When Logical Fallacies Do Not Fall

Logical fallacies are considered problems in reasoning, but the driving forces behind them are the mental shortcuts we use for cognition.

Our thinking systems

We have two thinking modes, by instinct and by logic.

Logic

It is our thinking system for reasoning, which preserves truth in the thinking process. However, to ensure the accuracy of ideas, this system is running slowly, which cannot suit our need for thinking. As it is a newly evolved system, we do not primarily rely on it and are also not fully specialized in using this system.

Instinct

Instinct is our primary thinking system, which has been tuned in the long period of evolution. It works in the way of modelling, which our brain analyzes the external environment extract features associated with them, which may not true and will be updated by future experiences.

The nature of logical fallacies

Logical fallacies arise when we use our instinct for logic, which makes reasoning no longer truth-preserving, so they serve as insights into how our instinct works.

How different logical fallacies work for us

Post hoc

It is the conclusion that if A happens before B, A is the cause of B, which is not always true. However, the time sequence of A before serves as the sign of cause-and-effect, as the effect always come after the cause, although the length of the time lag may varies.

False implication
The fallacy of false implication occurs when a statement, which may be clear and even true, implies that something else is true or false when it isn’t.

For example, a package of Carnation Breakfast Bars asserts that the product inside provides 25% of the daily-recommended amount of protein, if taken with a glass of milk. What the package does not tell you is that almost all of the protein is provided by the milk.

However, our world is highly interconnected, everything is having a cause-and-effect relationship with others, although the length of the cause-and-effect chain varies. The world is complex, so our instinct simplifies the long chain of cause and effect into a single chain of initial cause and final effect.

In the above example, consuming that product does provide us 25% of the daily-recommended amount of protein, although not in our expected way, and we may not be able to recognize that.

Slippery slope

It is the implication that an event happening causes a chain of undesirable events, which is not always true.

However, it shows the underlying mechanisms of our world, which is positive feedback and negative feedback.

In the positive feedback mechanism, if an event happen, it creates more events that create even more, generating a snowball effect.

In the negative feedback mechanism, if an event happen, it will be balanced by an opposing event to restore the balance of the system.

Our world runs with a mechanism in a mix between the two, so the effect of positive and negative feedback may cancel each other, making slippery slope invalid.

False dilemma

It is the limiting of choices which potentially excludes suitable answers, so it is not preferred.

However, it is a strategy developed by our instinct for decision making. If there are too many choices, our brain does not have the ability to evaluate them one by one, which disables us from making a good choice, as proved by research finding that participants make better decision within a smaller number of choices, since they do not select the one they found the best when viewed individually in a large number of choices.

Thus, by setting a threshold for evaluating decisions, only those valuable choices will be kept and evaluated one by one.

The gambler’s’ fallacy

It is the belief that past outcomes affect future outcomes, which is not always valid.

The famous example is the flipping of coin, which is supposed to depend on the probability instead of past outcomes.

However, in reality, coins are not perfectly made, it may be heavier on one side and affect the outcomes of flipping. Research found that the probability of the lighter side is 51%, slightly higher than the expected 50%.

This slight difference will be shown as there are more outcomes to confirm it, so past outcomes does implies future outcomes.

In this interconnected world, since future outcomes follow the same path with past outcomes, studying the past predicts the future.

Appeal to novelty

It is the conclusion that something is better if it is new, which is not always true.

However, the underlying assumption is that we are having a better perception of our world as time passes, which is a reasonable suggestion.
Our development is incremental, past achievements act as the foundation for future innovations, so new technologies are always better than the previous ones in a macroscopic view.

The only problem is that when viewed microscopically, not all innovations are successful and they may not pass the test of time.

Tu quoque
It is the implication that a statement is false if promoters of something failed to follow it, which is not always true, as the promoters may not do it due to personal constraints but realize the problem of it.

However, as words are the representation of our mind, if we truly believe something, we should be also doing it, otherwise we are just knowing something.

Thus, although there are promoters who truly recognize something and promote them but do not do it, we prioritize those who both say it and do it.

Ad hominen
It is the rejection of a statement by disapproval at the person, which is not always reasonable.

However, the underlying reason we are doing that is the consistency of our mind. Our knowledge grows by absorbing and linking relevant ideas to us, which cannot grow far beyond our knowledge circle.

The credibility of a statement will be doubted if the person is not expected to have any contact with related knowledge in the knowledge circle, so we prioritize experts in the field instead of a normal person, unless they show talents we do not expect.

Irrelevant appeal
Irrelevant appeals attempt to sway the listener with information that, though persuasive, is irrelevant to the matter at hand.

However, in this interconnected world, nothing is truly irrelevant, statements far away from the topic may be proved useful.

For example, sometimes a field simply grows with the borrowing of achievements from other fields.

Guilt by association
An association fallacy is an informal inductive fallacy of the hasty-generalization or red-herring type and which asserts, by irrelevant association and often by appeal to emotion, that qualities of one thing are inherently qualities of another.
However, the method of tagging works to give us an initial approximation of others, with improved accuracy by using multiple tags, and it is our responsibility to validate and update our impression of others.

Appeal to tradition
Appeal to tradition (also known as argumentum ad antiquitatem,[1] appeal to antiquity, or appeal to common practice) is a common fallacy in which a thesis is deemed correct on the basis that it is correlated with some past or present tradition. The appeal takes the form of “this is right because we’ve always done it this way.”

It is the oppose to the appeal of novelty, although it has a different meaning.

In the test of time, only valuable practices remains, since practices are constantly replaced by better ones.

It is only a problem when a new practice is better than the old one but the inertia of tradition prevents the replacement.

Conclusion

The problem of logical fallacies is that it does not differentiate between instinct and logic, but it shows how our instinct works.