Fallacies

Everyday we encounter arguments in many different places. It could be at work, home, at a gas station, while driving in the freeway, or even just by watching television. Most arguments we hear or take part in are "sound and convincing" but some arguments have logical fallacies or having mistakes in their reasoning. There are many types of logical fallacies that are common and frequently committed which sometimes are used to "psychologically" persuade the reader or viewer. Examples of these common logical fallacies are: the Look Who's Talking fallacy, the Two Wrongs Make a Right fallacy, and the Appeal to Force fallacy. Although there are many more, the three aforementioned are the ones I feel we encounter more often and have the ability to persuade us to make decisions to go the arguer's way.

The Look Who's Talking fallacy is probably the most common and widely used. This fallacy is committed when the arguer "rejects another person's argument or claim because that person fails to practice what he or she preaches". I used this fallacy as the basis of all of my arguments with my parents through my teenage life. Most parents preach to their children on not smoking, not doing drugs, no ditching from school or cutting classes, and most importantly for me as a girl, it was no sex at all before marriage. Growing up, I've always been very attentive to my parent's conversations and was able to retain information that I used against them later in my teenage years. Although it may sound quiet terrible of me to do so, it has actually helped me with the decisions I have to make now being a parent myself.

Our dad used to tell my sisters and I not to smoke then turn around and smoke half a pack of cigarettes a day. My sisters and I knew that he was one of the worst students in high school from our grandparent's stories. He used to cut classes and not do well in tests, and even fought in school. Although, my sisters and I had no desire to smoke cigarettes or cut classes, we certainly used the Look Who's Talking fallacy argument when we would get a lecture from him. Out of respect, of course, we would not use all of the arguments all at once. Sometimes it worked for our advantage and sometimes it did not. I used this particular fallacy when I was caught ditching on Senior Ditch day, but did not win my argument and was grounded for 2 weeks.

A closely related fallacy to the Look Who's Talking fallacy is the Two Wrongs Make a Right fallacy. This fallacy occurs when "an arguer attempts to justify a wrongful act by claiming that some other act is just as bad or worse". The most popular example for this type of fallacy is the scandal concerning our former President Clinton and an intern, Monica Lewinsky. When this scandal was publicized, the magazines, newspapers, Internet, television, and even classrooms were littered with information, opinions, and attacks on the former President. Many Clinton supporters argued that