Category talk:Fallacies

Fan death

Hi,

I suggest that "fan death" be removed from this list, as it is not a type of logical fallacy, but rather an instance (and a stretch at that). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.197.71.189 (talk • contribs) 19:43, 28 June 2005

Correct, and it was removed at some point.

To remove an article from a category: edit the article that contains the category, you'll see Category:Logical fallacies near the end of the wikitext, and delete the line. —Mrwojo (talk) 23:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Whoever compiled this list, its awesome and ive never seen anything like it! Is this all in some book somewhere or am I going to have to print each of these out on my own?? anyways, thanks for the compilations! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.130.149.121 (talk • contribs) 07:58, 25 January 2006

Doublethink

Doublethink is a type of logical fallacy if anyone complains remove it--Acebrock 22:25, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

alright how do i add it?--Acebrock 22:26, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

To add a category: edit the article that contains the category, near the end of the wikitext you'll see a bunch of categories listed, and add Category:Logical fallacies. —Mrwojo (talk) 23:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Subcategories

As this category has grown so very large, I recommend creating a number of subcategories and moving many of the entries into them. For example:

• Category:Informal fallacies
  • Category:Causal fallacies
  • Category:Relevance fallacies
    • Category:Appeals to emotion
    • Category:Genetic fallacies

I think this would help the organization a great deal, and would also make the meaning and relationship of many of the fallacies clearer to people who are just learning about them. The names on their own can be very ambiguous, and a categorization scheme is the ideal way to resolve this, as it makes it possible to cross-reference fallacies in multiple categories (for example, we could put converse accident into Category:Deductive fallacies, Category:Faulty generalizations, Category:Informal fallacies, and Category:Syllogistic fallacies). -Silence 14:07, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi, you've done nice work and I'm not going to undo anything, but I wonder if things are now over-categorized? In particular for somebody who may just want to browse through a simple list of logical fallacies? Perhaps a new article, List of logical fallacies is in order (the existing article is a redirect to Fallacy) ? -- MisterHand 19:31, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually, that's exactly what I was going to suggest as the next step in improving Wikipedia's coverage of fallacies. :) Listing them all in a single category is inefficient, anyway, for two reasons. First, it makes it impossible to list common spelling variants, so a user who only knows of the fallacy "bandwagon fallacy" will not be able to find out, from the category listing alone, that we have an article on this fallacy at all. A list can fix that pretty easily, directing users (as a text search would) to argumentum ad populum. Second, a simple category listing can't include any details about the fallacy except its name, making it pretty useless to anyone who isn't already familiar with all the fallacies present. A list, on the other hand (as shown by pages like List of Latin phrases and Etruscan mythology), can provide a brief description of the fallacy (and perhaps even a simple example, since I think examples can be hugely helpful in grounding the meaning of fallacies), all while remaining very simple and easy to navigate. This would also allow us to provide information on fallacies which aren't complex enough to merit their own Wikipedia articles, but are noteworthy enough to merit mentioning: we can simply include them on the list without a link to a daughter article for more information.

Anyway, yeah, I agree on the list. But don't think that I've already finished with creating daughter articles. :) I plan to create many more, the ones above are just an example. -Silence 08:28, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm slightly worried about categorization of fallacies because there are a great number of contradictory classification schemes that have been used over the centuries.

Authors A and B both use category X but they don't define X the same way. Or: A and B both discuss fallacy F but they don't define F the same way. In such cases whose categories do we use? The current method seems to be inclusive (categorize as "X" and "not X"), which seems more confusing as more categories are added.

Consider the informal formal fallacies that appear in syllogistic fallacy/Category:Syllogistic fallacies. —Mrwojo (talk) 23:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Category:Logical fallacies

Why isn't this called simply Category:Fallacies like the article and the list? There's a potential ambiguity in the name "logical fallacy" because it can either mean "formal fallacy" (common in older books; see Google Books search for PD logic books) or "fallacy" (as Wikipedia uses it). —Mrwojo (talk) 23:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

What about a fallacy category?

Please see Talk:Fallacy#Fallacy_vs_logical_fallacy. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 16:17, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

"What about...?" fallacy

Is there a specific name for the fallacy a person commits when they attempt to refute an argument by asking a question beginning with the words "what about"? For example, Person A argues that suspected terrorists should be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and Person B responds, "But what about the victims of terrorist attacks?". The problem is two-fold. First of all, Person B's question is phrased in such a way that no straightforward answer can be given. Secondly, it doesn't logically refute Person A's original argument, but is instead an appeal to emotion. This particular fallacy could simply be categorized as both a red herring and an appeal to emotion, but it's committed so frequently, especially in political and ethical debates, that I'd be genuinely surprised if it didn't have a unique name. Steohawk (talk) 06:53, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

You see, the problem with this question is that it isn't the "What about..." part of the response that makes a response a fallacy or not a fallacy. Asking "What about..." is a perfectly legitimate, and logically sound thing to do. Sometimes the question is material and of consequence for the preceding claim because it is an example of a contradiction, and sometimes it is not. You give some examples above which are different types of those cases where there is no contradiction. So, I don't think there is a "'What about...?' fallacy." Greg Bard (talk) 08:48, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Sure, "what about" can be a fallacy. "Joe Doaks, you are charged with being a thief." "But what about Bill Stickers? He's a thief." Bill's being (or not being) a thief is wholly irrelevant to Joe's guilt or innocence. It's a form of the Red Herring. JHobson3 (talk) 11:22, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Fallacies by date

I would like to know if we could either create subcategories here for organizing the 72+ fallacies in the category by the century/decade they were first recorded in, or perhaps as an alternative, we could create an article which organizes the fallacies in chronological order in terms of our earliest recorded reference to their usage and recognition in history.

This would help to map out the thinking process of the human race, because prior to the recognition of a fallacy and it's popularization, people would fail to recognize it as a fallacy, which would influence how people reached decisions in times past.

It also helps to convey the lack of finality in fallacy recognition. Some people claim "I know all the fallacies" or "I was taught and memorized all the fallacies in college". This of course can't be true since fallacies are constantly discovered, defined, and popularized as more become aware of them.

Wikipedia is a tool in that, but I believe a chronological list would establish the historicity of these fallacies. Ranze (talk) 21:11, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I think that would give the false impression that somehow certain arguments were valid at one time, and invalid at another time. That would be extremely unhelpful. Greg Bard (talk) 21:15, 24 April 2013 (UTC)