Question

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What would we call these fallacies?

Listening to people talk over time, I think I've identified a few fallacies and I'm not sure what to call them.

1. When someone is giving an argument in absence of opposition, I've seen them state things as if everyone in the audience agrees with them, as if to influence people in thinking that the majority of people do agree since nobody is questioning the statement.

2. When someone is giving an argument in the absence of opposition, I've seen them go a step farther and explain that there is opposition, but they are liars, are immoral, or generally not to be trusted. Or just state the opposition's argument in a way that doesn't do it justice so they can dispense with it quickly. It's basically something like: I got to this audience first, I've set the narrative, and by the time the opposition attempts to make their argument, most of the people I've spoken to know they can safely reject the opposing argument without listening to it.

3. I've seen where string of false claims will be made that go from less to more extreme, the claims will generally be an emotional minefield that make it impossible to maneuver, and then the opposition will simply accede to all but the very last and seemingly most important claim to rebut, thereby convincing the audience that the last several claims must be true, and the only legitimate arguments are about the very last claim. In reality the argument was always about winning the previous claims by default, since the last claim will be won in a future argument by not being the last claim in a new string of false claims. I'm particularly interested in this one, because as I've seen demonstrated over and over again, nobody seems to know how to deal with this situation.

asked on Sunday, Jul 24, 2022 10:00:53 PM by

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Answers

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Bo Bennett, PhD
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answered on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 07:15:23 AM by Bo Bennett, PhD

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TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:

Alleged Certainty...wow, can't believe I missed that.

I feel like a real moron.

posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 07:20:58 AM
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Bo Bennett, PhD writes:
[To Rationalissimus of the Elenchus]

Don't... as you know, there are often many that work. There are so many, we can't remember all of them all the time!

[ login to reply ] posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 07:27:15 AM
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account no longer exists writes:

I think gish gallop is the closest I've seen to my third example. The only difference (and maybe it's not big enough to make it distinct from this fallacy), is that the very last most extreme claim is actually a pawn, while the rest of the claims are emotionally loaded to a degree that the opponent feels the need to tell the audience he agrees with them (whether he does or not) so they know he is not bad person, before arguing the last point, which was never the point to begin with.

posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 01:38:30 PM
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Bo Bennett, PhD writes:
[To Daryl]

Fallacies are a lot like ingredients... you can combine them for a new fallacy and make countless fallacies if one were so inclined. This is why I am not a fan of the combined named fallacies.

[ login to reply ] posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 03:31:30 PM
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account no longer exists writes:
[To Bo Bennett, PhD]

I think you're right, my scenario is a combination of fallacies. Not just one.

[ login to reply ] posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 04:01:51 PM
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TrappedPrior (RotE)
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Hello Daryl, and welcome.

I think I know what you're talking about. Let's parse your post:

When someone is giving an argument in absence of opposition, I've seen them state things as if everyone in the audience agrees with them, as if to influence people in thinking that the majority of people do agree since nobody is questioning the statement.

I interpreted this as being one of those cases where people say things like "everyone knows X" as if something were obvious, but X is actually contentious, therefore not obvious.

Depending on how it is expressed specifically, it could be prejudicial language ("all good people know X") or proof surrogate ("X is an indisputable fact no one could possibly deny" - note the use of the word "indisputable", which is masquerading as evidence for X).

EDIT: See Dr Bo's answer. "Alleged Certainty" fits this example way better than whatever I name-dropped in my screed.

When someone is giving an argument in the absence of opposition, I've seen them go a step farther and explain that there is opposition, but they are liars, are immoral, or generally not to be trusted. Or just state the opposition's argument in a way that doesn't do it justice so they can dispense with it quickly. It's basically something like: I got to this audience first, I've set the narrative, and by the time the opposition attempts to make their argument, most of the people I've spoken to know they can safely reject the opposing argument without listening to it.

Two fallacies going on here - the first is poisoning the well (this is setting the narrative that the opponent is untrustworthy, stupid, otherwise immoral etc). This primes people to see the opponent in a negative light, which makes them prejudiced against said opponent's arguments - before the audience has even seen them.

The second is a strawman fallacy. The speaker "acknowledges" the existence of counterarguments, but bastardises them such that the audience doesn't see them as serious threats to the speaker's thesis.

I've seen where string of false claims will be made that go from less to more extreme, the claims will generally be an emotional minefield that make it impossible to maneuver, and then the opposition will simply accede to all but the very last and seemingly most important claim to rebut, thereby convincing the audience that the last several claims must be true, and the only legitimate arguments are about the very last claim. In reality the argument was always about winning the previous claims by default, since the last claim will be won in a future argument by not being the last claim in a new string of false claims. I'm particularly interested in this one, because as I've seen demonstrated over and over again, nobody seems to know how to deal with this situation.

Here, I picture the speaker making a string of claims - A, B, C, etc - wrapped in extremely emotional rhetoric. The audience, or opponent, accepts all the claims up to the final one - say, D - which is swiftly contested. However, A, B and C are also questionable claims, but thanks to the emotional blindsiding effect, they've gone uncontested. Thus, the speaker has smuggled dubious claims past their interlocutor via sloppy reasoning.

The closest match I can think of is hypnotic bait and switch (but the definition implies that the claims are uncontroversial and true - I believe the format can work for cases where the claims are false or at least equivocal, but are accepted as true.)

EDIT: As Dr Bo points out, this could also be considered a Gish Gallop.

To deal with it, it's probably best to take stock of every individual point the speaker makes - if necessary, ask them to repeat themselves. You'd want to make sure you're focusing on the most relevant parts of the argument.

answered on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 07:04:17 AM by TrappedPrior (RotE)

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account no longer exists writes:

While Dr. Bo pointed out some very good ones, I like your answer too. Prejudicial language is definitely a good one to understand in the context of #3.

I think you did a pretty good job of characterizing #3. Because it includes emotionally charged claims, it's hard to characterize with examples, because they'd all be controversial. I think the individual claims (A - C) could be instances of prejudicial language. So the opponent could either concede in spite of his internal beliefs, or he might have conceded internally that he is bad if he argues them. 

Hypnotic bait and switch actually sounds pretty close to the broad scheme of #3 though, except it's inverted. The main differences are: 1. The goal of the argument is not to win D. It is to win A - C. 2. The emotionally loaded claims A - C, will direct the opponent to attack only what he can win against, so he will claim to agree with A - C (whether he does or not) so the audience won't think he has bad intentions, and then try to dismantle D. The damage done is that both of them just placed criticism of A - C outside the Oberton Window, so the one claiming A - C wins by default, because now nobody else feels like he can argue against them either.

posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 01:26:26 PM
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TrappedPrior (RotE) writes:
[To Daryl]

Yeah, I got your point eventually. The speaker rattles off claims A, B and C - the stuff they're really trying to prove - and then reaches D, by which point the interlocutor/audience is no longer "hypnotised" and contests that claim, not realising they've tacitly accepted dubious claims A through C.

[ login to reply ] posted on Monday, Jul 25, 2022 05:40:00 PM
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Darren writes:

[To Daryl]

I wasn't familiar with "Overton Window"; very interesting concept.

(your posting had a typo--it's "O v erton" not "O b erton")

There are politicians with whom I vehemently disagree yet I respect the fact that they have a set of beliefs about what's right and wrong that dictate their policies.   I would say they have substance (even if I wouldn't vote for them).  

On the other extreme, there's politicians that constantly assess the Overton Window (even if they've never heard of the concept).  They put their finger in the wind and that dictates what they'll say and support.   It pains me to vote for such a politician, but I have no choice if they support the policies I agree with and their opponent doesn't.  But I likely won't respect them.

[ login to reply ] posted on Tuesday, Jul 26, 2022 10:09:23 AM