Show Notes The fallacy of Hasty Generalization is committed when an assumption is made based on too little information. It may, for example, be that a small sample of a large group has been observed, and the properties of this sample are assumed to be present in the larger group. This is...
Show Notes Latin for ‘after this, therefore because of this’, this fallacy is committed when people confuse correlation for causation and assume that because one event followed another, the former was caused by the latter. Of course, while this may be the case, it is by no means certain. The two...
Show Notes Tu Quoque is another Latin one - it literally means “You too.” It’s a particular type of Red Herring fallacy where the speaker avoids responding to a criticism by distracting the listener with claims that other people (ideally the one doing the criticizing) have also done similar bad things. It...
Show Notes The Slippery Slope fallacy is committed when a person assumes if one bad thing happens, then more, and often worse, bad things will inevitably follow. It is often applied to changes in the law that some groups are campaigning for, and others find distasteful. It is fallacious because to accept...
Show Notes Moving the Goalposts is such a common tactic that I’m sure everyone has come across it at some point. When someone makes an argument; you refute that argument with valid logic; and then they move on to a different argument without acknowledging that their first one failed, they’ve just moved...
Show notes The Genetic Fallacy doesn’t have anything to do with genes. Rather, it relates to the ‘genesis’, or origin, of an argument. When someone commits the Genetic Fallacy they are basing their decision about whether a claim is true or false on who is making the claim, or where it...