No True Scotsman
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No true Scotsman or appeal to purity is an
informal fallacy Informal fallacies are a type of incorrect argument in natural language. The source of the error is not just due to the ''form'' of the argument, as is the case for formal fallacies, but can also be due to their ''content'' and ''context''. Fallac ...
in which one modifies a prior claim in response to a
counterexample A counterexample is any exception to a generalization. In logic a counterexample disproves the generalization, and does so rigorously in the fields of mathematics and philosophy. For example, the fact that "student John Smith is not lazy" is a c ...
by asserting the counterexample is excluded by definition. Rather than admitting error or providing evidence to disprove the counterexample, the original claim is changed by using a non-substantive modifier such as "true", "pure", "genuine", "authentic", "real", or other similar terms. Philosopher Bradley Dowden explains the fallacy as an " ad hoc rescue" of a refuted generalization attempt. The following is a simplified rendition of the fallacy: Person A: "No
Scotsman Scottish people or Scots (; ) are an ethnic group and nation native to Scotland. Historically, they emerged in the early Middle Ages from an amalgamation of two Celtic peoples, the Picts and Gaels, who founded the Kingdom of Scotland (o ...
puts sugar on his
porridge Porridge is a food made by heating, soaking or boiling ground, crushed or chopped starchy plants, typically grain, in milk or water. It is often cooked or served with added flavourings such as sugar, honey, fruit, or syrup to make a sweet cereal ...
." Person B: "But my uncle Angus is a Scotsman and he puts sugar on his porridge." Person A: "But no Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."


Occurrence

The "no true Scotsman" fallacy is committed when the arguer satisfies the following conditions: * not publicly retreating from the initial, falsified ''a posteriori'' assertion * offering a modified assertion that definitionally excludes a targeted unwanted counterexample * using rhetoric to signal the modification An appeal to purity is commonly associated with protecting a preferred group. Scottish national pride may be at stake if someone regularly considered to be Scottish commits a heinous crime. To protect people of Scottish heritage from a possible accusation of
guilt by association The association fallacy is a formal fallacy that asserts that properties of one thing must also be properties of another thing if both things belong to the same group. For example, a fallacious arguer may claim that "bears are animals, and bears a ...
, one may use this fallacy to deny that the group is associated with this undesirable member or action. "No Scotsman would do something so undesirable"; i.e., the people who would do such a thing are tautologically (definitionally) excluded from being part of our group such that they cannot serve as a counterexample to the group's good nature.


Origin and philosophy

The description of the fallacy in this form is attributed to the British philosopher
Antony Flew Antony Garrard Newton Flew (; 11 February 1923 – 8 April 2010) was an English philosopher. Belonging to the analytic and evidentialist schools of thought, Flew worked on the philosophy of religion. During the course of his career he taught ...
, who wrote, in his 1966 book ''God & Philosophy'', In his 1975 book ''Thinking About Thinking'', Flew wrote: David P. Goldman, writing under his pseudonym "Spengler", compared distinguishing between "mature" democracies, which never start wars, and "emerging democracies", which may start them, with the "no true Scotsman" fallacy. Spengler alleges that political scientists have attempted to save the "US academic dogma" that democracies never start wars against other democracies from counterexamples by declaring any democracy which does indeed start a war against another democracy to be flawed, thus maintaining that no democracy starts a war against a fellow democracy. Cognitive psychologist
Steven Pinker Steven Arthur Pinker (born September 18, 1954) is a Canadian-American cognitive psychology, cognitive psychologist, psycholinguistics, psycholinguist, popular science author, and public intellectual. He is an advocate of evolutionary psycholo ...
has suggested that phrases like "no true Christian ever kills, no true communist state is repressive and no true
Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
supporter endorses violence" exemplify the fallacy.


See also

* ''Ad hoc'' hypothesis *
Begging the question In classical rhetoric and logic, begging the question or assuming the conclusion (Latin: ) is an informal fallacy that occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion. Historically, begging the question refers to a fault i ...
* Epistemic commitment *
Equivocation In logic, equivocation ("calling two different things by the same name") is an informal fallacy resulting from the use of a particular word or expression in multiple senses within an argument. It is a type of ambiguity that stems from a phrase ...
*
List of fallacies A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning in the construction of an argument. All forms of human communication can contain fallacies. Because of their variety, fallacies are challenging to classify. They can be classified by ...
*
Moving the goalposts Moving the goalposts (or shifting the goalposts) is a metaphor, derived from goal-based sports such as football and hockey, that means to change the rule or criterion ("goal") of a process or competition while it is still in progress, in such a wa ...
*
Persuasive definition A persuasive definition is a form of stipulative definition which purports to describe the true or commonly accepted meaning of a term, while in reality stipulating an uncommon or altered use, usually to support an argument for some view, or to cr ...
*
Reification (fallacy) Reification (also known as concretism, hypostatization, or the fallacy of misplaced concreteness) is a fallacy of ambiguity, when an abstraction (abstract belief or hypothetical wikt:construct, construct) is treated as if it were a concrete real ...
*
Special pleading Special pleading is an informal fallacy wherein a person claims an exception to a general or universal principle, but the exception is unjustified. It applies a double standard. In the classic distinction among material fallacies, cognitive fa ...
*
Whataboutism Whataboutism or whataboutery (as in "but what about X?") is a pejorative for the strategy of responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of a defense against the original accusation. From a logical and argumentative point of ...


References

{{Fallacies 1971 introductions Verbal fallacies