Glossary
33 terms, each linked to the sentence that defines it.
A
- Abduction
- Inference to the most likely explanation from incomplete evidence.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- ad hominem
- An attack on a person in place of an answer to their argument.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- appeal to authority
- Treating a person's status or credentials as proof of a claim instead of examining its evidence.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- appeal to emotion
- Using an emotional response in place of evidence for a claim.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- asymmetric skepticism
- Demanding strong proof for unwelcome claims while accepting weak support for welcome ones.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- attribute substitution
- Answering an easier related question in place of the difficult question at hand.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
B
- Bounded rationality
- Decision-making under limits of time, information, and cognitive capacity.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
C
- Circular reasoning
- An argument that assumes its conclusion in its premises.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- conclusion
- The claim an argument tries to establish from its premises.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- confounder
- A third factor that influences both variables and can create a misleading association between them.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
D
- deduction
- Reasoning in which the conclusion must follow if the premises are true and the inference is valid.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
E
- Equivocation
- Changing the meaning of a word within an argument so that its conclusion appears to follow.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- ethos
- The credibility of a speaker as a source of persuasion.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
F
- fallacy fallacy
- The mistake of treating a conclusion as false because an argument for it is flawed.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- false cause
- Mistaking correlation or sequence for evidence that one event caused another.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- false dilemma
- Presenting two options as the only possibilities when others exist.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
G
- Gish gallop
- Overwhelming an opponent with claims faster than they can reasonably be checked or answered.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- goalpost-moving
- Changing the standard of proof after evidence meets the original demand.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
I
L
M
- Motivated reasoning
- Reasoning toward a preferred conclusion instead of following the evidence wherever it leads.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- motte-and-bailey
- A move that retreats from a bold claim to an easier claim when challenged, then returns to the bold claim.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
P
- premises
- A claim or assumption used to support an argument's conclusion.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
R
- reverse causality
- A mistaken causal explanation in which the proposed effect actually causes the proposed cause.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
S
- slippery slope
- A claim that one step will lead to a harmful chain without showing how each step follows.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- Soundness
- The property of a deductive argument that is valid and has true premises.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- steel man
- The strongest reasonable version of an opposing argument.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
- straw man
- A distorted weaker version of an argument that is easier to attack.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
T
- Tu quoque
- Rejecting a claim by accusing its speaker of hypocrisy instead of addressing the claim.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
V
- Validity
- The property of an argument whose conclusion follows from its premises if they are true.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps
W
- Whataboutism
- Deflecting criticism by pointing to a similar or worse act by someone else.
- Ch. 01 · Logic, Fallacies & Cognitive Traps