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Appeal To Pity
An appeal to pity (also called ''argumentum ad misericordiam'') is a fallacy in which someone improperly appeals to pity or similar feelings like empathy, as a method of persuading someone to agree with a conclusion. It is a specific kind of appeal to emotion. This fallacy can happen in two ways: 1) when an appeal to pity (or a similar emotion) has nothing to do with the actual point of the argument, or 2) when the emotional appeal is exaggerated or excessive compared to the situation being discussed. Not all appeals to pity are logical fallacies. When the feelings of pity are directly related to the conclusion and help support the argument logically, they can be reasonable. For instance, appealing to pity when asking for help. Examples * "You must have graded my exam incorrectly. I studied very hard for weeks specifically because I knew my career depended on getting a good grade. If you give me a failing grade I'm ruined!" * "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, look at this miserable ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fallacy
A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning in the construction of an argument that may appear to be well-reasoned if unnoticed. The term was introduced in the Western intellectual tradition by the Aristotelian '' De Sophisticis Elenchis''. Fallacies may be committed intentionally to manipulate or persuade by deception, unintentionally because of human limitations such as carelessness, cognitive or social biases and ignorance, or potentially due to the limitations of language and understanding of language. These delineations include not only the ignorance of the right reasoning standard but also the ignorance of relevant properties of the context. For instance, the soundness of legal arguments depends on the context in which they are made. Fallacies are commonly divided into "formal" and "informal". A formal fallacy is a flaw in the structure of a deductive argument that renders the argument invalid, while an informal fallacy originates in an error in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pity
Pity is a sympathetic sorrow evoked by the suffering of others. The word is comparable to ''compassion'', '' condolence'', or ''empathy''. It derives from the Latin (etymon also of ''piety''). Self-pity is pity directed towards oneself. Two different kinds of pity can be distinguished, "benevolent pity" and "contemptuous pity". In the latter, through insincere, pejorative usage, pity connotes feelings of superiority, condescension, or contempt. Psychological opinions Psychologists see pity arising in early childhood out of the infant's ability to identify with others. Psychoanalysis sees a more convoluted route to (at least some forms of) adult pity by way of the sublimation of aggression—pity serving as a kind of magic gesture intended to show how leniently one should oneself be treated by one's own conscience. Religious views In the West, the religious concept of pity was reinforced after acceptance of Judeo-Christian concepts of God pitying all humanity, as found ini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Appeal To Emotion
Appeal to emotion or ''argumentum ad passiones'' (meaning the same in Latin) is an informal fallacy characterized by the psychological manipulation, manipulation of the recipient's emotions in order to win an argument, especially in the absence of factual evidence. This kind of appeal to emotion is irrelevant to or distracting from the facts of the argument (a so-called "red herring") and encompasses several logical fallacies, including appeal to consequences, appeal to fear, appeal to flattery, appeal to pity, appeal to ridicule, appeal to spite, and wishful thinking. Appeal to emotion is an application of social psychology. It is only fallacious when the emotions that are elicited are irrelevant to evaluating the truth of the conclusion and serve to distract from rational consideration of relevant premises or information. For instance, if a student says "If I get a failing grade for this paper I will lose my scholarship. It's not plagiarized." the emotions elicited by the first st ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Appeal To Consequences
Appeal to consequences, also known as ''argumentum ad consequentiam'' (Latin for "argument to the consequence"), is an argument that concludes a hypothesis (typically a belief) to be either true or false based on whether the premise leads to desirable or undesirable consequences. This is based on an appeal to emotion and is a type of informal fallacy, since the desirability of a premise's consequence does not make the premise true. Moreover, in categorizing consequences as either desirable or undesirable, such arguments inherently contain subjective points of view. In logic, appeal to consequences refers only to arguments that assert a conclusion's truth value (''true or false'') without regard to the formal preservation of the truth from the premises; appeal to consequences does not refer to arguments that address a premise's consequential desirability (''good or bad'', or ''right or wrong'') instead of its truth value. Therefore, an argument based on appeal to consequences is v ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ad Hominem
, short for , refers to several types of arguments that are usually fallacious. Often currently this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than the substance of the argument itself. This avoids genuine debate by creating a diversion often using a totally irrelevant, but often highly charged attribute of the opponent's character or background. The most common form of this fallacy is "A" makes a claim of "fact", to which "B" asserts that "A" has a personal trait, quality or physical attribute that is repugnant thereby going off-topic, and hence "B" concludes that "A" has their "fact" wrongwithout ever addressing the point of the debate. Other uses of the term are more traditional, referring to arguments tailored to fit a particular audience, and may be encountered in specialized philosophical usage. These typically refer to the dialectical strategy of using the target' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Think Of The Children
"Think of the children" (also "What about the children?") is a cliché that evolved into a rhetorical tactic. In the literal sense, it refers to children's rights (as in discussions of child labor). In debate, it is a plea for pity that is used as an appeal to emotion, and therefore may become a logical fallacy. History ''Art, Argument, and Advocacy'' (2002) argued that the appeal substitutes emotion for reason in debate. Ethicist Jack Marshall wrote in 2005 that the phrase's popularity stems from its capacity to stunt rationality, particularly discourse on morals. "Think of the children" has been invoked by censorship proponents to shield children from perceived danger. ''Community, Space and Online Censorship'' (2009) argued that classifying children in an infantile manner, as innocents in need of protection, is a form of obsession over the concept of purity. A 2011 article in the ''Journal for Cultural Research'' observed that the phrase grew out of a moral panic. It wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
