CHAPTER 5

Fallacies in Legal Reasoning

Fallacy
Fallacy is using an invalid or faulty reasoning in approaching an issue. It can be
composed of entirely true statements or beliefs but the reasoning behind it is illogical or
it is not supported by the facts.
Fallacy is used to describe an error in reasoning rather than falsity in a statement or
claim.
Fallacies are deceptive and misleading even if they are incorrect because they sound
correct and acceptable.

Formal and Informal Fallacy

Fallacies are divided as formal or informal.
A formal fallacy is a deductive argument that is invalid. It describes how ideas are
sequenced incorrectly in an argument. This incorrect arrangement of ideas usually
renders the argument as nothing but noise. In formal fallacy, the conclusion is not
supported by the premises. The deduction is wrong, so there is no logical argument.

For informal fallacy, the ideas are correctly arranged but the content itself which is
derived from the ideas is wrong. Unlike in formal fallacy, the error in informal fallacy is
not in the form or logic of the argument. Informal fallacies often involve using irrelevant
information in arguments or information based on assumptions that later prove to be
false. They are widespread in everyday conversations and can take many forms. We
can observe informal fallacies in political speeches, advertisements, newspaper articles,
internet forums, and social networking sites. They are often dependent on misuse of
language and misuse of evidence.
Informal fallacies accomplish their purpose of misleading by persuading people to
believe or accept something in many different ways.
Three categories: fallacies of ambiguity, fallacies of irrelevant evidences, and fallacies
of insufficient evidences.

Fallacies of ambiguity – committed because of a misuse of language. They contain

ambiguous or vague statements which causes to mislead the people.
Fallacies of irrelevant evidences – does not have a problem with the language but
with the connection between the premise and conclusion. It occurs because the
premises are not logically relevant to the conclusion. They are misleading because the
premises are just psychologically relevant so the conclusion seems to follow the
premises although it does not follow logically.

Fallacies of insufficient evidences – does not have a problem with the language but
also with the connection of premise and conclusion. It occurs not because the premises
are not relevant to the conclusion but because the premises fail to provide strong
evidence to support the conclusion.

Fallacies of Ambiguity
Equivocation – uses ambiguous language to hide the truth. If “the same word or form
of the same word is used in two different contexts, it must mean the same thing in both
contexts.” Equivocation uses a word or term in its different senses but making it appear
to have only one meaning. It intentionally or carelessly allowed a key word to shift in
meaning in the middle of argument while giving the impression that they still have the
same meaning.
Example: Mr. Parker told his friends that he passed the bar. His friends congratulated
him on his accomplishment.
The fallacy: Mr. Parker equivocated the meaning of passing the bar. Passing the bar
has two meanings. Mr. Parker might have lied in suggesting that he passed the bar
exam. He could simply have walked past the bar in a courtroom separating the public
from the well where the lawyers argue and the judge sits.

Amphiboly – presenting a claim or argument whose meaning can be interpreted in two

or more ways because of the grammatical structure in the sentence.
In equivocation, ambiguity comes from changing meanings of the word but in amphiboly
ambiguity comes from the way the sentence or statement was constructed. The double
meaning that it gives do not lie on the word but in the grammatical structure itself.
Instead of using the same word with multiple meanings, as with the Fallacy of
Equivocation, the Fallacy of Amphiboly involves the use of sentences which can be
interpreted in multiple ways with equal justification due to some defect in the grammar,
sentence structure, and punctuation or both.
The statement is amphibolous when its meaning is indeterminate because of the loose
or awkward way in which its words are combined.
Example: “Your dog chased after me on my bicycle.” (I was riding on my bicycle while
your dog chased me. vs. Your dog was riding on my bicycle and chased me.) “I took
some pictures of the dogs at the park playing, but they were not good.” Does ‘they’
mean the dogs or the pictures “were not good”? The ambiguity in the structure of the
sentence makes the conclusion invalid.

Improper Accent – misleading the people by placing improper emphasis on a word,

phrase or particular aspect of an issue or claim. An improper accent fallacy creates an
ambiguity in the way a word or words are accented.
Example: A reporter asks a member of Congress whether she favors the President’s
new missile-defense system. She responds, “I’m in favor of a missile defense system
that effectively defends America.”
The fallacy: Her answer could mean that she favors the President’s missile defense
system or that she opposes it because the system is not effectively defending America.
She creates an ambiguity in which word is accented. If the word “favor” is accented, her
answer is likely in favor of the missile defense system. If the words “effectively defends”
are accented, she likely opposes the defense system.

Vicious Abstraction – misleading people by misusing vague or abstract terms.

Vague words are misused when these words are very significant in the premises to
establish a conclusion. However, a premise that is not understood cannot provide
support to conclusion.
Example: If we wished to argue against an employee’s claim that she is overworked, we
must know precisely what it means to be overworked before we can know whether the
counter evidence we might have weakens or refutes the claim.
Important Note: If we do not know exactly the meaning of a term due to its vagueness,
we cannot know at what point counter evidence may do some damage to the claim in
which it appears.
How can we deal with this kind of fallacy? We, need to sense if our opponent is
attempting to support a particular claim with a statement containing a vague word and
challenge the acceptability of the premises on the grounds that you cannot assess the
evidential value of the support as long as the meaning of the vague terms remains
unspecified.
Composition –makes the assumption that one part of something will apply to the
whole. It was like treating a distributed characteristics as if it were collective. It occurs
when one makes the mistake of attributing to a group or a whole some characteristics
that is only true for its individual members, and then makes inferences based on that
mistake.
The fallacy of composition assumes that a feature of the individuals in a group is also a
feature of the group itself.
Example: “Because a lawyer earns more than a secretary, therefore all lawyers earn
more than all secretaries.” This fallacy turns on a confusion between “distributive” and
the “collective” use of general terms. Lawyers earn more than secretaries, distributively,
but collectively secretaries earn more than lawyers, because there are lot more
secretaries in the world than lawyers.
Example: “Although college students may enroll in no more than six different classes
each semester, it is also true that college students enroll in hundreds of different
subjects each semester.” It’s true of college students, distributively, that each of them
may enroll in not more than six subjects every semester. “COLLEGE STUDENTS” –
(Distributive use of the term) we are speaking of college students taken singly.
Example: “Roger Federer and Martina Hingis are two of the best tennis players in the
world, so if these two swiss players team up, they’d make one of the best mixed
doubles teams.” The two players are very difficult to defeat when they play individually,
but it does not follow that they will also be very difficult to defeat when they play
together as a team because the skills and strategies in double matches in tennis are
different from those in single categories.

Division – is the reverse of the fallacy of composition, because rather than assuming
that a characteristic of the parts is therefore a characteristic of the whole batch, it makes
a wrong assumption that what is true in general is necessarily true in particular or each
part considered separately.
Division is the converse of the composition fallacy. If a group has a feature, the
individuals in the group have that feature.
Example: To argue that, since PNP is one of the most corrupt agencies of the
government, therefore, these three policemen cannot be trusted, is to commit the fallacy
of division. Although it is true that PNP as an agency gets a high rating in surveys in
terms of incidence of corruption, it does not mean that the individual members of the
agency, in particular, are corrupt.

Fallacies of Irrelevance
Argumentum ad Hominem (Personal Attack) – is an argument directed to the person
or attacking the other person directly by focusing on their personal characteristics. In
any normal argument, what should be attacked is the reasoning of the opponent’s
argument and not the person offering the argument but when we say argumentum ad
hominem it’s more of making the opponent the issue rather than attempting to
addressing the issue that is being raised.
Ad Hominem attacks intention is to shun and give the audience a negative feel or
thoughts about the opponent’s arguments.
Example: She is for raising the minimum wage, but she is not smart enough to even run
a business.
Abusive Argumentum ad Hominem – approach the argument based on the arguer’s
reputation, personality or some personal shortcomings. When you abuse a person or
use invectives to attack his/her argument, it is abusive ad hominem.
Example: A basic example of an ad hominem argument is a person telling someone
“You’re stupid, so I don’t care what you have to say”, in response to hearing them
present a well-thought position. This is the simplest type of fallacious ad hominem
argument, which is nothing more than an abusive personal attack, and which has little to
do with the topic being discussed.
Circumstancial Argumentum ad Hominem – attacks the opponent’s circumstances in
particular rather than simply generally abusing the opponent. They “try to discredit an
opponent because of his background, affiliations, self-interest or issue in the matter at
hand.”
It is also called Tu quoque which means “you’re another” or you yourself do it. It is the
like a "common practice" that consists of answering allegations of wrong doing by
saying "other people do the same thing," or "everybody does it." It typically occurs when
a person is attacked for doing what they are arguing against.
Example: You are telling your daughter to do not engage into any romantic relationship
until she graduated from college and your daughter retaliated that you, yourself were
already in a relationship with her dad since you two were college.
As you can see, the arguers in these examples are trying to make the case that what
they have done is justified by insisting that the other person has also done the same. If
the act or statement in question was so bad, why did they do it? It is sometimes referred
to as "two wrongs don't make a right" because of the implication that a second wrong
makes everything all right. Even if a person is completely hypocritical, though, this does
not mean that their advice is not sound and should not be followed.

Argumentum ad Misericordiam (Appeal to Pity) – this fallacy happens when a

person tries to win support for an argument or idea by exploiting his or her opponent’s
feelings pity or guilt. It is like a type of manipulation that uses emotion in place of reason
in order to attempt to win the argument.
Example: You should not find the defendant guilty of murder, since it would break his
poor mother’s heart to see him in jail.
Example: You need to pass me in this course, since I'll lose my scholarship if you don't."

Argumentum ad Baculum (Appeal to Force) – committed when a person appeals to

persuade by using force, threat, pressure or any other forms of intimidation that scares
them to bring acceptance or agreement with the argument.
Example: You have a friend who means a great deal to you and was desperately asking
you a favor to help him cheat on the exams and he says to you that, “If you won't help
him cheat during the exams, then he can't be your friend anymore.” This is an example
of appeal to force because of the threat of losing the friendship if you won’t help him
cheat.

Petitio Principii (Begging the Question) – occurs when an argument's premises

assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it. In other words, you assume
without proof the stand/position, or a significant part of the stand, that is in question.
Persuading people by the means of wording its premises.
Example: No one is permitted to use the gymnasium on weekends, since people are
permitted to use the gymnasium only on weekdays.
Arguing in Circle – occurs when the end of an argument comes back to the beginning
without having proven itself. It uses the conclusion as evidence to show that the
reasons for the very conclusion are true.
Example: You must obey the law, because it’s illegal to break the law. Murder is wrong
because killing another human is wrong. If you would observe the words and phrases
used to express the premises are synonymous with the words and phrases used to
express the conclusion. That is, the conclusion is merely a re-wording of the premises.
Question-Begging Language – occurs when you prematurely assume that a matter
that is or may be at issue has already been settled. In some cases, the listener is subtly
being begged to infer a particular conclusion although there are no good reasons that
are being presented by using slanted or loaded language.
Complex Question – committed when someone asks a question that presupposes
something that has not been proven or accepted by all the people involved. A question
that contains a controversial or unjustified assumption.
A complex question is simply a loaded question because it occurs when an apparently
single question is asked that really involves two or more questions. It was more like a
trick question because you’re trying to imply something.
Example: Have you stopped beating your wife? If you answer no, it will imply that you
are still continuing beating your wife and you are not a nice person. If you answer yes, it
will mean that you are admitting that you have beaten your wife in the past. The
question is complex because it is actually lumping two questions into one.
Leading Question – a leading question is one that suggests the answer desired by the
speaker. It is intended to lead people to answer questions in a specific way based on
how these questions are phrased which contain information that the form creator wants
to confirm rather than creating a question that tries to achieve a true, unfiltered answer.
Example: You were outside the country when the crime was committed, weren’t you? In
this case the defense lawyer is leading the witness by assuming whether the defendant
was in the country or outside the country when the crime happened in order to
encourage the witness to explain the circumstances regarding his/her whereabouts
when the crime was committed.

Fallacies of Insufficient Evidence

Argumentum ad Antiquum (Appeal to the Ages) – a fallacy in which something is
accepted as true or right because “it is always done that way.” Or has been done for a
very long time even if there is no evidence that a specific belief of course of action is
better.
Example: Gay marriage is wrong because marriage has always been between a man
and a woman. Another would be, I am a Catholic because our family have been
Catholic for generations and it carries on a family tradition.

Argumentum ad Verecundiam (Appeal to Inappropriate Authority) – this occurs

when someone uses the testimony of an authority or popular figure in order to warrant
their conclusion, but the authority or appealed to is not an expert or has no particular
expertise in the field in question.
Example: Marian Rivera, a celebrity is making an advertisement of her cooking using
the product Ginisa Mix.

Accident – occurs when someone applies a general rule to a case in which the rule is
inapplicable. It may be committed due to carelessness or because one has the
assumption that generalizations will apply to all similar situations, even though there are
clear exceptions.
Example: “Human beings have the ability to hear sounds. Therefore, all people are
capable of hearing sounds.” Such a claim is fallacious because the general rule doesn’t
apply here; the speaker ignores the fact that there are people who have a hearing
disability.

Hasty Generalization (Converse Accident) – when one makes hasty generalization or

assumptions, he applies a belief to a larger population or whole group based on the
information or sample that he has that is inadequate (usually because it is atypical or
just too small). It occurs when the writer takes a limited sampling to justify a broad
conclusion. Example: Stereotypes about people ("frat boys are drunkards," "grad
students are nerdy," etc.) are a common example of the principle underlying hasty
generalization. For example: "My roommate said her philosophy class was hard, and
the one I'm in is hard, too. All philosophy classes must be hard!" Two people's
experiences are, in this case, not enough on which to base a conclusion.

Argumentum ad Ignorantiam (Arguing from Ignorance) – concluding that something

is true simply since it has not been proved false or that is false simply because it has
not been proved true. In other words, it occurs when someone argues that something
must be either true or false because it hasn’t been proven to be one way or the other.
Example: "God must exist, since no one can demonstrate that she does not exist."
Example: Individuals that are accused of a crime in a court of law are not burdened with
proving themselves innocent against a charge that has not been proven. It is the
prosecutor who has the burden to prove the guilt of the accused. The prosecutor must
show beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty. It is not the responsibility
of the defendant to prove his own innocence. Usually, the burden of proof lies with the
one who is making the assertion. You can’t accuse your friend of stealing your iPhone
and then ask him to prove he didn’t do it. As the one making the allegation, the burden
rests with you to offer proof of the theft. By expecting your friend to prove himself
innocent, you are shifting the burden of proof, which generally rests on the person who
sets forth the claim.

False Dilemma – an argument that suggests or presents a choice between only two
possible alternatives, implying that there are no other options where in fact, many other
alternatives or options may exist. It was like “either this or that” language.
Example: I thought you were a good person, but you weren’t at church today. The
assumption here is that if one doesn't attend church, one must be bad. Of course, good
people exist who don’t go to church, and good church-going people could have had a
really good reason not to be in church.
Example: Which came first, the chicken or the egg?