Learning Materials for Informal Fallacies

This lecture notes discusses "appeal to authority", a common type of informal fallacy that arises when one who has the difficulty in confronting or understanding complicated questions will seek refuge to the ideas, concepts, principles or judgments of a person who enjoys a reputation as an expert ...

This lecture notes discusses "appeal to people", a variation of the appeal to authority, consists in arguing that some statement p is true because most people believe p.

This lecture notes discusses "appeal to force", a type of informal fallacy that arises when the arguer, instead of showing the evidence, appeals to intimidation or use force to gain acceptance of his or her argument.

This lecture notes discusses "appeal to pity", a type of informal fallacy that arises when an appeal to evidence is replaced by an appeal to pity or mercy.

This lecture notes discusses "appeal to ignorance", a type of informal fallacy that arises when an argument is taken as true because it has not proven to be false, or an argument is false because it has not proven to be true.

This lecture notes discusses "argument against the man", a type of informal fallacy that arises when the arguer ignores the real claims or issues in the argument so that what is emphasized is the character, personality, or belief of the opponent.

This lecture notes discusses "false cause", a type of informal fallacy that arises when one assigns as the cause those facts that merely preceded or accompanied the effect when in fact there is no good evidence of a logical connection or causal relation.

This lecture notes discusses "slippery slope", a type of informal fallacy that arises when the arguer claims that a chain of causal events will necessarily occur.

This lecture notes discusses "Either/Or Fallacy", a type of informal fallacy which occurs when the arguer mistakenly reason from two alternatives, one claimed to be bad (that is, to be avoided) so that we ought to choose the other alternative.

This lecture notes discusses "fallacy of equivocation", a type of informal fallacy which occurs when a term or word switches meaning in the course of the argument, that is, when a term or word expresses one meaning in one premise and another meaning in another premise or conclusion.

This lecture notes discusses "hasty generalization", a type of informal fallacy occurs when a generalization is formed on the basis of an unrepresentative sample.

This lecture notes discusses "fallacy of composition", a type of informal fallacy which occurs when the arguer mistakenly concludes that something is true to the whole simply because it is true to some of the parts of the whole.

This lecture notes discusses "fallacy of division" a type of informal fallacy which occurs when the arguer mistakenly concludes that something is true to one or some of the parts of the whole simply because it is true of the whole.