Author: Richard Paul and Linda Elder Publisher: Foundation for Critical Thinking Copyright: 2006 Pages: 56 Dimensions: 51/4" x 8" ISBN (10Digit): 0-944583-27-X ISBN (13Digit): 978-0-944583-27-2
An original approach to the identification of fallacies focusing on their relationship to human self deception, mental trickery, and manipulation. Introduces the concept of fallacies and details 44 foul ways to win an argument.
Additional Information About: The Thinker’s Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery
The study of fallacies can be pursued in at least two different ways. It can be approached traditionally: in which case one defines, explains, and exemplifies ways in which unsound arguments can be made to appear sound. Or it can be approached deeply, in which case one relates the construction of fallacies to the pursuit of human interests and irrational desires. Using the first approach, students gain little by memorizing the names and definitions of fallacies. They soon forget them. Their minds are left largely untouched and therefore unmoved. On the other hand, the second approach makes possible the acquisition of lifelong insights into how the mind – every mind – uses unsound arguments and intellectual “tricks” to further its ends.
Students need seminal insights and intellectual tools that enable them to protect themselves from becoming intellectual victims in a world of swarming media piranhas, or, just as bad, from joining the swarm as a junior piranha in training. Insights and tools, grounded in intellectual integrity, should be the ultimate aim of the study of “fallacies.”
The cultivation of intellectual virtues is crucial to human development. Without a long-term transformation of the mind, little can be done to produce deeply honest thought. When challenged, the human mind operates from its most primitive intellectual instincts. This can be verified in the history of politics, economics, religion, and war — indeed in any history that deeply plumbs the human mind in action.
Consequently, it is important to learn to recognize the most common tricks of persuasion, that we might better understand ourselves and others. Used on others, fallacies are intellectually indefensible tricks of persuasion and manipulation; used on ourselves, they are instruments of self-deception.
In this guide we concentrate on the most common and flagrant intellectual tricks and snares. Sometimes these tricks are “counterfeits” of good thinking. For example, a false dilemma is the counterfeit of a true dilemma. We shall see this most obviously in dealing with errors of generalization and comparison.
44 Foul Ways to Win an Argument (which include the following):
Appeal to Authority
Appeal to Experience
Appeal to Fear
Appeal to Popular Passions
Appeal to Tradition or Faith ("the tried & true")
Assume a Posture of Righteousness
Attack the person (and not the argument)
Beg the Question
Call For Perfection (demand impossible conditions)
Create a False Dilemma (the great either/or)
Question Your Opponent's Conclusions
Create Misgivings: Where There's Smoke, There's Fire
Create A Straw Man
Deny or Defend Your Inconsistencies
Demonize His Side Sanitize Yours
Evade Questions, Gracefully
Flatter Your Audience
Hedge What You Say
Ignore the Evidence
Ignore the Main Point
Attack Evidence (that undermines your case)
Insist Loudly on a Minor Point
Make Much of Any Inconsistencies in Your Opponent's Position
Make Your Opponent Look Ridiculous
Oversimplify the Issue
Or, pick up our complete set of mini guides, including this one:
Set of Twenty One Thinker's Guides
Author: Richard Paul and Linda Elder Publisher: Foundation for Critical Thinking
This is the complete library of the Thinker's Guide Series. The set contains all our Thinker's and Mini Guides * (520M, 525M, 530M, 533M, 535M, 550M, 553M, 555M, 560M, 563M, 565M, 570M, 573M, 575M, 580M, 583M** , 585M, 590M, 595M, 593M**, 534M** ).
**This Set now contains
534M A Glossary of Critical Thinking Terms and Concepts,
593M The Thinker's Guide to Intellectual Standards and
583M - A Critical Thinker’s Guide to Educational Fads
*Set does not contain Critical Thinking for Children and Aspiring Thinker's Guide to Critical Thinking
