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The Fallacy-a-Day Podcast

fallacyaday.com

An easy way to learn the logical fallacies. Published each day, Monday-Friday.
Begging the question (or Petitio Principii, which means assuming the initial point) is a logical
fallacy in which the proposition to be proven is assumed implicitly or explicitly in the premise.
Usually the conclusion will be a rephrasing of one of the premises so that the equivalence is not
immediately apparent.
Example:
Opium induces sleep because it has a soporific quality.
The argument is fallacious because the phrase has a soporific quality is equivalent to induces
sleep. That is, the conclusion assumes the premise.
Note:

23.
Begging
the
Question

In informal or colloquial usage, circular argument is another name for begging the question.
However, in formal logic, a circular argument is using a premise to prove a conclusion, and then
using that conclusion, with one or more intermediate arguments, to prove the original premise.
That is, it is an invalid argument that attempts to prove two statements reciprocally from each
other. By contrast, begging the question does not require any such reversal.
Begging the question is also similar to the fallacy of many questions or loaded question which
we will examine in a future episode. The difference is that in the fallacy of many questions the
assumption of the truth of a hidden premise is phrased in the form of a question, so that we
have a question that begs, or assumes the answer to, another question. Hence the name,
many questions.
Note:
Many English speakers incorrectly use begs the question to mean raises the question; for
example, this years deficit is half a trillion dollars, which begs the question: how are we ever
going to balance the budget?
Argumentum Verbosium (or Proof by Verbosity or Proof by Intimidation) refers to a style of
presenting a purported mathematical proof by giving an argument loaded with jargon and
appeal to obscure results, so that the audience is simply obliged to accept it, lest they have
to admit their ignorance and lack of understanding. The term is also used when the author is
an authority in his field presenting his proof to people who respect a priori his insistence that
the proof is valid or when the author claims that his statement is true because it is trivial or
because he simply says so.
More generally, Argumentum Verbosium refers to any argument that is so complex and
long-winded that the audience is obliged to accept it, simply to avoid having to sort through

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its many details. It is sometimes employed by articulate advocates of dubious science or

conspiracy theories in order to obfuscate the weakness of their case. It is effective because,
while it doesnt make the argument waterproof it can make it effectively irrefutable.

22.
Argumentum
Verbosium

Either side of an extremely detailed debate, such as Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW),
appears as argumentum verbosium to the non-expert or to the person who doesnt have the
time to follow up most of the references.
I suggest the following rule of thumb: Any sufficiently complex argument is indistinguishable
from proof by verbosity, to the person with insufficient time to either confirm or refute it.
So what do we do?
One defensive tactic in filtering out falsehood is to calibrate the honesty or competence of the
proponent of a position by looking at other arguments that he makes which are easily
disproved. For example, someone may argue in support of the official story of the
assassination of JFK. But the lone gunman theory is easily dispoven, which in turn proves
that its proponent is either dishonest or careless on that particular subject and so increases
the likelihood that he is also unreliable on other subjects. So if the same person then also
argues in favor of AGW then one might reasonably judge that it is a poor use of ones time to
cross-check any of his claims. Of course, that in itself would not disprove AGW but it means
that one should look elsewhere in deciding the matter.
Argumentum Ad Nauseam (also known as Argument from Repetition and Argumentum Ad
Infinitum) is a form of argument in which two or more people with opposing views cover the
same ground over and over without being able to persuade one another and which develops
into a competition of who will have the last word. The argument continues until one side
becomes exhausted and stops participating. The fallacy is the assumption that because the
other side has stopped arguing that your case has been proven. Argumentum Ad Nauseam
is commonly found on Internet forums.
Example:
Both religious believers and atheists sometimes resort to Argumentum Ad
Nauseam in their debates with one another. This is because their respective
premises differ and so no amount of examining the validity of either sides
reasoning, starting from their differing premises, can change either sides views.

21.
Argumentum
Ad Nauseam

Note:
One can generate many other examples by using the example above as a template and
substituting different pairings. Simply look for debates that go on forever and end (usually
only temporarily) by exhaustion or the threat of violence (which segues into Argumentum Ad
Baculum, to be discussed in a later episode).
Debates on Internet forums, because of the nature of the medium, have less possibility of
ending in violence which is one reason why they are so fertile for Argumentum Ad Nauseam.
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Argument from ignorance (Argumentum Ad Ignorantiam, or appeal to ignorance) is an informal

fallacy that asserts that a proposition is true because it has not been proven false (or vice
versa). It is a type of false dichotomy because it ignores the alternative possibility that there is
insufficient information to prove that the proposition is either true or false.
The fallacy exploits the facts that:
(a) True things can never be disproven, and
(b) False things can never be proven.
Appeals to ignorance claim that the converse of these facts is also true; namely that:
(c) If a proposition has not been disproven, then it must be considered true,
and
(d) If a proposition has not been proven, then it must be considered false.
Notice that (c) and (d) are examples of the fallacy of affirming the consequent of (a) and (b),
respectively.
Example:
Psychic phenomena do not exist because no-one has proved that they exist.
The argument is fallacious because it presumes that all evidence of proof would be known to
the speaker and that all psychic phenomena have been studied in ways that would provide
satisfactory proof to the speaker.
The rule absence of evidence is not evidence of absence can often be used to indicate that
an argument is an argument from ignorance.

20.
Argument
from
Ignorance

However, absence of evidence (of X) is equivalent to evidence of absence if the method of

detection of X is sensitive and reliable enough to always detect X when it is present. For
example, when a biopsy shows the absence of malignant cells then this result, of finding
nothing, is evidence of the absence of cancer, even though nothing has been actually
detected.
Another example is that absence of evidence of the existence of the Loch Ness monster is
evidence of its non-existence because if one such creature existed in Loch Ness then there
would have to be a breeding population of them and their presence could reasonably have
been expected to be detected.
A related, fallacious argument is Argument from Incredulity, or Lack of Imagination:
Arguments from incredulity take the form:

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P is too incredible (or I cannot imagine how P could possibly be true);

must be false.

therefore P

or
It is obvious that P is true (or I cannot imagine how P could possibly be
false)
therefore P must be true.
These arguments are similar to arguments from ignorance in that they too ignore and do not
properly eliminate the possibility that something can be both incredible and still be true, or
appear to be obvious and yet still be false.
Note 1: The argument from ignorance is sometimes confused with the logically valid,
contrapositive argument: If P implies Q then Not-Q implies Not-P.
Note 2: The legal principle of presumption of innocence (or innocent until proven guilty) is
intended to remove the possibility of an argument from ignorance (that is, that innocence hasnt
been proved) causing a defendant to be convicted.
The fallacy of the undistributed middle is a logical fallacy that occurs when a
syllogisms middle term is undistributed in both of the premises.* The middle term is
the term that appears in both of the premises but not in the conclusion.
Example 1:
19. Fallacy of the
Undistributed Middle

Major Premise:
B.Conclusion:

All A are B.Minor Premise:

Therefore, all C are A.

All C are

The argument is fallacious, as follows: From the major premise, a random member of
B might or might not be an A (that is, we cant say), and from the minor premise, a
random member of B might or might not be a C. And the answers to these two
questions are independent of one another, so B is of no use in determining the
relationship between A and C. This means we cannot use these premises to deduce
the relationship between A and C.
A similar but concrete example:
Trees are green.Money is green.Therefore, money grows on trees.
Mnemonic Notes:
Note 1: Refer to
the notes for
fallacy 17 for an
explanation of the
picture.

* Note 1: The definition of this fallacy in Wikipedia is wrong. The webpage is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_undistributed_middle and it says: The
fallacy of the undistributed middle [...] is committed when the middle term in a
categorical syllogism is not distributed in the major premise.[emphasis added].
Looking further afield, I found that other sources contradict that claim. Read the
Note 2: It might be following webpage for a clearer (and consistent) explanation of the fallacy:
helpful to think of http://philosophy.lander.edu/logic/middle_fall.html.
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this fallacy as
Illicit Middle
because of its
similarity to Illicit
Major and Illicit
Minor.

To see why Wikipedias definition must be incorrect, consider the following argument
that complies with their definition and satisfy yourself that the argument is in fact valid
(given that there is at least one member of A):
Major Premise:
C.Conclusion:

All A are B.Minor Premise: All B are

Therefore, some C are A.

Note 2: Wikipedia, in its discussion of the fallacy of the undistributed middle cited
above, states all cases of the fallacy of the undistributed middle are, in fact,
examples of affirming the consequent or denying the antecedent. However, I have
been unable to find confirmation of that claim from other, independent sources and I
do not know if it is true.
Notice that both of our examples above are examples of affirming the consequent.
However, I have been unable to think of a clearcut example that is denying the
antecedent. Can you think of such an example?
Illicit Minor is a logical fallacy that occurs when a syllogisms minor term (that is, the
subject in the conclusion) is undistributed in the minor premise but distributed in the
conclusion.
This fallacy has the following form, where C is the minor term:
18. Illicit Minor

Major Premise:
C.Conclusion:

All A are B.Minor Premise:

Therefore, all C are B.

All A are

That is, not all C are accounted for in the minor premise because a random member
of C could be either A or not A. But the conclusion is a claim about all C.
Example:

Mnemonic
Notes:Refer to
the notes for
fallacy 17 for an
explanation of
the picture.

Major Premise: All cats are felines.Minor Premise: All cats are
mammals.Conclusion:
Therefore, all mammals are felines.
In this example, the minor term is mammal, which is not distributed in the minor
premise because this premise is only talking about some mammals; that is, that some
mammals are cats but some might not be cats. However, in the conclusion, mammal is
distributed because it is talking about all mammals being felines. The example is
shown to be false by any mammal that is not a feline; for example, a dog.
Note: In the form of the fallacy, if we amend the conclusion as follows then it becomes
a valid argument:
Major Premise:
C.Conclusion:

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All A are B.Minor Premise: All A are

Therefore, some C are B.
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Notice that C has now become undistributed in the conclusion.

Illicit Major is a logical fallacy that occurs when a syllogisms
major term is undistributed in the major premise but distributed
in the conclusion.
The major term is the predicate in the conclusion: the are part.
So for example, if the conclusion is all C are B, then the subject
is C and the predicate (i.e., the major term of the syllogism) is B.
This fallacy has the following form, where B is the major term:
Major Premise: All A are B.Minor Premise: No C
are A.Conclusion:
Therefore, no C are B.
17. Illicit Major

That is, not all B are accounted for in the major premise
because a random member of B could be either A or not A. But
the conclusion is a claim about all B because it is equivalent to
the statement all B are not C.

Mnemonic Notes:Note 1: In the

pictures for this and the next two
fallacies, we have used the insignia of
Example:
US Army ranks as a visual aid and
memory hook for symbolizing the three
Major Premise: All dogs are mammals.Minor
types of terms, as follows:
Premise: No cats are
dogs.Conclusion:
Therefore, no cats are
Major: The stylized oak leaf of a
mammals.
major.
Middle: The three chevrons of a
sergeant.
Minor: The single chevron of a
private.

In this example, the major term is mammals. This is distributed

in the conclusion because we are making a claim about all
mammals: namely, that they are not cats. However, it is not
distributed in the major premise where we are only talking about
some mammals; that is, that some mammals are dogs but some
might not be dogs.

Note 2: The types of the terms (major,

The error is in assuming that the converse of the major premise
middle and minor) are due to their
(namely, that all mammals are dogs) is also true.
positions within the syllogism and are
unrelated to their arbitrary labels such
Note: If we amend the form of the fallacy as follows then it
as A, B or C.
becomes a valid argument:
Note 3: The major premise is defined
as the premise containing the major
term and the minor premise is defined
as the premise containing the minor
term.

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Major Premise: Some A are B.Minor Premise: All

A are C.Conclusion:
Therefore, some C are not
B.
Notice that B is still the major term and it is still undistributed in
the major premise but that now it is undistributed in the
conclusion.
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The fallacy of four terms (Quaternio Terminorum) is the logical fallacy that occurs when a
syllogism has four (or more) terms rather than the requisite three. This form of argument is
thus invalid.
Valid syllogisms always have three terms:
Example 1:
Major Premise: All fish have fins.Minor Premise: All goldfish are
fish.Conclusion:
Therefore, all goldfish have fins.
Here, the three terms are: goldfish, fish, and fins.
The use of four terms invalidates the syllogism, as shown in the next example:
Example 2:
Major Premise: All fish have fins.Minor Premise: All goldfish are
fish.Conclusion:
Therefore, all humans have fins.
The premises dont connect humans with fins, so the reasoning is invalid. Notice that there
are four terms: fish, fins, goldfish and humans. Two premises arent enough to connect
four different terms, since in order to establish connection, there must be one term common to
both premises.
In everyday reasoning, the fallacy of four terms occurs most frequently by equivocation: using
the same word or phrase but with a different meaning each time, creating a fourth term even
though only three distinct words are used:
16. Fallacy
of Four
Terms

Example 3:
Major Premise: Nothing is better than eternal happiness.Minor Premise: A ham
sandwich is better than nothing.Conclusion:
Therefore, a ham sandwich is
better than
eternal happiness.
The word nothing in the example above has two meanings, as presented: nothing is better
means the thing being named has the highest value possible; better than nothing means the
thing being described has only marginal value. Therefore, nothing acts as two different words
in this example, thus creating the fallacy of four terms.
We will return to equivocation in more detail in a future episode.
Reducing terms:
Sometimes a syllogism that is apparently fallacious because it is stated with more than three
terms can be translated into an equivalent, valid, three-term syllogism.
Example 4:

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Major Premise: No humans are immortal.Minor Premise:

people.Conclusion:
Therefore, all Greeks are mortal.

All Greeks are

This syllogism apparently has five terms: humans, people, immortal, mortal, and
Greeks but can be rewitten with three terms by noting that humans is equivalent to people
and that the premise no humans are immortal is equivalent to all humans are mortal.
The fallacy of exclusive premises is a logical fallacy committed in a syllogism that is invalid
because both of its premises are negative.
From the discussion of the previous two fallacies we have the rules that:
1. Exactly one of the premises must be negative in order to construct a valid
syllogism with a negative conclusion.
2. Both premises must be affirmative in order to construct a valid syllogism with an
affirmative conclusion.
Because a syllogism must have a conclusion that is either affirmative or negative then these two
rules cover all possible syllogisms, and so any syllogism with two negative premises is invalid.
Even so, let us examine two examples:
Example 1:
Premise 1: No mammals are fishes.Premise 2: No fishes are
whales.Conclusion: Therefore, no mammals are whales.

15.
Fallacy of
Exclusive
Premises

The argument is invalid because, from our prior knowledge of mammals, fishes and whales,
both premises are true but the conclusion is false.
But even if we have no prior knowledge of mammals, fishes and whales we can say the
following:
If there is at least one whale then all we can conclude about it from the premises is that it is not
a fish, which is a restatement of premise 2. And if there is at least one mammal then all we can
conclude about it from the premises is that it is not a fish, which is a restatement of premise 1.
And if either there are no mammals or there are no whales then the statement no mammals are
whales is necessarily true regardless of the premises. So whichever way we look at it the
argument is invalid.
Example 2:
Premise 1: No mammals are fishes.Premise 2: No fishes are
whales.Conclusion: Therefore, some mammals are whales.
This example differs from the first in having the same premises but an affirmative conclusion.

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And this argument, also, is invalid because the most we can conclude about whales or
mammals, from the premises, is that neither of them are fishes, so the conclusion does not
follow from the premises.
Negative conclusion from affirmative premises is a fallacy committed when a syllogism has
a negative conclusion yet both premises are affirmative. The inability of two affirmative
premises to reach a negative conclusion is one of the rules of constructing a valid
syllogism.
All statements in syllogisms have one of the following four forms:
Affirmative statements:
All A is B.
Some A is B.
Negative statements:
No A is B.
Some A is not B.
The rule states that a syllogism in which both premises are of either of the affirmative forms
cannot validly reach a conclusion that has either of the negative forms. Exactly one of the
premises must be negative to construct a valid syllogism with a negative conclusion.
Example:
14. Negative
Conclusion
from Affirmative
Premises

Premise 1: All colonels are officers.Premise 2: All officers are

soldiers.Conclusion: Therefore, no colonels are soldiers.
The argument is fallacious because both premises are affirmative but the conclusion is
negative.
Note: If there is at least one colonel then he is an officer (from premise 1) and a soldier
(premise 2) and so the conclusion would be false.
And if there were no colonels then the statement no colonels are soldiers would
necessarily be true but the conclusion would still be false because the therefore part
would still be invalid. That is, the conclusion would still not follow from the premises.
Example:
Premise 1:
is not A.

All A is B.Premise 2:

All B is C.Conclusion: Therefore, some C

The argument is fallacious because both premises are affirmative but the conclusion is
negative.
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Note: If A, B and C were equivalent to each other then the premises would be true but the
set of C that is not A would be empty and so the conclusion would be false.
Text and audio is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.

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