RHETORICAL FALLACIES 

1. Fallacies of matter: general assumptions or premises that are simply not strictly true, or not based on shared collective knowledge. While statements that everyone would regard as self-evident (America is a dominant world power) or “true by definition” (a majority is a plurality in excess of 50 per cent of the total number) do not require justification, you should watch out for statements or premises that mask as self-evident “common sense”: “Our society has been in a steady state of moral decline (or progress) over the past century,” or even “Everyone in this country is born equal, having an equal chance of success or failure.” For a significant amount of the audience, these general assumptions may themselves be very debatable.

2. “Guilt by association”: a person who shares values or beliefs with other people becomes held responsible for their vices. In the “deductive” form, one might generally observe that all child pornographers in this country support freedom of speech, and then point out that Jack supports freedom of speech.  The conclusion: Jack endorses child pornography. In the “inductive” form, one might point to several particular corrupt senators, and then point out that Jack is a member of their party. The conclusion: Jack is corrupt as well. This fallacy can thus operate from general concepts to specific examples, or from specific examples to general concepts– either way, the connection between the overall trait and the individual case remains weak or arbitrary.      

3. Conclusion from negative premises: in this case, a conclusion comes about too easily from the negation of a general premise.  Variant A (the “liberal” fallacy): A. Conservatives are influenced by the wealthy.  B. I am not a conservative  C. I am not influenced by the wealthy.  Variant B (the “Steve Forbes” fallacy): A. Professional politicians are harmful to this country B. I am not a professional politician. C. I will be a good leader for this country. By negating one thing, the opposite thing is affirmed in a simplistic way. Negative campaign ads on television are often the crudest form of this false logic: by making the other candidate look bad, the ad establishes that their candidate is good.  

4. Either/ or fallacy: while some situations may be regarded as either/ or situations, in many cases there may be other alternatives, possibilities or explanations. This is a frequent fallacy in political rhetoric, since politicians often find advantage in polarizing certain positions: either a senator cares about the life of unborn children, or he doesn’t; either the president supports free enterprise, or he doesn’t; you either want the maximum penalty for all drug crimes, or you don’t care if pushers roam the streets. This fallacy is also known as the “false dilemma” fallacy.

5. Fallacy of affirming the consequent: a case in which the argument begins with a hypothesis, establishes its consequence first and then goes backwards. For instance, one may initially state: “If the president makes too many concessions to special interest groups, the government will be less open to the common people.” In this fallacy, one would first establish that the government is becoming less open to the common people, and then draw the invalid conclusion that the president has made too many concessions to special interest groups. I might reasonably assume that “if students care about the quality of their papers, they will have no spelling errors in their papers,” but if I get a paper with no spelling errors, I can’t automatically assume that the student necessarily cared all that much about his or her paper; I would be arguing backwards. Even if the first thing may result in the second thing, the second thing doesn’t always require the first thing. 

6. Fallacy of denying the antecedent: another case of using hypothetical propositions to make a faulty argument. In this case the hypothesis would be something like “If the president would pass this bill, he would show his concern for the working people of America.” After establishing that the president did not pass this bill in question, the argument would then conclude that the president is not concerned about the working people of America. The only way this argument would work would be to also show that the only way (or the most important way) the president could show his concern would be to pass this single bill. Another example would be if I said, “If you stopped going to your other classes and spent this time to work on your papers, you would be very devoted to your work.” When my unrealistic premise doesn’t get fulfilled, then I would conclude—unreasonably-- that you weren’t devoted to your work.

In this instance, the fallacy could also be seen as an either/or fallacy. In this fallacy, as well as fallacy #4, the strategy involves arbitrarily limiting a field of possibilities; the cards are already stacked to get certain results.

7. Fallacy of faulty generalization: applies to cases of inductive reasoning in which inadequate evidence or limited examples are employed to justify a generalization. The evidence may be inadequate in the following ways: a.) the particulars may be irrelevant;  b.) the particulars may be unrepresentative;  c.) the particulars are not numerous enough;  d.) the authorities from which the evidence comes may be biased or prejudiced;  e.) the authorities may be incompetent or outdated;  f.) the authorities may be misquoted or quoted out of context; g.) the authorities may be misinterpreted. The most typical of these will be b.) and c.).  A particular form of this fallacy is stereotyping. 

8. Faulty causal generalization: this common fallacy occurs when one argues for a certain cause and effect relationship. 

For instance, it occurs when we argue from an effect to a cause when we a.) assign an inadequate cause to an effect, or b.) fail to account for the fact that there could be more than one cause to an effect. “Over the past four years, our country experienced a 10% rise in teen drug use, a 12% rise in teenage pregnancy, and a 7% rise in urban crime. Do we want four more years of a Democratic domestic policy?”

This fallacy can also occur when we argue from a cause to an effect. We may a.) fail to establish that a potential cause did in fact operate on a particular occasion, or b.) fail to take into account that the same cause can produce diverse effects. The previous example would apply again if we simply changed the sequence: “Through four years of a Democratic domestic policy, our country has suffered a moral breakdown: a 10% rise in teen drug use…”

Both of these variants are simply two sides of the same coin, and may be used in a positive or negative fashion--either to assign blame for something or to take credit for something in a loose way. Another term for this fallacy is post hoc, ergo propter hoc (“after this, therefore because of this”): a relationship in time is confused with a relation of causality.   

9. Faulty analogy: this fallacy is often very vulnerable to criticism, particularly when the similarities between the analogy and the real situation are trivial or irrelevant, and the differences are significant. The analogy essentially offers a misleading example to illustrate an issue: one analogy that has recently been criticized is the analogy between Nixon’s behavior in the Watergate scandal and Clinton’s own behavior in the Lewinsky scandal. If I wanted to give you an assignment for a 50-page paper, and justified my decision by saying that this is how they do things in graduate school courses, I would of course be offering a faulty analogy between two very different circumstances.

10. The “slippery slope” argument: when someone argues that a particular course of action will result in exaggerated future actions or consequences. “If we don’t pass stronger anti-drug legislation, we’ll have a nation of addicts”; “If we allow some regulations for gun control, we’ll eventually lose our right to carry guns at all”; “If we allow workplace drug testing, we will soon lose all our rights of privacy.”  

11. Begging the question: another phrase for this is “circular reasoning.” In this case, one already assumes in the premise what the conclusion is trying to prove. This technique is frequently employed by Gary Birdsong, the legendary “pit preacher”: “God exists.” “How do you know?” “The Bible says so.” “Why should I believe what the Bible says?” “Because it’s the inspired word of God.” In this fallacy, one can’t detect any significant movement from the premise to the conclusion. Beavis and Butthead often use this form of reasoning as well: “Why does this show suck?” “Because it sucks.” Even if the premise/conclusion is correct, this does not make the reasoning itself any more valid, because the argument doesn’t do anything. This fallacy might be regarded as a particular form of fallacy #1: the premise itself is what remains debatable, yet the argument essentially reverts back to the same doubtful premise to establish its conclusion.

12. Argument ad hominem (“to the man”): a form of emotional argument in which the focus shifts from a discussion of the issues to a discussion of personalities. While character is not always completely irrelevant in an argument, you should be alert to instances where it becomes a means of distracting from the issue at hand, or where it remains the main foundation of an argument.

13. Argument ad populum (“to the people”): similar to #11, this fallacy involves an appeal to irrational fears or prejudices in the audience to distract them from the issue at hand. While the use of honorific terms (“a true American,” “patriotism,” “motherhood”) or perjorative terms (“godlessness,” “radical,” “reactionary,” “traitors”) are not good or bad in themselves, and while appeals to emotion are not in themselves illegitimate, they are open to criticism when employed to obscure the audience’s perspective. When used properly, they reinforce solid logic without distorting it; they become fallacies when they cover up shoddy reasoning or bogus logic.

14. The “red herring”: another diversionary tactic. This occurs when one steers the argument away from the issue at hand to a side issue. Instead of directly admitting the faults of a particular policy, for instance, a politician may simply begin talking about other successful policies. This is a very subtle technique in political rhetoric, particularly in speeches— but one can detect it when a potentially damaging issue is already posited as an important issue, only to be set aside too quickly or easily in favor of some other unforeseen topic.