NAME- Ayush Aryan

ID- 2018A8PS0041P
TOPIC- INFORMAL FALLACIES IN SOCIO-POLITICAL/
ECONOMIC WORLD

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 What is informal fallacy?

Informal fallacies are arguments arise due to the stated premises not
b e i n g a b l e t o s u p p o r t t h e i r c o n c l u s i o n . I t m a yb e b e c a u s e o f a n e r r o r i n
reasoning. Informal fallacies due to deductive reasoning have
fundamental disconnect (because of hidden co -premise) between the
premise and conclusion which makes the argument invalid. Informal
fallacies due to inductive reasoning are almost opposite to its
counterpart as it arises because of induction of premise -premise to a
false conclusion.

1.2 Types of informal fallacies

a) Ad Hominem- Happens when the instead of taking the person’s

argument into consideration, the person is irrelevantly attacked.
b) Appeal to ignorance- Occurs when the argument’s basis is that there
is no evidence or proof against it.
c) Begging the question/ Arguing in a circle - Happens when instead of
supporting the argument its premise assumes the truth of the
conclusion.
d) Confusion of necessary with a sufficient condition - Happens when it
assumed that a necessary condition is sufficient for an event to happen.
e) Equivocation- Occurs when a key term is used to as one meaning in
the argument and the other in another part of argument.
f) False-dilemma- Occurs when all the possibilities are not taken into
consideration
g) False tautology- Happens when its assumed that if two things is
s i m i l a r i n o n e o r m o r e t h a n o n e f a s h i o n t h e n t h e y’ l l b e s i m i l a r i n
another way also.
h) Inconsistency- Happens when contradictory claims are made.
i ) I r r e l e v a n t a u t h o r i t y - H a p p e n s w h e n yo u b e l i e v e a n a r g u m e n t t o b e
t r u e w i t h o u t a n y s u p p o r t o n l y b e c a u s e o f t h e p e r s o n ’ s a u t h o r i t y.
f) Is ought - Happens when it’s assumed that things are in a certain way
b e c a u s e t h e y o u g h t t o b e t h a t w a y.
h ) O u g h t i s - H a p p e n s w h e n o n e w a n t s t h e t h i n g s t o b e i n a c e r t a i n w a y.
i) Questionable cause- Happens when two random events are correlated
without any proof.
j) Red herring- Occurs by diverting from the main topic to another
which only has a minor relation with the first.
k) Slippery slope- Happens when a course of action is rejected because
a proofles assumption is made that it would lead to undesirable end.
l) Straw Person- Happens when a person’s argument is deduced to be
something else to contradict it.
m) Two wrongs- Happens when a person tries to justify himself by
stating the similar action of his/her counterpart.
n) Unwanted generalization - Occurs when a generalization is made on
too little evidence.

2. DISCUSSION

I’ll be doing two case studies to explain the informal fallacies within
the socio- economic as well as in the economic world and how they
affect us or affected us. My first case study is of 2008 economic cri sis
which was cause due to false tautology and how the aftermath was
made worse with questionable cause. My second case study is on
reconstituting of Kashmir in India which would explain Irrelevant
Authority and Ought is.

2.1 CASE STUDY-1

2.1.a Introduct ion

In 2008 due to collapse of the housing market in USA one of the most
devastating economic crisis happened around the globe. The global
economy hit an all-time low. Millions lost their jobs and thousand
companies were shut.
It all happened when people saw the rise in housing market and started
b u yi n g m o r e a n d m o r e o f h o u s e s o u t o f e x p e c t a t i o n t h a t i t ’ l l r i s e o n l y.
They started taking more and more risky loans to buy houses with hope
o f p a yi n g b a c k w i t h t h e p r o f i t s w h i c h t h e y’ l l m a k e f r o m s e l l i n g t h e
houses. But instead this created a bubble and in the end there weren’t
e n o u g h b u ye r s a n d t h e s e l l e r s w e r e n ’ t a b l e t o p a yb a c k t h e i r l o a n s a n d
defaulted. This busted the bubble and caused the economic downfall.
Now the aftermath of this bubble burst was mass ive for other reasons
also. Those reasons were that there were other people also risking their
money and placing bets. Those bets were that the person who has
borrowed the loan would pay it back for sure. These bets were made by
a third party and are called CDO (collateral debt obligation). Now
another third party would place their bets that the earlier third party
w o u l d e a r n p r o f i t f r o m h i s b e t w h i c h i s c a l l s yn t h e t i c C D O a n d s o f o r t h
and so on. And this got a lot of capital involved which was finally all
lost when the borrowers of house loans defaulted.

2.1.b Informal Fallacies Involved

The first and foremost informal fallacy involved i s false tautology.
When people saw other people earning profits from housing market
they assumed that the case would be s imilar for them without any
background check.
When the economy collapsed, the USA government and the people
shifted the blame on the defenceless immigrants. They blamed them for
taking their jobs for cheap and dropping their quality of life leading to
Q u e s t i o n a b l e C a u s e . T h e r e a l c u l p r i t s w h o g a v e o u t s yn t h e t i c C D O s a n d
those who gave out loans without any collateral (called as subprime
mortgages) were roaming free.

2.2 CASE STUDY-2

2.2.a Introduction
Recently Article 370 was scrapped off by the Modi gov ernment. The
article gave special status to Kashmir. The article stated that no one
besides the residents of Kashmir can buy property in Kashmir. Then the
government there was autonomous. This was seen as a huge success by
the majority of the Indians. But it brings attention to another far more
important topic. The residents of the Kashmir. The government is
making decisions for their homeland without even consulting them.
They are enforcing their rule and having a catfight with the
neighbouring countries without even being a little concerned about
their welfare. Even if they are concerned, they showcase their concern
by sending in heavy troops and cutting -off their communication in the
name-sake of stopping terrorism.
The ongoing conflict between India, Pa kistan and China has been
terrorising the people of Kashmir since 1947.Each country stating they
c a n d o b e t t e r f o r t h e p e o p l e b u t e a c h s h o w i n g n o e f f o r t e x c e p t t r yi n g
for aggressive undertaking of Kashmir. The residents of Kashmir when
voice their concerns for their own goodwill are shut down by being
showered with pellets and being cut down from social media. Kashmir
has been in all blackout for more than a month now. People have been
struggling to get daily supplies or even basic medical care for that
matter. Those who try are shutdown.

2.1.b Informal Fallacies Involved

The major informal fallacy involved is Ought Is , The Kashmir conflict
arose when in 1947 during partition the British rule let Kashmir decide
which nation it wanted to be a part of. Then Kashmir had major Muslim
population but a Hindu monarch so the partition of Kashmir become
disputed. Since then each nation has wanted complete control over the
state of Kashmir and hence the judgement by the Modi government.
The decision of scrapping off of Article 370 was just to gain more
control over Kashmir and showcase to Pakistan and China that it is still
a part of India. The claims made were that India would improve the
living conditions of the residents of Kashmiris in general. People
believed that because they in general built a trust on Modi showcasing
Irrelevant Authority.

3. CONCLUSION

From my case studies I conclude that since the beginning of the human
h i s t o r y, h u m a n i t y a l t o g e t h e r h a s b e e n i g n o r a n t t o g e t w h a t i t w a n t s a t
the end of the day giving rise to multiple informal fallacies from day to
day life. Some fallacies impact in a major way some not so major and
some build up to finally burst at a global scale.
People need to think logically and make their judgements after proper
proofs and deductions to their propositions. They shouldn’t follow the
general crowd. One needs to keep the cognitive biases kept in check.
One’s foolish and hasty decision making based upon poor facts can be
harmful to oneself and others too.
 4. REFRENCES

1) Informal Fallacies, Wikipedia -

https://simple.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Informal_fallacy
2 ) T yp e s o f i n f o r m a l f a l l a c i e s -
h t t p s : / / w w w . t x s t a t e . e d u / p h i l o s o p h y/ r e s o u r c e s / f a l l a c y - d e f i n i t i o n s . h t m l
3) ‘The big short’ Film by Adam Mckay
4) ‘Kashmir conclfict’ video by VOX.