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mucool
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Argument essay: Should we identify fallacies by name?

by mucool Wed May 20, 2009 11:45 pm

In some of the books I've read, they talk about common fallacies in the argument essay and categorize them and name them.

Should we try to say in our introduction, "this argument is weak because it suffers from a faulty analogy fallacy, correlation does not imply causation fallacy, and a biased sample fallacy", or

is it ok to just say, "this argument suffers from several fallacies, some of which are discussed in the subsequent paragraphs"

or simply, "this argument is weak because it suffers from several fallacies.
<new para> Firstly, the author commits a biased sample fallacy by ... "
StaceyKoprince
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Re: Argument essay: Should we identify fallacies by name?

by StaceyKoprince Mon May 25, 2009 2:02 pm

You don't need to use official terminology, though you can if you want to. However, you can't assume that the reader knows what a "biased sample fallacy" is, so you have to explain anyway. You may want to use some of the language but not as a title - just as part of your explanation. "This argument suffers from a possibly faulty interpretation of the survey data. Specifically, the author assumes that the survey results apply to all dogs, although only dachsunds participated in the survey."

Note that I said it was "possibly" faulty, not definitely faulty. I don't actually know whether the data could actually apply to all dogs - perhaps it could! But the author has made an assumption rather than establish this as fact. In order to strengthen the argument, the author needs to establish this assumption as fact. That's the general rule for any of these arguments. I don't know for sure that some line of seemingly faulty reasoning actually is faulty, because I don't know whether the author's assumptions are good / true. So I'm not saying the author is wrong, just that s/he needs to present additional information or present info in a different way, in order to solidify the claims and assumptions made.
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