Critical Thinking in Ethics: A Review of Philosophical Fallacies - Term Paper Example

Critical Thinking in Ethics: A Review of Philosophical Fallacies I. Introduction Philosophers may be equipped with compelling and logically perfect arguments and yet linger on completely sightless to meaningful potentialities whose philosophical relevance is huge. Philosophical fallacies may also include physical or psychical occurrences in addition to their purposes and importance. Some completely reliable arguments should be taken into account as fallacious. Whether in an argumentative or logical manner, such arguments are judged perfect or satisfactory. Thus, in this regard, fallacious arguments should not be bad ones. But, they have greatly deceived philosophers through closing their eyes to understand and see profoundly into critical philosophical concerns (Heal 2003). The question is what makes philosophers sightless in spite of their justifiable, logically perfect, or even overpowering arguments? Critical philosophy has remarkably contributed to people’s philosophical thinking. Excellent critical arguments have affected people’s thinking significantly in every philosophical domain. In the name of the splendid tradition, disputably commencing with the Socratic Method, critical philosophy has opened people’s eyes to understand, realize and expand countless philosophical potentialities of high importance. Primarily, critical philosophy has provided people with outstanding arguments in addition to the delicate means to validate the reliability and logic of arguments of any kind. However, as H.D. Price intensely demonstrated previously in the 1940s that clarity is not sufficient and as well as to obvious and intelligent arguments people to a great extent demand much more. Arguments are inevitable but on no account adequate instruments for philosophers (Gilead 2004). There are several enlightening instances of philosophical fallacies which takes place in spite of logically perfect arguments. Philosophical fallacies are a separation or dissociation not from concrete reality or facts as such but primarily from the essentiality or purposes of actual reality or facts with regard to the arguments that discard their actual existence. The competence of incorporating the explanation of the discarded realities or observable facts into the arguments removes these arguments from fallacies. Insights are required to attain that involvement, for such involvement initially demands realization why such fallacies occur and why some philosophers have not considered them as fallacies at all (ibid). Recognizing, particularly a profound realization, necessitates insight. On the contrary, those who depend simply on their arguments as opposed to other philosophical standpoints easily identify the defects in these perspectives without seeing or recognizing the causes, a number of which may be extremely deep, resulting in or serving as the foundation for establishing these perspectives. To disprove idealism, for example, one has to recognize idealism profoundly. The Eleatics had brilliant philosophical justifications to omit plurality, modification and movement as being simply fallacies, but they had no actual recognition of the perspectives that regarded them inevitably or undeniably real (Brossmann 2006). The argument of this discussion is that people frequently do not behave in manners that are logical; inappropriate reasons affect how people think. This is important to understand since knowledge of how people evaluate arguments can facilitate people improve their own thinking and to convince others, a subject matter to be taken into account next. Illogical reasoning strategies used for the objective of persuasion are referred to as fallacies. Fallacies are violation one or more standard for logical arguments, the premises are improper, or the premises are irrelevant to the conclusion or conflicting, or the specialist is not reliable, or significant information is lacking (Halpern 1996). It is not probable to enumerate every fallacy that has been applied to modify how people think. The list would be extremely long to be helpful, with only slight dissimilarities among a number of the strategies. Accordingly, simply the most general and representative strategies are discussed. II. Popularity and Testimonials The popularity strategy, also referred to as the bandwagon, depends on the need for obedience for its persuasive influence. It is persuasive since it clarifies that every person supports a perspective or purchase a particular goods or services. It is anticipated that the message receivers will assume the belief or purchase the product so as to feel as if he/she is part of the groups specified. Utterly, the premise is, “if everyone is doing it, it must be right” (Halpern 1996, 194). A variation of the popularity strategy is testimonials. Admired politicians or movie icons endorse a virtue or product. It is assumed that people will desire to resemble the personalities they worship; hence they will prefer to use similar facial wash or body soap or advocate the same principles. The receivers of testimonials are expected to conclude from the information aforementioned (ibid). It is anticipated that they will justify within these contexts. Occasionally, nevertheless, the popularity strategy and testimonials can be reasonable persuasive strategies. If, for instance, all of the members of an impartial professional panel designed to investigate the effects of a medicinal drug judge that it is unsafe, I would regard this information significant to the concern of the drug’s safety since it passes the drug screening. Likewise, if a renowned educator promotes a reading textbook, this might appropriately have a great influence on people’s assessment of the textbook. Both of these situations presume that the professionals have no individual interests for their promotions, specifically, they are not being compensated for stating these things and their specialization is significant to the status or product that they are endorsing. In this instance, they are trustworthy sources of information (Hoemlae 1952). III. Straw Person A straw person is feeble and easy to defeat. With a straw person argument, an extremely pathetic kind of an adversary’s argument is established and then knocked down. It takes place when as adversary to a specific conclusion misrepresents the argument in sustenance of the conclusion and replaces one that is far weaker (Heal 2003). Yet again, an instance is possibly the paramount way to characterize this type of fallacy. In a discussion on the concern whether learners should be assessing their mentors, one adversary to this idea provided this straw person argument; that student’s assessment of their teachers should be considered in decisions about which teachers should be promoted. Further, the student said that he/she doesn’t think that the judgments as to which teachers should be elevated in status should be decided by the students (Halpern 1996, 198). Observe how the initial argument says that student assessment should be integrated in the decision-making procedure was shifted to the opinion that students should not be judging which teachers get promoted (ibid, 198). The initial argument was for student assessment to be fraction of the measure applied in the decision-making procedure. This is not similar to having students set up the decision. In its modified form, the argument is more trouble-free to knock down, akin to a straw person. IV. Knowing the Unknowable In some occasions people are provided information that is unknowable. This is the fallacy of knowing the unknowable. For instance, you read in the journals that we should improve the population of the police force since the rate of undisclosed sexual harassments has mounted drastically. A little distress should come out when you interpret this: How can anyone know about the rate of undisclosed sexual harassments? I don’t suspect that numerous sexual harassments are not reported to the police or that this is an issue of primary importance. What is at question is the fluctuation in the rate when the real number is impossible to know (Halpern 1996). There are countless instances when sources provide accurate statistics when such statistics are not probable. Child molestation is another instance. This is a heartbreaking and significant concern for any society to come to grips with, but calculations about the population of children victimized can by no means be precise since much of it is unidentified. Specialist can attempt to estimate from the figures of child molestation cases that are dealt with in the social service offices or that proceed to court, but there are no satisfactory techniques of converting these disclosed statistics to undisclosed cases. An elevation in the number of cases of child rape or molestation may be because of improved awareness and education regarding these wrongdoings. An increase in reported cases could be linked with a boost, reduction, or constancy in undisclosed cases (ibid). There is no means people can know the unknowable. V. Conclusion Arguments may force an individual to approve of, recognize, or decline some perspective, but they cannot make that individual perceive or appreciate anything from this or that perspective. People should take on or select a perspective from which they are capable to perceive, understand, and realize something. Nothing, aside from arguments, can make or force them to perceive, understand, or realize something from their own perspective. People may make use of arguments to show another person, for example, that something must be in error in his manner of arguing or accomplishing something, as arguments may unveil conflicts and irregularities in arguing or accomplishing (Gilead 2005). Such arguments may summon his attention to these conflicts and irregularities, but they cannot make him perceive, realize ore understand what he accomplishes or says implies, for example, self-deceit. To fulfill this, he demands insight or realization. No argument can make him understand what is the purpose or relevance of his argument or accomplishing something. We perceive, yet again, that meanings are quite associated with insight and realization, and by no means on arguments. Works Cited Brossmann, Brent. "Fallacies and Argument Appraisal." Argumentation and Advocacy (2006): 95+. Gilead, Amihud. "Philosophical Blindness: Between Arguments and Insights." The Review of Metaphysics (2005): 147+. Halpern, Diane F. Thought and Knowledge: An Introduction to Critical Thinking. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1996. Heal, Jane. Mind, Reason, and Imaginatin: Selected Essays in Philosophy of Mind and Language. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Hoemlae, Reinhold Friedrich. Studies in Philosophy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1952. Read More