Fallacies
Updated 2026-09-10
INTRODUCTION
English translation pending.
CORE DEFINITION
There are two competing understandings of fallacy: a mistaken yet popular belief, and an argument that appears valid but is in fact bad, which may be called the belief conception and the argument conception respectively. Academic researchers insist on or prefer the argument conception, while the belief conception is more popular in everyday and non-academic discourse.
SCAFFOLDING EFFECT
Reduce cognitive load
- Expose false support: identify whether the support relation between premises and conclusion really holds. - Type the error: decide whether the trouble lies in ambiguity, irrelevance, or circularity, so the objection can be targeted. - Reverse-test the form: substitute an obviously absurd case with the same structure and see whether it still persuades.
Anchor fast decisions
Fallacies persuade because they borrow the appearance of reliable reasoning: the support relation between premises and conclusion is masked by rhetoric, ambiguity, or psychological association, so the audience believes it has been given sufficient grounds when the relation does not hold or is far weaker than it feels.
MINIMUM ACTION
In progress 0/1Practice this model in one real situation:
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Source support: Explicit
- plato.stanford.eduhttps://plato.stanford.edu/entries/fallacies/verified
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