematical fallacy
- Paradox
- Prosecutor's fallacy
- Sophist
- Soundness
- Lies, damned lies, and statistics
- Truth
- Validity
- Victim blaming
