Introduction to Logic Test 02

1) Fallacies are called “informal” because they are applicable to all kinds of reasoning, no matter what the particular form of the reasoning (inductive or deductive).

2) The literal Latin translation of argumentum ad verecundiam is:

3) According to Dr. Peikoff: In most cases where you rely on experts, you cannot claim to be absolutely certain that what he is saying is true.

4) If you have never been to China, then you are committing verecundiam to accept the existence of China because you’ve never been there.

5) The attempt to use “prestige jargon” to intimidate others into accepting one’s view is an indirect form of verecundiam.

6) Argumentum ad baculum is also known as: 

7) Argumentum ad hominem is also known as: 

8) Tu quoque means: 

9) When someone tries to refute someone’s belief, not by showing that it is objectively false, but by appealing to another (contradictory) belief of held by that same individual, he is committing:  

10) Identify the fallacy: “I can’t bear to believe there will be a dictatorship in America, therefore there won’t be one”  

11) Fill in the blank: The classic example of the _______________ fallacy is, the rabble-rouser or the demagogue, who tries to inflame his audience’s emotions by playing on their prejudices, whipping them up into a frenzy, counting on them to abandon logic and thought and argument, in the heat of the unleashed passions of the moment.

12) Identify the name of this fallacy: An employee asks for a raise, not on the grounds of the quality of his work, the value of his product, factual considerations of that kind, but because he has three children that depend on him, they all have polio, and his mother-in-law was just run over.

13) It is impossible to disprove an arbitrary assertion that something exists.

14) This fallacy claims: because you cannot disprove an arbitrary positive; it must be true.

15) ____________ is the fallacy of using or assuming the point you are trying to prove as part of your proof.

16) Identify the name of this fallacy: Your arguments against Red China’s system of government are completely worthless, because you haven’t even been there. 

17) Identify the name of this fallacy:

Long hair is superior to short hair, as proved by the consensus of distinguished youth leaders.

How do you determine who is a distinguished youth leader?

That’s easy. They all have long hair.

18) Identify the name of this fallacy: Until you are omniscient about yourself, you cannot know for sure whether or not some part of your motivation, presently unknown to you, is basically evil. For the present, you have no proof on this point either way. You must, therefore admit that it is possible that you are, to some extent, basically evil. 

19) Identify the name of this fallacy: My friends, the only cure for the present energy crisis is the nationalization of all oil and coal companies. Once and for all, we must put an end to the diabolical conspiracy of the profit-mad, power-lusting vultures of Big Business. Don’t let the tycoons warp their slimy tentacles around our nation’s economy, and squeeze it dry for their own aggrandizement. Don’t let them sink their blood-drenched claws into the helpless, exposed flesh of the American people. 

20) Identify the name of this fallacy: “Every person acts at every moment to achieve the maximum personal pleasure. That is the sole human motivation.”
“What about Mr. X? He just went into the desert for 10 years to mortify the flesh and lie on a bed of nails.” 
“That’s no argument against me. That’s his way of achieving personal pleasure.”
“How do you know that that’s his way of achieving pleasure?”
“Well, it’ s obvious. After all, every person acts at every moment to achieve the maximum personal pleasure. That is the sole human motivation.”

21) Identify the four sub-forms of Petitio Principii covered by Dr. Peikoff: 

22) Paradox is simply another term for a contradiction.

23) The belief in God synonymous with mysticism.

24) Dr. Peikoff claims that if your senses are not completely, 100% valid, then you have no basis whatever in which to say that you are conscious of anything.

25) Dr. Peikoff makes no distinction between proof and validation.