1. Adapted from Lunsford, et.al. Everything’s An Argument, 2004
Logical Fallacies
These faulty ways of arguing instantly raise questions about the ethics of argument – whether your argument is fair, accurate, or principled.
Think more that these are strategies that hurt everyone and make an argument less productive or more difficult. They’re not always direct “errors.”
Adapted from Lunsford, et.al. Everything’s An Argument, 2004

2. Flashpoints of Emotional Argument
Emotional arguments can be powerful and are suitable in many circumstances.
However, pulling on heartstrings too often or in an unfair way detracts from legitimate argument and destroys credibility.

3. Scare Tactics
Can be used to stampede legitimate fears into panic or prejudice
Even well-intended fear campaigns (like those directed against drugs or HIV) can misfire if their warnings prove too shrill.
Effect: Close off thinking because fear/anger/etc. lead to people being irrational.
EXAMPLES:
Life insurance ads
Fear of losing job  mistrust of all immigrants

4. Either-or Choices
Reduces an issue to only 2 choices – one is often presented favorably, while the other is horrible.
Can be well-intentioned to get things done.
Fallacious when they seek to oversimplify.
Effect: work mostly on people who don’t know the issue; therefore it does not enlighten people and give them opportunity for an intelligent decision.
Examples:
Eat your broccoli or no dessert. (OK if carried through)
Social Security must be privatized or the system will go broke.
We can grow the economy or protect the environment.

5. Slippery Slope
It implies that today’s decisions cause tomorrow’s avalanche.
Fallacious when the future consequences of an action are exaggerated, usually to cause fear.
Effect: Often seem reasonable, because actions do have consequences, just not so dire as presented.
Examples:
A School Board’s decision about school posters becomes an attack on all First Amendment rights.
Any legislation about firearms will lead to government control and seizure of all weapons.

6. Sentimental Appeals
Use emotions excessively to distract readers from facts.
Focus on heart-warming or heart-wrenching situations.
Become an impediment when they shut down clear thinking.
Examples:
Documenting day-to-day struggles of a kind, generous, good welfare mother who needs help for her sweet children. – or—
Showing a welfare recipient in a new car with nails done trading food stamps for money while a working family struggles.
Using endangered/abused animals in ads that don’t really relate.

7. Bandwagon Appeals
Urge people to do something because “everyone is doing it”!
Among the most potentially serious and permanently damaging flashpoints of argument
Examples:
Good – people want to be part of important issues such as
The war on drugs
Health care reform
Gun control
Welfare reform
Teen smoking
Bad – when get out of control or aren’t for positive causes such as
McCarthy “witch hunts” in the 1950s
Concerns over child abuse led to indiscriminate prosecutions of parents in the 1980s

8. Flashpoints of Ethical Argument
Sometimes authors/speakers use unethical ways of presenting themselves and trying to get you to trust them.

9. Appeals to False Authority
Fallacious when the warrant is that the authority is trustworthy when he/she isn’t.
It looks like this: X is true because I say so. (CLAIM) What I say must be true. (WARRANT)
Examples:
Politician bases argument on The Constitution (but his interpretation)
Religious organizations base beliefs/actions on the authority of a Holy text (but their interpretation – and non-believers don’t recognize as an authority)

10. Dogmatism
The assertion or assumption that a particular position is the only one conceivably acceptable.
Undermines the trust that must exist between those who would make and those who would receive arguments.
Effect: Ideas are repressed, not explored.
Examples:
Arguments that begin with “No reasonable person would disagree that…” or “It is clear to anyone who has thought about it that…”
Attacks on the historical reality of the Holocaust (a ridiculous example)

11. Moral Equivalence
Suggestion that serious wrongdoings don’t differ in kind from minor offenses.
Response to serious accusations: “But everyone else does it too!”
Examples:
Nixon said his “crimes” were no different from other presidents’ actions
Equating all “substance abuse” issues – from serious drug offenses to smoking cigarettes or eating too much chocolate

12. Ad hominem Arguments Means “to the man.”
Directly attack a person’s character.
Turn real arguments into two-sided good guy vs. bad guy issues.
Character is important; it becomes fallacious when it’s an unfair attack meant to derail the argument.
Examples:
Criticizing any policy from Bill Clinton by mentioning his womanizing
Discrediting a doctor because he’s overweight

13. Flashpoints of Logical Argument
These happen when claims, warrants, and/or evidence are invalid, insufficient, or disconnected.
Often seem reasonable or natural, especially when they appeal to self-interests.

14. Hasty Generalization One of most prevalent.
Inference drawn from insufficient evidence.
Forms basis of most stereotypes.
Effect: sweeping claims of little merit.
Generalizations are important at times, so make sure you qualify statements and use reasonable and fair generalizations.
Examples:
Because my Honda broke down, all Hondas must be junk.
Women are bad drivers.
English teachers are…nevermind.
Scientists are nerds.

15. Faulty Causality
Sometimes referred to in the Latin: post hoc, ergo propter hoc (“after this, therefore because of this”)
The assumption that because one event or action follows another, the first necessarily causes the second.
Examples:
The economy suffered after X was elected president; therefore his policies were bad for the economy.
A team improved under a new coach so he gets all the credit.
Test scores went down so it’s the teachers’ fault.

16. Begging the Question
The problem with the claim is that it is made on grounds that cannot be accepted as true because those grounds are in doubt.
It’s assuming as true the very claim that is disputed; it’s a circular argument.
Example:
You can’t give me a C; I’m an A student! (But if you just earned a C, you’re not an A student. Being an A student only applies to certain classes; it’s not a given forever.)
I can’t be guilty of embezzlement; I’m an honest person! (Merely claiming to be honest doesn’t make it so, especially if there’s evidence of dishonesty.)

17. Equivocation
An argument that gives a lie an honest appearance; it is a “half-truth.”
Usually involve tricks of language.
Examples:
In Macbeth, the witches tell Macbeth not to fear his enemies “till Birnam wood do come to Dunsinane,” which seems impossible, but it ironically happens.
A student who copies a paper word for word but says she wrote it completely on her own – “wrote” as in copied the words, not “wrote” as in authored.

18. Non Sequitur
An argument in which claims, reasons, or warrants fail to connect logically; one point does not follow from another.
Occur when writers omit a step in an otherwise logical chain of reasoning, assuming that readers agree with what may be a highly contestable claim.
Examples:
You don’t love me or you’d buy me that bicycle!
Arguing that we must spend more money on education because kids performed badly on an international math exam.

19. Faulty Analogy
Inaccurate or inconsequential comparisons between objects or concepts.
Comparisons are useful but they may prove false either on their own or when pushed too far or taken too seriously.
Examples:
Human mind is a garden that must be cultivated ; they thrive when carefully planted, weeded, watered, pruned, etc. But they also thrive when spread with manure… too far?
Abortion is like pornography (from “Divinity and Pornography”)

20. Works Cited
Lunsford, Andrea, John J. Ruszkiewicz, and Keith Walters. Everything’s An Argument, 3rd Ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2004: