Logical Fallacies and How to Adress Them

• What is the effect of X? How does it achieve that effect? What details contribute to the overall effect? Might it have different effects on different audiences?

In Class 11/11: Summarizing

Summary in Depth

Why Summarize?

• Better Understand Larger Conversation
• Get you thinking in new ways (change analysis/viewpoint/practice etc)

• Prove you got it
• Set up your argument

Bottom Line: Summaries Vary Based on Purpose

Compare one of your summaries with 2 of your classmates' on the same article.

Write down 1 idea and 1 phrasing from theirs you will incorporate in yours

Explain why for each of the above

Write a new 2-3 sentence summary of the article that shows the big idea and prepares to set up an argument you will make in your response

Expanding Your Response

reminder: summaries basically are data collations from another author

In his recent article, “Obesity: Chasing an Elusive Epidemic,” Daniel Callahan laments the evidence suggesting that despite intensive devotion of resources, relatively little progress has been made in countering obesity in the United States. He recommends three categories of interventions: “strong and most likely coercive public health measures,” “childhood prevention,” and “social pressure on the overweight.” Our response focuses on the third strategy, which is misguided on several fronts. Not only does weight stigmatization impose psychological and social harm, but it fails as an incentive for improving health behaviors and may instead reinforce obesity. Obese individuals are already highly stigmatized, despite their attempts to lose weight and despite the significant sociocultural and economic conditions that contribute to obesity, which is where our efforts should be focused. Even if obesity stigma were entirely effective, we submit that its use still violates ethical norms of social justice.

So What?: Explaining the payoff of your thinking/ writing

This pattern changes

[PRACTICE? ANALYSIS? ASSUMPTIONS? CAUSATION (SOME REVERSAL OF THE INITIAL BELIEF OF RELATION OF TWO THINGS)? ORDER (CHANGE IN THE INITIAL UNDERSTANDING OF WHEN THINGS HAPPEN)?]

by

[HERE YOU EXPLAIN THE CHANGE].

Analytical discourse FAIL

• How could the reading of the narrator's feelings have happened differently, and what might be the effects of changes to the process?

rational voice

mad cannibalist

• How could the reading of the narrator's saity have happened differently, and what might be the effects of changes to the process? What is the significance of this process?

So an Application:

Builds from a Data Collation, Answers an Analytical Question, and Presents a So What

assumption

criteria: components (time, cost)

criteria: availability

mad cannibal

• What is the significance of having less hours?

So What?: Explaining the payoff of your thinking/ writing

This pattern changes

[PRACTICE? ANALYSIS? ASSUMPTIONS? CAUSATION (SOME REVERSAL OF THE INITIAL BELIEF OF RELATION OF TWO THINGS)? ORDER (CHANGE IN THE INITIAL UNDERSTANDING OF WHEN THINGS HAPPEN)?]

by

[HERE YOU EXPLAIN THE CHANGE].

yes BUT

restrained mad cannibal

• How could the reading of the narrator's sanity have happened differently, and what might be the effects of changes to the process? What is the significance of this process?

• What is the effect of affordable healthcare? Might it have different effects on different audiences?

• What does X mean?

• What is the significance of X?

• What conditions, influences or events caused X to be as it is? How or why did it become what it is?

• What is the process that led to X? What were the steps in the process? How did that process take place?

• How could X have happened differently, and what might be the effects of changes to the process? What is the significance of this process?

• Who is the audience for X? What is that audience’s expectations, and how are those expectations

addressed?

• What caused x to happen as it did? Where did it happen, who was involved and what was the outcome? What might have caused it to happen differently? What controversies surround the event?

• What is the effect of X? How does it achieve that effect? What details contribute to the overall effect? Might it have different effects on different audiences? What choices did the author/artist make in order to achieve that effect?

• What are the various opinions about X?

• What disagreements might circulate around X?

• What are the common assumptions about X? Is there any overlap between positions about X? What are the reasons for each opinion?

critics reading of tone

So What?: Explaining the payoff of your thinking/ writing

In Class 11/13: Developing Responses

This pattern changes

[PRACTICE? ANALYSIS? ASSUMPTIONS? CAUSATION (SOME REVERSAL OF THE INITIAL BELIEF OF RELATION OF TWO THINGS)? ORDER (CHANGE IN THE INITIAL UNDERSTANDING OF WHEN THINGS HAPPEN)?]

by

[HERE YOU EXPLAIN THE CHANGE].

In Class Write:

1. Select how much/which parts of data collation will help reader (underline/highlight)

2. Choose and write down your analytical question: make specific to your collation ("a more precise definition of term from the box above¬")

3. Answer that question in 2-3 sentences

4. Write a So What based on that answer

5. Number the above sections in order you would put in your response

In Class

This is a chance to put together the elements we have been assembling over the last 2 weeks: using your skills in identifying assumptions, doing a data collation between an article and an observation, writing a summary that sets up an argument, and writing an application that answers an analytical question and a so what, draft a response to a specific comment on your topic. Use anything we have done so far!!!

• Choose One So What from the article we have been discussing
• Think about what sort of assumption/response to our topic it would be useful in thinking about: be specific!!
• Get as far through the data collation as possible:

Yes BUT Template

__Specific Detail 1__ is surprisingly different than __Specific Detail 2_ in terms of _choose 1 from box below____.

Shape

Size

Placement/Timing (either in terms of plot or in terms of the actual text)

Make-up/components/ function within a group

Use/Purpose

Outcome

Definitions

Reasoning

Causes

By this, I mean _____term from the box above__ is ____description of how it fulfills the term in the box__ in ____Specific Detail 1___ while there is a striking difference in ___Specific Detail 2___ in terms of ____description of how it fulfills the term in the box__. Noticing this pattern of ____a more precise definition of term from the box above¬___ suggests that ____Specific Detail 3 that was not in original dump____ is also a part of this collation because it _____ description of how it matches one specific detail, but not the other__.

Adressing Assumptions: Logical Fallacies

Adressing Assumptions: Identify Assumptions of Arguments

o Pretend you disagree with the conclusion you’re defending. What parts of the argument would now seem fishy to you? What parts would seem easiest to attack? Give special attention to strengthening those parts.

Appeal to Biased Authority. In this sort of appeal, the authority is one who actually is knowledgeable on the matter, but one who may have professional or personal motivations that render his professional judgment suspect: for instance, "To determine whether fraternities are beneficial to this campus, we interviewed all the frat presidents." Or again, "To find out whether or not sludge-mining really is endangering the Tuskogee salamander's breeding grounds, we interviewed the supervisors of the sludge-mines, who declared there is no problem." Indeed, it is important to get "both viewpoints" on an argument, but basing a substantial part of your argument on a source that has personal, professional, or financial interests at stake may lead to biased arguments.

Hasty Generalization (Dicto Simpliciter, also called “Jumping to Conclusions,” "Converse Accident"): Mistaken use of inductive reasoning when there are too few samples to prove a point. Example: "Susan failed Biology 101. Herman failed Biology 101. Egbert failed Biology 101. I therefore conclude that most students who take Biology 101 will fail it." In understanding and characterizing general situations, a logician cannot normally examine every single example. However, the examples used in inductive reasoning should be typical of the problem or situation at hand. Maybe Susan, Herman, and Egbert are exceptionally poor students. Maybe they were sick and missed too many lectures that term to pass. If a logician wants to make the case that most students will fail Biology 101, she should (a) get a very large sample--at least one larger than three--or (b) if that isn't possible, she will need to go out of his way to prove to the reader that her three samples are somehow representative of the norm. If a logician considers only exceptional or dramatic cases and generalizes a rule that fits these alone, the author commits the fallacy of hasty generalization.

Irrelevant Conclusion (Ignorantio Elenchi): This fallacy occurs when a rhetorician adapts an argument purporting to establish a particular conclusion and directs it to prove a different conclusion. For example, when a particular proposal for housing legislation is under consideration, a legislator may argue that decent housing for all people is desirable. Everyone, presumably, will agree. However, the question at hand concerns a particular measure. The question really isn't, "Is it good to have decent housing?" The question really is, "Will this particular measure actually provide it or is there a better alternative?" This type of fallacy is a common one in student papers when students use a shared assumption--such as the fact that decent housing is a desirable thing to have--and then spend the bulk of their essays focused on that fact rather than the real question at issue. It's similar to begging the question, above.

One of the most common forms of Ignorantio Elenchi is the "Red Herring." A red herring is a deliberate attempt to change the subject or divert the argument from the real question at issue to some side-point; for instance, “Senator Jones should not be held accountable for cheating on his income tax. After all, there are other senators who have done far worse things.” Another example: “I should not pay a fine for reckless driving. There are many other people on the street who are dangerous criminals and rapists, and the police should be chasing them, not harassing a decent tax-paying citizen like me.” Certainly, worse criminals do exist, but that it is another issue! The questions at hand are (1) did the speaker drive recklessly, and (2) should he pay a fine for it?

What major logical fallacies is the senator committing?

Why does "I suggest you check your sources" serve as an effective answer here?

Look hard at the major categorizations, definitions, and the configuration of key concepts that an argument uses. This will often point to the existence of important assumptions. Take categorizations, for example. “Far East, Middle East, Near East; Mr, Mrs, Miss; Negro, Black, African American,” etc. We can also look at how changes in the meanings associated with categories reveal cultural assumptions.

• Specifics within a group
• Maloney: Gender of those being asked questions
• Cummings: Gender, Health Care vs Banks/Corporations
• Outcome
• Cummings: Trying to "strip federal support" for women vs for wrong doings

Adressing Assumptions: Using Toulmin

Think about data dumps, collations, applications, and so whats

How does Maloney structure her response using these?

How does Cummings?

“This whole defunding fight is just a pretext for the real Republican agenda” — to “take away the constitutional right of women and their doctors to decide what is best for them.”

"real...agenda"

“These are huge companies that are actually guilty of breaking the law,” said Mr. Cummings. “Republicans never criticize the salaries of their C.E.O.s, and they never try to strip their federal funding, their government subsidies or their tax breaks.”

The reasoning about what sort of federal sanctions should take place are based on political agendas rather than wrong doing

Were there similar investigations conducted?

Citigroup and JP Morgan pled guilty this year to currency manipulation, he said, yet those banks continued to receive “extensive federal support” like F.D.I.C. insurance. Congress never summoned their C.E.O.s for questioning on their salaries, $13 million and $20 million respectively. Nor did Congress seek to withdraw federal funding from Lockheed Martin, whose chief executive made $33 million last year, after the company was fined for using taxpayer money for lobbying.

In Class

• Using the information on p 58-62, as well as http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/respond-fallacious-arguments-internet-stuff-watch/, identify ONE logical fallacy committed
• Go back through our list of analytical questions, and think about at least 2 which might help shift the fallacy to a more analytical stance.That is, as per the example of cause and effect fallacies on p 60, you might ask "What disagreements might circulate around the claim we live in an inward facing age?" "What conditions, influences or events caused our inward facing age to be as it is?"

Logical Fallacies and How to Adress Them