The hardest fallacies to spot are those that lead to a conclusion with which we agree. No scientist would disagree with Bauer’s [1994] conclusion that personal ethical responsibility is essential. And yet, his argument is fallacious: we may value the innate checks-and-balances of the scientific method, but no scientist responds by abdicating personal ethics. Between premise and conclusion, the argument has gone astray -- in this case by misrepresenting the relationship between scientist and scientific method. This straw man fallacy is one of several ways in which the link between premises and conclusion may be fallacious.
- Missing the point is basing a conclusion on an argument in which the premises actually lead to a quite different conclusion. Like red herring, much of the argument in missing the point is valid but only appears to lead toward the conclusion. Red herring, however, is often deliberate whereas missing the point is accidental. The fallacy is detectable by deciding what conclusion is actually warranted from the premises, then comparing this valid conclusion to that drawn by the arguer.
“Hypothesis A fails these two tests, and consequently hypothesis B is the best explanation.”
- Overinterpreting is the attempt to claim a firm conclusion although one or more premises is quite uncertain. The fallacy is in asserting a definite, deductive conclusion:
“Scientists have tried for years to refute this hypothesis and have failed. Thus the hypothesis must be true.”
In contrast, the following somewhat similar argument is valid, because it properly considers the evidence as inductive:
“Many attempts to find N rays have failed, although N rays should be detectable by these tests. Therefore N rays probably do not exist.”
- Begging the question is an argument in which the logic may be valid, but a dubious premise is either propped up by the conclusion or is ignored entirely. This term is used to describe two different fallacies: ignored dubious premise and circular reasoning.
An ignored dubious premise, omitted from but essential to an argument, is a common pitfall. Ignoring a premise is reminiscent of but more extreme than the fallacy of suppressed evidence. This fallacy is one of the most serious pitfalls of scientific research, for three reasons. First, everyone is better at noticing characteristics of observed features than at noticing that something is missing. Second, once a premise is overlooked, it will be harder for anyone else to recall. Third, most occurrences of this fallacy could be avoided, if the researcher would just list the premises. Too often, scientists fail to ask themselves what their premises are, or they think about the answers superficially but fail to write them down systematically.
“You need a different kind of instrument, because the one you have broke down.” The dubious premise is that a different type of instrument will not break down.
Circular reasoning is an argument in which the conclusion and premises seem to support each other, but actually they say virtually the same thing in two different ways. The logic is valid if trivial (A, ∴A), yet the repetition lends the illusion of strengthening the conclusion.
“It is obvious that the instrument is not working reliably because it gives anomalous results. These results must be wrong because the instrument malfunctioned.”
