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Wednesday, September 14, 2011

The Straw Man Argument



I'm posting this because it's good information for anyone anywhere in the world to know...

A note to Christians - this fallacy has been used both to defend our position and to criticize it. 

Let's be careful not to use it  - or fall for it!

 

Straw man

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Straw man argument)



A straw man is a component of an argument and is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "attack a straw man" is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by replacing it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the "straw man"), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.[1][2]

Origin

The origins of the term are unclear. One common (folk) etymology given is that it originated with men who stood outside courthouses with a straw in their shoe in order to indicate their willingness to be a false witness, but it is unlikely that individuals would publicly declare their willingness to commit a crime outside a courthouse.[3][4] Another more popular origin is a human figure made of straw, such as practice dummies used in military training. Such a dummy is supposed to represent the enemy, but it is considerably easier to attack because naturally, it neither moves nor fights back.

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In the UK, the adversary is sometimes called Aunt Sally, with reference to a traditional fairground game.

[edit]Reasoning

The straw man fallacy occurs in the following pattern of argument:

1.   Person A has position X.
2.   Person B disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y. Thus, Y is a resulting distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:

1. Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent's position.
2. Quoting an opponent's words out of context — i.e. choosing quotations that misrepresent the opponent's actual intentions (see fallacy of quoting out of context).[2]
3. Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender, then refuting that person's arguments — thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position (and thus the position itself) has been defeated.[1]
4. Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs which are then criticized, implying that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.
5. Oversimplifying an opponent's argument, then attacking this oversimplified version.

3.   Person B attacks position Y, concluding that X is false/incorrect/flawed.
This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious, because attacking a distorted version of a position fails to constitute an attack on the actual position.

[edit]Examples

Straw man arguments often arise in public debates such as a (hypothetical) prohibition debate:
Person A: We should liberalize the laws on beer.
Person B: No, any society with unrestricted access to intoxicants loses its work ethic and goes only for immediate gratification.
The proposal was to relax laws on beer. Person B has exaggerated this to a position harder to defend, i.e., "unrestricted access to intoxicants".[1] It is a logical fallacy because Person A never made that claim. This example is also a slippery slope fallacy.
Another example:
Person A: Our society should spend more money helping the poor.
Person B: Studies show that handouts don't work; they just create more poverty and humiliate the recipients. That money could be better spent.
In this case, Person B has transformed Person A's position from "more money" to "more handouts", which is easier for Person B to defeat.

[edit]See also

§         List of fallacies
§         Ad hominem
§         Cherry picking (fallacy)
§         Straw man proposal
§         Straw man (law)
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