Logical Fallacies Research Paper

Dr.Wheeler created the Logical Fallacies Handlist and it states that fallacies are statements that might sound reasonable or superficially true but are actually flawed or dishonest. It is important to avoid logical fallacies as they undermine your argument. There are several types of logical fallacies and to keep track of all of them you can separate them into different categories. There are four different main categories that the certain types can go into; they are fallacies of relevance, component fallacies, fallacies of ambiguity, and fallacies of omission. The Logical Fallacies Handlist states fallacies of relevance are all fallacies that appeal to certain evidence or examples that have nothing to do with the specific argument given. The Fallacies of relevance help readers form a conclusion on the topic by distracting from the main point. The types of fallacies that
are in this group are, appeal to force fallacies, genetic fallacy, personal attack, appeal to tradition fallacies, appeal to improper authority fallacies, appeal to emotion fallacies, argument from adverse consequence fallacies, and argument from personal incredulity fallacies. These fallacies help you appeal or argue certain aspects of your argument to gain the reader’s attention.
Following are component fallacies, these are all errors in both inductive and deductive reasoning. This category has quite a few logical fallacies. The types of fallacies that are in this group are, begging the question fallacies, circular reasoning fallacies, hasty generalization fallacies, false cause fallacies, irrelevant conclusion fallacies, straw man argument fallacies, non sequitur fallacies, slippery slope fallacies, either/or fallacies, faulty analogy fallacies, undistributed middle term fallacies, and contradictory premises fallacies. Next is Fallacies of ambiguity these are fallacies that contain errors with ambiguous words or phrases that tend to shift the meaning of the discussion. The types of fallacies in this category are equivocation fallacies, amphiboly fallacies, composition fallacies, division fallacies, and fallacies of reification. Last is Fallacies of omission, these contain errors because the author leaves out important information that is viable to that specific
argument. This last category holds very few of the fallacy types just like the last category did. The types of fallacies in this category are, stacking the deck fallacies, ‘No True Scotsman’ fallacies, argument from the negative fallacies, appeal to a lack of evidence fallacies, hypothesis contrary to fact fallacies, and complex question fallacies. These fallacies help your argue your points with little information to help prove your point. One final idea mentioned in the Logical Fallacies Handlist is Occam’s razor. Occam’s Razor was proposed by William of Ockham, who was a theologian, philosopher, and logician. Occam’s Razor has become a tool or guideline to use when reasoning issues out logically. Occam’s Razor states that when a problem occurs there are many possible theories that could explain how the problem happened, and when logically thinking about the theories that explain your problem the simpler theory is most likely the correct theory. Occam’s razor helps cut out the unnecessary parts of your possible theories. Almightily, ruling out all the far out theories that are not logical to the problem