notMichaelJackson

I am attempting to learn all of the logic fallacies from this list, but it looks like I will need a little help understanding a few of the items. I'm going to learn one new fallacy every two days, and will learn them in alphabetical order.

Can someone please clarify "Accent?"

Thanks in advance to all who help me.

Quantum Ninja

There are some more here:

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_fallacy

RichardMorey

The fallacy of refered to on the page as "Accent" is one that can exist because emphasis placed on a word can imply something beyond what you actually say. For instance, extending the example on the page (the implication of the accent is given in parentheses):

We should not speak ill of our friends. (We should speak kindly of our friends)

We should not speak ill of our friends. (but we can speak ill of our enemies)

We should not speak ill of our friends. (but other people can speak ill of their friends)

We should not speak ill of our friends. (but we can speak ill of other peoples' friends)


Say them in your head, emphasizing the bolded word. Moving the emphasis changes the implication in the statement. Using this against somebody is taking advantage of ambiguity in language, and it is especially easy with written language. Here's an example. Suppose I say:

I don't want to go to the store today.

I could stress any one of the following words, implying something different:

"I" - implies that someone else wants to go to the store today
"store" - implies that I'd go someplace else
"today" - implies that, maybe, I'd go tomorrow or another day.

Hope that helps.

Witt

notMichaelJackson:
I am attempting to learn all of the logic fallacies from this list, but it looks like I will need a little help understanding a few of the items. I'm going to learn one new fallacy every two days, and will learn them in alphabetical order.

Can someone please clarify "Accent?"

Thanks in advance to all who help me.
------------------------------------------------

Hi notMichaelJackson,

The argument forms that are most often used are the tautologies of propositional logic, which are easily tested by truth value analysis (eg. truth tables), and, the assertions of Syllogistic logic.
There are only 24 valid syllogisms that we need to consider, all others are invalid.

These logically valid arguments are fewer than the seemingly endless lists of fallacies, imo.

The proceedures used to acertain logical valididty and logical invalidity, eg, truth tables, Venn diagrams, are much simpler than memorizing large possibilities.

Witt

ex-xian

I think his question was concerning rhetorical fallacies, and not fallacies of formal logic. That is, he would be more concerned with an ad hominem or composition than the existential fallacy or an undistributed middle term.

notMichaelJackson, you should also check out Carl Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit from The Demon Haunted World.

Soma

It's good to know logical fallacies. They can come in quite handy when you want to make someone look stupid.

braces_for_impact

In my opinion, the best reason to learn logical fallacies is to be able to recognize errors in your own logic, assertions, beliefs and prejudices.

I've never been formally schooled in logic, but studying the ones on that website (and like ones) has helped me to be able to formulate my thoughts and assertions in a more orderly manner.

A more coherent argument is a more persuasive argument.