Appeal to emotions

After my son was born, he was diagnosed with a lot of problems. This is God's way of punishing me because I had an abortion prior to my first born. 

The statement "This is God's way of punishing me because I had an abortion prior to my first born" is an example of the logical fallacy known as "Appeal to Emotion." Let's break down why this is the case and address any associated cognitive biases and poor reasoning:

1. **Appeal to Emotion:**
- **Definition:** An appeal to emotion is a logical fallacy in which emotion is used in place of reason in order to attempt to win an argument.
- **Application:** The statement leverages feelings of guilt and divine retribution to explain a child's medical condition. The emotional weight of guilt and perceived punishment diverts attention from rational, evidence-based reasoning.

2. **Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc (Causal Fallacy):**
- **Definition:** This fallacy occurs when one assumes that if one event happens after another, then the first must be the cause of the second.
- **Application:** The statement implies that past actions (having an abortion) are directly responsible for the child's current health issues without any scientific or medical evidence to support this causal link.

3. **Confirmation Bias:**
- **Definition:** This is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs.
- **Application:** The person might be predisposed to believe that negative events are a form of divine punishment, thus interpreting the child's health issues as confirmation of this belief.

4. **Attribution Error:**
- **Definition:** Attribution error refers to the common human tendency to attribute causes to people's actions and overlook other factors that might have contributed.
- **Application:** The individual attributes the health issues to their personal guilt and assumes divine retribution, overlooking possible genetic, environmental, or medical factors involved.

5. **Lack of Evidence:**
- **Application:** There is no empirical evidence provided to back up the claim that the health issues are a form of divine punishment. Medical conditions have complex causes that are best understood through scientific inquiry and medical examination.

6. **Guilt Projection:**
- **Explanation:** The person is projecting their guilt over a past decision (the abortion) onto an unrelated event (the child's health issues). This projection can lead to misplaced blame and emotional distress.

In conclusion, the reasoning given in the statement is primarily driven by emotional responses rather than logical analysis and evidence-based reasoning. A more rational approach would involve consulting medical professionals to understand the child's health issues and exploring medical and scientific explanations, rather than attributing them to personal guilt and divine punishment.

You have several unsupported premises here.

A fallacy is incorrect argument in logic and rhetoric resulting in a lack of validity.
Validity is always hypothetical: IF the premises are true, then the conclusion is true.  The logic can be  structurally correct, but if the premises are false, then the conclusion is not true. 

For the premises to be true, all of them need to be true. But, for the premises to be false, only one need be false. Therefore, an argument with both true and false premises is an argument with false premises—it is false because all the premises are not true. 

Validity guarantees a true conclusion only when the premises are true but not when the premises are false. False premises can lead to either a true or a false conclusion, even in a structurally correct argument. In such cases, luck rather than logic can lead to a true conclusion.

Here are a couple errors I see:

Fallacy of Presupposition – is to ask a question that presupposes a premise that has not been proven or accepted by all the people involved. 

Moralistic fallacy – inferring factual conclusions from purely personal evaluative premises in violation of fact–value distinction. For instance, inferring “what is”  from “what ought” is an instance of moralistic fallacy. Moralistic fallacy is the inverse of naturalistic fallacy.

The biggest error is this:

Post hoc ergo propter hoc is Latin for “after this, therefore because of this.” This fallacy has several other names, such as the “Correlation proves causation fallacy,” faulty cause/effect, coincidental correlation, and correlation without causation. Post hoc occurs when assuming the correlation between two variables implies that one causes the other. X happened, then Y happened; therefore X caused Y. 

From other questions you have asked, I see you are having an issue with religion. Good, you should examine all beliefs you hold. 

As an exercise, see if you can intelligibly define the god you believe in. I have never seen one, and I doubt you will find such a definition. Then, ask yourself how you came to believe in something you cannot intelligibly define.

I agree with the comments calling this a post hoc fallacy, so I won't rehash that.

The other fallacy I'm seeing here is amazing familiarity or appeal to heaven . She is asserting that she understands what God's intentions are, despite having no way of knowing them. While many Christians do consider the idea of abortion being immoral as part of their religious beliefs, there is almost no mention of abortion specifically in the Bible, and there's no punishment laid out for it.