FALLACIES: How To Identify and Avoid Them

Philosophy is a discipline with its own tools! Logic is one important tool in philosophy to differentiate good reasoning from bad reasoning. Logic deals with argument. Argument is a set of propositions with premisses and conclusion. The premisses of an argument provide grounds for the conclusion. It is impossible to have a valid or true premisses with a false conclusion. When this happens, the argument in question is either invalid or false. The errors committed in arguments are regarded as fallacies.

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Fallacy can be defined as the errors in reasoning. People employ different methods to make their arguments appeal to their audience. In the process, they use tricks, sentiments, and emotions to persuade or deceive others to accept their point of view in an argument. 

Etymologically, fallacy is derived from the Latin word falor which means ‘to be deceived’. M.I Copi defines fallacy as that argument that may seem to be correct but which proves, upon examination, not to be so.

Types of Fallacies

Fallacies can be divided into two, namely formal (or logical) fallacies and material fallacies (or fallacies of irrelevance).

Formal (or logical) fallacies

The problems with these types of fallacies are found in their forms or nature. In the argument, everything looks deductively valid but in reality, they are not. Some of these fallacies are amphiboly, accent, equivalent, division, etc.

Material fallacies (or fallacies of irrelevance)

Here, fallacies are committed when we fail disambiguate terms, vagueness, misplaced precisions, etc. These fallacies focus on the issues raised not why they are raised. For example, suppose you tell Mr A to follow you because Mr A’s friend (Mr B) is a traitor. Here, you have not told Mr A why he should follow you. Rather, you have only succeeded in telling Mr A why he should not follow Mr B. Some of these fallacies are Argumentum Ad Baccculum, d Hominem, Ad Misericordiam, Ad Populm, etc.

I will try to explain some of these fallacies so that we can be guided not to make them or employ some of these fallacies while arguing for or against anything. Argument in philosophy is not about winning or proving that the other person is inferior in reasoning. Rather, to use facts to prove why you think your position is more logical and sound than your opponent. 

1) Argmentum Ad Ignorantiam (Appeal to ignorance)

This fallacy is committed when you argue that certain facts about the issue at hand are not known. The ignorance is of two kinds:

(a) A proposition is true because no one has proven it to be false. This is a fallacy. Just because no one has proven something to be false doesn’t make it true.

(b) A proposition is false because no one has proven it to be true. When you argue that there are no transgenders, for instance, because you have not seen one then you are only committing Arguemntum Ad Ignorantiam

2) Argumentum Ad Hominem

This fallacy is commited when you leave the issue on ground to face or attack the personality of the person involved.

If for instance we are arguing about the importance of good governance and instead of you to argue based on the issue on ground, you started attacking my personality that I have not done anything good for the state, then you have practically deviated from the issue on ground. Whenever you leave the important issue to question the person that raised it, you have committed Ad Hominem.

3) Argumentum Ad Misericordiam (Appeal to pity)

 This fallacy is committed when we try to appeal to people’s emotion rather than using facts to prove our point. 

For instance, a man killed another man during a robbery attack and instead of the accused to plead guilty or explain what actually happened, he resorted into begging the judge that he has children to take care of, aged mother at home, house rent to pay, etc. The man in question is not saying he is innocent but rather trying to appeal to the judge's emotions to free him.

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4) Argumentum Ad  Bacculum (Appeal to force)

This fallacy is committed when  you use threat or force someone to accept your conclusion.

If as a lecturer, you threaten your students to buy your textbook or you will fail them, then you have committed an appeal to force. It means you forcefully sold your textbooks to the students.

5) Poisoning the well

This fallacy is committed when an attempt is made to shift attention from the merit of the argument to the source or origin of the argument. 

Let’s assume that your supervisor at work decided to recommend fellow colleague for promotion but you stood up to remind your supervisor about what your colleague did to stop him from being the supervisor, then you have committed the fallacy of poisoning the well.

6) Fallacy of complex questions

This fallacy is committed when several questions are rolled into one. The question asked will indirectly assume answer and build another question into it. 

If for instance I asked: Have you stopped beating your wife?

This question looks straight and simple but it is not. Let’s break it down:

If you answered yes, it means you have been beating your wife and you still beat her!

If you answered no, it means you have been beating your wife but you have stopped!

This is often a deceitful device to achieve the questionnaire's purpose. Even when the question looks serious, the presumption of the answer is surreptitious. 

7) Fallacy of Amphiboly

It is the deliberate manipulation of the meaning of words, terms, and concepts in an argument. This occurs when we argue from premisses whose formulations are ambiguous and vague.

The sign ‘slow down men at work’ commits fallacy of amphiboly. Does it mean men working should always slow down or we should slow down when we are working?

The above are some of the fallacies we commit every day. Knowing some of these fallacies will help us greatly to avoid them when arguing. Not all arguments are valid, sound and true! A valid, sound and true argument is one without fallacy. Fallacies are errors in reasoning and we should try to avoid these errors.

Thanks for reading. Your boy @smyle the philosopher.

Reference: Anthony A. Asekhauno, Philosphy and Logic, 2005, Benin, Nigeria.