TYPES OF FALLACIES

1. Appeal to authority. This fallacy is committed when the debater accepts the word of alleged authorities when he shouldn’t either because it’s not be telling the truth or because experts disagree on the issue. Example Taking the word of famous business executives on the safety of nuclear power plants.

2. Appeal to ignorance. This fallacy is committed when the debater argues that since no one can prove something is false, he is entitled to believe it is true, or vice versa. Example: Arguing that aliens do not exist because no one can prove that they exist.

3.Ad hominem argument. In this fallacy the argument shifts from the proposition to the character of personality of one’s adversary. Example: You’re not going to believe a former addict, will you?

4. Ad populum argument. This fallacy occurs when the arguer appeals to the theory that whatever the masses believe is true or when he appeals to the crowd to determine the truth. Example: Arguing that smoking must be harmful since most people think it is.

5. Begging the question. An argument begs the question when it assumes something as true when it actually needs to be proven. It asserts without justification all or part of the very question at issue. Example: The declaration that “ these corrupt practices must be changed” asserts the corruption but does not prove it, and consequently the conclusion is not justified.

6. Arguing in a circle. This fallacy occurs when two unsupported assertions are used to prove each other. Example: Because gambling is immoral it should be prohibited. Because gambling should be prohibited the practice of gambling is immoral.

7. Pseudo question or complex question or fallacious question. This fallacy arises when an advocate asks an unanswerable loaded or ambiguous questions or a question based on false assumption or so many questions that an opponent cannot possibly answer them adequately within the available time. Example: Have you stopped using shabu?

8. Invalid inference or irrelevant reason. This fallacy occurs when the advocate draws a conclusion that does not follow from the premises or evidence on which it is based or when he is trying to prove something using evidence that may appear to be relevant but really isn’t. Example: A man who is kind to animals will make a good husband.

9. Questionable premise. This arises when one accepts a premise when he has no good reason to accept it. Example: Having believed the premise that Sec. Gonzales had no part in the textbook scam, without having a good reason to believe it.

10. Suppressed evidence. This refers to the omission from an argument of known relevant evidence. Example: The failure of a certain gasoline brand to indicate in its commercials that most other standard brands of gasoline contain the ingredient. Platformate.

11. Questionable cause. This refers to labeling something as the cause of something else on the basis of insufficient evidence or contrary to available evidence. Example: A columnist’s suggestion that Serb civilians were massacred by NATO soldiers were trying too hard.

12. Quetionable statistics. This refers to using or accepting statistics that are questionable without further proof or support. Example. Statistics on undertable or off the record transactions.

13. Questionble clasification. This involves placing items in the same class although they aren’t relevantly similar. Example: Classifying some people as leftists instead of activists.

14. False dilemma. This refers to erroneous reduction of alternatives or possibilities usually a reduction to just two. Example: Implying that prostitution is due to either poverty or white slavery, while omitting all sorts of other possibilities.