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[Code of Intellectual Conduct]:
5. The Principle of Charity If a participant’s argument is reformulated by an opponent, it should be carefully expressed in its strongest possible version that is consistent with what is believed to be the original intention of the arguer. If there is any question about that intention or about any implicit part of the argument, the arguer should be given the benefit of any doubt in the reformulation and/or, when possible, given the opportunity to amend it.
10. The Rebuttal Principle: One who presents an argument for or against a position should include in the argument an effective rebuttal to all anticipated serious criticisms of the argument that may be brought against it or against the position it supports.
[The Clarity Principle:] The formulations of all positions, defenses, and attacks should be free of any kind of linguistic confusion and clearly separated from other positions and issues. Any successful discussion of an issue must be carried on in language that all the parties involved can understand. Even if what we have to say is perfectly clear to ourselves, others may not be able to understand us. A position or a criticism of it that is expressed in confusing, vague, ambiguous, or contradictory language will not reach those toward whom it is directed, and it will contribute little to resolving the issue at hand.
Most reasonably clever people can devise what appears to be a good argument for whatever it is that they believe or want us to believe. For example, virtually every jury in a criminal trial is impressed by the quality of the prosecutor’s argument. If that were the only argument heard, nearly all juries would convict the accused. It is the defense attorney’s rebuttal and the prosecutor’s response to that rebuttal that give the jury the whole picture and the proper basis for decision.
Fallacy of the Mean Definition: Assuming that the moderate or middle view between two extremes must be the best or right one simply because it is the middle view. Another name for this bit of faulty thinking is the fallacy of moderation. It is often assumed—indeed, it is unfortunately a part of our conventional wisdom—that a position on an issue that is somewhere in the middle is always the best simply because it is in the middle. However, the fact that a particular position is the moderate one has nothing to do with its worth. Even though in some situations, a moderate view may in fact be the best or most justifiable position to take, in many other situations, the so-called extreme or radical solution to a problem is the most defensible one. In any case, a premise that embodies the unwarranted assumption that the middle position is always the best one is an unacceptable premise and can disqualify as a good argument any argument in which it appears. It should perhaps be pointed out that sometimes a compromise may be the only practical way to resolve some difficult situations. For example, a compromise may prevent continued economic deprivation, bloodshed, or mental anguish. Even though it is not a fallacy to compromise in order to settle such disputes, it is a fallacy to conclude that a compromise solution is the most defensible one simply because it is the compromise solution.
Related Study:
Attacking Faulty Reasoning by Wikipedia
Attacking Faulty Reasoning is a textbook on logical fallacies by T. Edward Damer that has been used for many years in a number of college courses on logic, critical thinking, argumentation, and philosophy. It explains 60 of the most commonly committed fallacies. Each of the fallacies is concisely defined and illustrated with several relevant examples. For each fallacy, the text gives suggestions about how to address or to “attack” the fallacy when it is encountered. The organization of the fallacies comes from the author’s own fallacy theory, which defines a fallacy as a violation of one of the five criteria of a good argument:
- the argument must be structurally well-formed;
- the premises must be relevant;
- the premises must be acceptable;
- the premises must be sufficient in number, weight, and kind;
- there must be an effective rebuttal of challenges to the argument.
Each fallacy falls into at least one of Damer’s five fallacy categories, which derive from the above criteria.
The five fallacy categories
- Fallacies that violate the structural criterion. The structural criterion requires that one who argues for or against a position should use an argument that meets the fundamental structural requirements of a well-formed argument, using premises that are compatible with one another, that do not contradict the conclusion, that do not assume the truth of the conclusion, and that are not involved in any faulty deductive inference. Fallacies such as begging the question, denying the antecedent, or undistributed middle violate this criterion.
- Fallacies that violate the relevance criterion. The relevance criterion requires that one who presents an argument for or against a position should attempt to set forth only reasons that are directly related to the merit of the position at issue. Fallacies such as appeal to tradition, appeal to force, or genetic fallacy fail to meet the argumentative demands of relevance.
- Fallacies that violate the acceptability criterion. The acceptability criterion requires that one who presents an argument for or against a position should attempt to use reasons that are likely to be accepted by a rationally mature person and that meet the standard criteria of acceptability. Fallacies such as equivocation, fallacy of division, and wishful thinking are unacceptable because they are based on linguistic confusion or involve unacceptable assumptions.
- Fallacies that violate the sufficiency criterion. The sufficiency criterion requires that one who presents an argument for or against a position should attempt to provide reasons that are sufficient in number, kind, and weight to support the acceptance of the conclusion. Fallacies such as argument from ignorance, special pleading, and the post hoc fallacy violate this criterion because they are arguments that are missing important evidence or make causal assumptions based on insufficient evidence.
- Fallacies that violate the rebuttal criterion. The rebuttal criterion requires that one who presents an argument for or against a position should attempt to provide an effective rebuttal to all serious challenges to the argument or the position it supports and to the strongest arguments for viable alternative positions. Fallacies such as red herring, straw man, and poisoning the well fail to meet this criterion because they attack the arguer rather than the argument or use argumentative devices that divert attention away from the issue at stake.
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