swansont Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 A premise is offered, and then an argument follows without establishing the veracity of the premise. If the premise is false the conclusion is invalid, but the poster is proceeding as if it were true. Such as an argument based on the moon being made of cheese, and concluding the moon landings were faked because they would have noticed the cheese if they’d landed there. (the conclusion is not being used to support the premise, so it’s not begging the question/circular logic) Seems like this happens a fair amount, and it’s a failure of logic, but is there a recognized name for it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iNow Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 Fallacy of unwarranted assumption https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781119165811.ch100 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted September 28 Author Share Posted September 28 Thank you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheVat Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 Have heard something similar called a false premise fallacy. But unwarranted assumption would cover a wider swath, including both false premises and also premises that are unsupported, ergo not established as true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
studiot Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 2 hours ago, swansont said: A premise is offered, and then an argument follows without establishing the veracity of the premise. If the premise is false the conclusion is invalid, but the poster is proceeding as if it were true. Such as an argument based on the moon being made of cheese, and concluding the moon landings were faked because they would have noticed the cheese if they’d landed there. (the conclusion is not being used to support the premise, so it’s not begging the question/circular logic) Seems like this happens a fair amount, and it’s a failure of logic, but is there a recognized name for it? In my experience most problems arise when combinations of statements are made, the results depend upon the connective employed. Here is a good set of truth tables for first order logic about this. A disjunction of a false statement (premise) with a true statement has a truth value of true. https://docs.oracle.com/html/E79061_01/Content/Reference/Truth_tables.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iNow Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 2 hours ago, swansont said: Thank you Sometimes is simplified as an assumption fallacy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted September 28 Author Share Posted September 28 18 minutes ago, studiot said: In my experience most problems arise when combinations of statements are made, the results depend upon the connective employed. Here is a good set of truth tables for first order logic about this. A disjunction of a false statement (premise) with a true statement has a truth value of true. https://docs.oracle.com/html/E79061_01/Content/Reference/Truth_tables.htm It’s true that there are these issues, and also conditionals cause problems with some, but the examples I’m thinking of look to be simple false/unwarranted assumptions. But the wonderful world of search engines employing AI kept pointing me to begging the question, which isn’t it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StringJunky Posted September 28 Share Posted September 28 3 hours ago, TheVat said: Have heard something similar called a false premise fallacy. But unwarranted assumption would cover a wider swath, including both false premises and also premises that are unsupported, ergo not established as true. 'False premise' is what I call it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dimreepr Posted September 29 Share Posted September 29 16 hours ago, swansont said: A premise is offered, and then an argument follows without establishing the veracity of the premise. If the premise is false the conclusion is invalid, but the poster is proceeding as if it were true. Such as an argument based on the moon being made of cheese, and concluding the moon landings were faked because they would have noticed the cheese if they’d landed there. (the conclusion is not being used to support the premise, so it’s not begging the question/circular logic) Seems like this happens a fair amount, and it’s a failure of logic, but is there a recognized name for it? Philosophically speaking, language's can be misinterpreted, maybe the premise offered is valid, even when both appear to be speaking the same language, the smallest nuance can be the switch between the truths. If memory serves, it a Wittgenstein type question. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted September 29 Author Share Posted September 29 1 hour ago, dimreepr said: Philosophically speaking, language's can be misinterpreted, maybe the premise offered is valid, even when both appear to be speaking the same language, the smallest nuance can be the switch between the truths. If memory serves, it a Wittgenstein type question. Maybe it is, but that’s not the point of contention here. The issue is that it’s unsupported. Nothing offered to show that it’s true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sethoflagos Posted September 29 Share Posted September 29 19 hours ago, swansont said: Seems like this happens a fair amount, and it’s a failure of logic, but is there a recognized name for it? Is it truly a failure of logic? Bad arguments based on false premises can still be logically flawless. We get a bit challenged in our definitions when assuming all arguments are presented in good faith. Sometimes they are not. The problems can lie in ethos or pathos rather than logos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted September 29 Author Share Posted September 29 1 hour ago, sethoflagos said: Is it truly a failure of logic? Bad arguments based on false premises can still be logically flawless. The subsequent steps could be flawless, but not the premise if it's false. i.e. the failure is thinking the conclusion is valid. 1 hour ago, sethoflagos said: We get a bit challenged in our definitions when assuming all arguments are presented in good faith. Sometimes they are not. The problems can lie in ethos or pathos rather than logos. It's an informal fallacy; the conclusion is invalid if the premise is false, and the burden of proof is on the presenter. They own the obligation to ensure the premise is true, so if there is a question, their argument is incomplete. I don't think it's necessarily an issue of good faith or not. I just wanted to know what to call it when it comes up. No need to debunk such an argument until the premise has been verified. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eise Posted September 30 Share Posted September 30 Maybe this distinction can help others to clarify what you want to say to them: the difference between a valid argument and a sound argument: Quote A deductive argument is said to be valid if and only if it takes a form that makes it impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion nevertheless to be false. Otherwise, a deductive argument is said to be invalid. A deductive argument is sound if and only if it is both valid, and all of its premises are actually true. Otherwise, a deductive argument is unsound. From here. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
studiot Posted September 30 Share Posted September 30 40 minutes ago, Eise said: Maybe this distinction can help others to clarify what you want to say to them: the difference between a valid argument and a sound argument: From here. Thank you for this link. Quite a good presentation. I do note however, that the examples given are examples of what I was talking about, namely fallacies that arise from combinations of premises. swansont has already pointed out that he specified a single premise only. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dimreepr Posted September 30 Share Posted September 30 22 hours ago, swansont said: Maybe it is, but that’s not the point of contention here. The issue is that it’s unsupported. Nothing offered to show that it’s true. It's still basically the same question, in that nothing offered that you consider to be true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swansont Posted September 30 Author Share Posted September 30 4 hours ago, studiot said: Thank you for this link. Quite a good presentation. I do note however, that the examples given are examples of what I was talking about, namely fallacies that arise from combinations of premises. swansont has already pointed out that he specified a single premise only. Your previous objection, as I read it, was that it was how the combination was connected - “and” vs “or” - and that’s not the issue. It’s the dubious veracity of a premise, like in the example “all toasters are made of gold” * More than one premise could be false, but that’s irrelevant. You can’t assert the conclusion is true until the dubious premise is confirmed. The link calls the toasters example a a valid argument but not a sound argument. My wording was that the conclusion was invalid, i.e. the truth value is still in question. *all toasters contain 6 oz of gold 6 oz of gold is worth at least $10,000 Therefore, all toasters are worth at least $10,000 One premise is of dubious veracity. There is no connection confusion. The conclusion can’t be offered as being true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
studiot Posted September 30 Share Posted September 30 3 hours ago, swansont said: Your previous objection, ... That wasn't an objection that was an attempt to supply additional information. If there is more than one premise either the premises are totally independent from each other or they are not. This has a bearing on the deductive process. All I was offering was a link to some well presented tables tabulating possibilities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sethoflagos Posted September 30 Share Posted September 30 9 hours ago, Eise said: Maybe this distinction can help others to clarify what you want to say to them: the difference between a valid argument and a sound argument: From here. Thank you, yes. That's the distinction I was attempting to refer to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MSC Posted 54 minutes ago Share Posted 54 minutes ago On 9/28/2024 at 3:15 PM, iNow said: Fallacy of unwarranted assumption https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781119165811.ch100 So this is why I hate when other philosophers say "we need to make some baseline assumptions in order to..." Or something similar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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