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A straw man fallacy (sometimes written as strawman) is the informal fallacy of refuting an argument different from the one actually under discussion, while not recognizing or acknowledging the distinction. [1] One who engages in this fallacy is said to be "attacking a straw man".
In a slippery slope argument, a course of action is rejected because the slippery slope advocate believes it will lead to a chain reaction resulting in an undesirable end or ends. [1] The core of the slippery slope argument is that a specific decision under debate is likely to result in unintended consequences. The strength of such an argument ...
Slippery slope (thin edge of the wedge, camel's nose) – asserting that a proposed, relatively small, first action will inevitably lead to a chain of related events resulting in a significant and negative event and, therefore, should not be permitted. [46]
Slippery slope arguments may be defeated by asking critical questions or giving counterarguments. [32] There are several reasons for a slippery slope to be fallacious: for example, the argument is going too far into the future, it is a too complex argument whose structure is hard to identify, or the argument makes emotional appeals. [33]
Slippery slope arguments argue against a certain proposal based on the fact that this proposal would bring with it a causal chain of events eventually leading to a bad outcome. [ 4 ] [ 9 ] But even if every step in this chain is relatively probable, probabilistic calculus may still reveal that the likelihood of all steps occurring together is ...
The form of the post hoc fallacy is expressed as follows: . A occurred, then B occurred.; Therefore, A caused B. When B is undesirable, this pattern is often combined with the formal fallacy of denying the antecedent, assuming the logical inverse holds: believing that avoiding A will prevent B.
This dialogue presents an example of appeal to ridicule: Person A: At one time in prehistory, the continents were fused together into a single supercontinent, which we call Pangaea. Person B: Yes, I definitely believe that hundreds of millions of years ago, some laser cut through the Earth and broke apart a giant landmass into many different ...
The power of emotions to influence judgment, including political attitudes, has been recognized since classical antiquity. Aristotle, in his treatise Rhetoric, described emotional arousal as critical to persuasion, "The orator persuades by means of his hearers, when they are roused to emotion by his speech; for the judgments we deliver are not the same when we are influenced by joy or sorrow ...