Logical Fallacies 1
A fallacy based on fear that one step will inevitably lead to the next.
Slippery Slope
When a writer arrives at a conclusion based on inadequate evidence or a sample that is too small.
Hasty Generalizations
Moderator: Candidate, our city has faced corruption issues at City Hall for the past three decades. How do you plan to combat corruption in city government?
Participant: I have a multistep plan for combating corruption, and I also have ten-point plan for reducing emissions. The first step is that ten-point environmental plan is...
Red Herring
Introducing an unrelated or invalid point to distract the reader from the actual argument.
Red Herring
Discrediting an argument by attacking the person who makes it, rather than the argument itself.
Attacking the Person/Ad Hominem
Exploiting the audience's feelings to convert them to a particular viewpoint.
Appeal to Emotion
A rhetorical device the repeats the initial consonant sounds in a series of words.
Alliteration
At the birthday I attended over the weekend, there was a clown. Clowns are a part of birthday parties.
Hasty Generalizations
All the parts of the engine were lightweight, so the engine should have been lightweight.
Composition
Claiming that a position is true because most people believe it is.
Appeal to Popular Opinion.
Don't listen to Becky's opinion on welfare; she just opposes it because she's from a rich family.
Attacking the Person/Ad Hominem
You attempted to manipulate an emotional response in place of a valid or compelling argument.
Appeal to Emotion
You appealed to popularity or the fact that many people do something as an attempted form of validation.
Appeal to Popular Opinion
A: I'm in favor of lowering sentences for drug offenses.
B: So you think our children should be running around doing drugs?!
Straw Man Fallacy - distorting someone else's argument to make it easier to attack or refute.