Fallacies1:
- Ad Hominen: Attacking the person rather than the argument
- Texas Sharpshooter: Selecting evidence to fit a narrative
- Bandwagon: Assumption of truth because the majority of people believing it to be true
- Straw Man: Ignoring the real argument in favor of a distorted flimsy one
- Red herring: Distracting from the argument with a seemingly related (but actually not) point
- Hasty Generalization: Jumping to conclusions
- Appeal to Authority: Relying on an experts opinion as proof of truth
- No True Scotsman: The changing of the original argument to evade a counter argument
- Sunk Cost: You should continue an effort based on previous irrecoveraable costs
- Non-Sequiter: The conclusion does not follow from the evidence
- False Dilemma: Presenting only two choices, when many exist
- Tu Quoque: Descrediting an argument because the arguers behavior is inconsistent with the argument
- Slippery Slope: Starting at benign point and using a series of improbable steps to get to a more radical, extreme end point
- Begging the Question: Circular reasoning in which the argument is presented in a way that includes the conclusion in the premise
- Loaded Question: Asking a question with a presumption built into the question
- Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc: Assuming that because an event followed another that the first event caused the later event
- Equivocation: Using a word in an intentionally misleading manner
- Personal Incredulity: Assuming that because you cannot understand something, it must not be true
- Burden of Proof: The inability to provide evidence that a claim is false is used to prove that it is true
- Fallacy Fallacy: Assuming a claim must be false because a fallacy was used to argue the claim
Wrong Side of maybe fallacy
When we judge a forecast wrong based on a small sample size, often a single event2
1. Bloom, S. Thread on Logical Fallacies. (2021).
2. Tetlock, P. E. & Gardner, D. Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction. (Crown, New York, 2015).