Christian P.

Salazar FM: 09103

Mrs. E. Ibasco- Ochangco November 24, 2009

Informal Fallacy: An informal fallacy is an argument whose stated premises fail to support their proposed conclusion. The deviation in an informal fallacy often stems from a flaw in the path of reasoning that links the premises to the conclusion. Kinds of Informal Fallacy: 1. Hasty generalization is a logical fallacy of faulty generalization by reaching an inductive generalization based on insufficient evidence. It commonly involves basing a broad conclusion upon the statistics of a survey of a small group that fails to sufficiently represent the whole population. Example: Person A travels through Town X for the first time. He sees 10 people, all of them children. Person A returns to his town and reports that there are no adult residents in Town X. 2. A dicto simpliciter (Latin: "from a maxim without qualification" -- meaning 'from a universal rule') or ad Dictum simpliciter (Latin: "to a maxim without qualification" -- meaning 'to a universal rule') are Latin phrases for a type of logical fallacy. The a (meaning "from") is often omitted when this phrase is used in English, being mistaken for an indefinite article. 3. Post hoc ergo propter hoc, Latin for "after this, therefore because (on account) of this", is a logical fallacy (of the questionable cause variety) which states, "Since that event followed this one, that event must have been caused by this one." It is often shortened to simply post hoc and is also sometimes referred to as false cause, coincidental correlation or correlation not causation. Example: "I can't help but think that you are the cause of this problem; we never had any problem with the furnace until you moved into the apartment." The manager of the apartment house, on no stated grounds other than the temporal priority of the new tenant's occupancy, has assumed that the tenant's presence has some causal relationship to the furnace's becoming faulty. 4. False analogy is an informal fallacy applying to inductive arguments. It is often mistakenly considered to be a formal fallacy, but it is not, because a false analogy consists of an error in the substance of an argument (the content of the analogy itself), not an error in the logical structure of the argument. Example: Love is like a spring shower. It brings refreshment to a person's body. (Does it also sometimes lead to thunderstorms and being hit by lightning?) 5. Contradictory premises: assumption of contradictory premises is an extremely dangerous error, since-after they are assumed-any conclusion can be demonstrated with formal validity. Example: Fining you as a deterrent because you were speeding sometime before the accident; the fine is assumed to control your deliberate behavior to avoid unintentional results-- an accident. Was the accident really an accident or a willful act if you decided to exceed the speed limit (a crime)? 6. Hypothesis contrary to fact: applying a speculative assumption contrary to the observations about the phenomenon. It is not possible to reach a definite conclusion by presupposing a state of affairs contrary to what actually occurred.

Example: The pilot had to do something wrong to cause this approach accident, regardless of the sudden drop in airspeed just before the accident. 7. An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the person" or "argument against the person") is an argument which links the validity of a premise to an irrelevant characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise. Example: "Tom says the umpire made the correct call, but this can't be true, because Tom is the father of the boy who was "safe" on second base." Assuming Tom is the father of the baseball player, his viewpoint is uncritical and may therefore be scrutinized, but the umpire may nonetheless have made the right call. 8. Argumentum ad Misericordiam (argument from pity or misery) the fallacy committed when pity or a related emotion such as sympathy or compassion is appealed to for the sake of getting a conclusion accepted. Example: Person L argues statement p or argument A. L deserves pity because of circumstance y. Circumstance y is irrelevant to p or A. Statement p is true or argument A is good. 9. Argumentum ad baculum (Latin for argument to the cudgel or appeal to the stick), also known as appeal to force, is an argument where force, coercion, or the threat of force, is given as a justification for a conclusion. It is a specific case of the negative form of an argument to the consequences. Example: If you drive while drunk, you will be put in jail. You want to avoid going to jail. Therefore you should not drive while drunk. 10. An argumentum ad populum (Latin: "appeal to the people"), in logic, is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or all people believe it; it alleges, "If many believe so, it is so." Example: Christianity is believed in by the greatest number of people in the world, so it must be true. 11. The argument from ignorance, also known as argumentum ad ignorantiam ("appeal to ignorance" argument by lack of imagination, or negative evidence, is a logical fallacy in which it is claimed that a premise is true only because it has not been proven false, or is false only because it has not been proven true. Example: My investigation training is perfectly fine; my critics don't really understand the investigation business enough to offer credible suggestions. 12. Argument from authority or appeal to authority is a logical fallacy, It is also known as argumentum ad verecundiam (Latin: argument to respect) or ipse dixit (Latin: he himself said it). Where it is argued that a statement is correct because the statement is made by a person or source that is commonly regarded as authoritative. Example: Referring to the philosophical beliefs of Aristotle: "If Aristotle said it was so, it is so."