Wikipedia: Logical fallacy/Talk

Is this what a 'straw man' is? I've always been told that it is giving your opponents worst argument so that you can defeat it easily, hence, "setting up a straw man" refers to the act of choosing the worst argument. Hmm. --MichaelTinkler

I don't see the distinction between what the entry says and what you just said. I'm coming to suspect that I must be dense, though. :-) --KQ

I think the distinction is that Michael's taking about actively messing someone's mind, whereas the article is passive: the person believes the fallacy... and also, Michael refers to the opponents true argument, not someone elses...

Maybe. [Dave McKee?]

For "straw man", perhaps in place of

: A logical fallacy in which a person misattributes a position to a person who does not hold it and then refutes it, therefore, to the unperceptive, proving the person "wrong."

the following would be more accurate

: A logical fallacy in which an advocate presents an argument for the opposing position which is invalid and then refutes it, seeming, to the unperceptive, to prove the opposing position "wrong."

Right, but I thought the misattribution was part of it: that, regardless of whether the argument is invalid, it also had to be one that the person did not hold. Else why would it be a logical fallicy to prove an invalid argument invalid?

yep, I think that straw men are not logical fallacies but rhetorical tactics. They are distortions, but not untruths - your opponent holds the position, but you are caricaturing it.

Well, as far as I can tell, in most cases the Straw Man fallacy refers generally to the practice of refuting weaker arguments than your opponents actually offer. The terminology is based on a combat metaphor -- instead of grappling with your opponent's real arguments, you set up a straw man which is easier to knock down.

This can be done in a number of ways:

By presenting one of your opponent's lesser arguments then refuting it and then going on as if you've refuted her whole argument.
By presenting a modified version of your opponents argument which is weaker than their real argument and then treating the refutation of the weaker argument as a refutation of her real argument.
By presenting an poor defender of a position as the defender of that position and then defeating her arguments, and acting as tha that were a refutation of the position.

I suppose some folks might want to limit the use of "straw man" to only one of the above situations, but I don't think we should treat these special cases as the standard. All of the above situations are commonly referred to as "setting up a straw man" and I think we should follow common use. I also think that common use allows for unintentionally setting up a straw man, by accidentally misrepresenting your opponent's argument. -- Mark Christensen

My (old, battered) logic textbook does indeed refer to it as only #2 above. But we should concede to common usage, I suppose, though perhaps with some caveat about whichever sense is most commonly strictly in the study of logic. --KQ

Of course it is not a fallacy to prove an invalid argument invalid. It is a fallacy to believe that doing so disproves the conclusion of the invalid argument.

I'll modify my above description to mention that some logic books treat the second case as the definitive, and to make clear that the fallacy is not the refutation of a week argument, but treating the refutation of the week argument as a refutation for all the arguments for that position. Then I'll replace the current page. There's far more information about the straw man fallacy here, than there is on the original page. --Mark Christensen

Is "master dixit" really correct? I would have thought the Latin would be "magister dixit". (There's also "ipse dixit", which is essentially the same thing.) --Zundark, 2001 Sep 26

Calling the "no true Scotsman" argument a fallacy is incorrect. Allow me some examples:

A: No person of the Jewish Faith eats pork.

R: But my friend Chaim eats pork.

Rb: Ah yes, but no true person of the Jewish Faith eats pork.

I know several Jews who would consider this a perfectly correct example of the fallacy, as they consider themselves Jews and enjoy pork.

: Well, fine. I think my point is still pretty clear, and someone kindly fixed up the entry to my satisfaction, except that I removed that part about "atrocities of religions..." as it seemed to be mean-spirited and contrary to NPOV. --Alex Kennedy

A: No pacifist believes in using the atom bomb on civilians.

R: But my friend Mohandas wants to use such a bomb Pakistani civilians!

Rb: Ah yes, but no true pacifist wants to use the atom bomb on civilians.

The fact that someone can claim to be something they are not, or that someone can be thought to be something they are not, makes this argument not necessarily a fallacy.

I think there is a logically fallacy here, although maybe it's not clearly explained: it is the fallacy of narrowing your definitions after-the-fact to dance around counterexamples. This is a popular pastime of Creationists: those are just "microevolutions", not real evolution; OK, new species can evolve, but not "created kinds". What's a "created kind"? Well, the ones that God created. Where are the dividing lines? Well, wherever we need to draw them to avoid the evidence. --LDC

I think this is not so much a fallacy as an unsound argument (or is it invalid argument?). It results from using a different definition of a word than your opponent in a logical debate uses. Thus, in the above example the first speaker's definition of "Jew" includes "does not eat pork." The second speaker's definition does not include this. --KamikazeArchon