In Praise of Fallacies
Western tradition tells you to never use fallacies, but sometimes fallacies can prove useful.
Two fundamental sorts of fallacies
There are, according to Aristotle, two kinds of fallacies: language-dependent (in dictione) and non-language-dependent fallacies (extra dictionem). Language-dependent fallacies deal with ambiguity, or wrong conclusions, while extra dictionem fallacies deal with elements out of language, as it happens with the appeal to force fallacy.
Here we will praise the last kind of fallacy, the non-language-dependent (extra dictionem) because there is no possible defense for the other kind (since there is no possible defense for bad language-dependent reasoning).
Ad Hominem
Western tradition tells you not to use your opponent's characteristics against him. But sometimes you may need to call things by their real name, i.e., a jerk is a jerk, a nazi is a nazi. You shouldn’t go through purely metaphysical discussions to prove someone deserves to be called what they are.
When someone says you are wrong because of your hair color, the discussion’s Scopus is only increased. Proving your adversary wrong won’t be difficult.
Appeal to Emotion
If we never appeal to our emotions the world would be ruled by psychopaths. However, there is a line dividing the good use and the bad use of this fallacy.
You may, for example, use it for the good when you want to prevent someone from doing something terrible that would make one or more than one person sad, angry, or happy (in case you don't want some bad person to be happy.) Or it may be used to practice emotional blackmail (which is really not a nice thing to do).
Appeal to Force
There is a good use for this fallacy, like when a mother is trying to show her young child something is dangerous and uses her force to move the child out of that dangerous situation.
Although, later, when the child grows up, the use of force may not be necessary to make the child understand an action is dangerous.
Fallacist’s Fallacy (Argumentum ad Logicam)
Now, this fallacy is also known as an argument from fallacy. It's one of the most important fallacies I know. It can involve both in dictione and extra dictionem fallacies because it is about the wrong use of “calling something fallacious.”
If you realize an argument is fallacious (in an in dictione way), you are saying “argument A for conclusion C is fallacious,” but it doesn’t mean conclusion C is false just because the reasoning within the argument is wrong.
I.e., the fallacy occurs when you deny that C is true because someone defended it in an unsound and illogical way. But just because someone’s reasoning is bad, it doesn’t entail that their conclusion is false.
The same may happen with extra dictionem fallacies. Just because someone appealed to force, emotion, or swearing, it doesn't necessarily mean their conclusion is wrong (as was shown in the previous sections).
The Western Tradition and the Fallacies
The following quote shows the lesser importance of logic in modern times. A very common provocative answer follows it:
“You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it.”
- G.K. Chesterton in Daily News, 1905.
“Said the man who jumped out the window trying to fly…”
If you want to understand the problems of the logic vs empiricism discussion you should start by asking:
Why did the west stop praising logic and metaphysics?
Nietzsche is one of the most famous critics of Western tradition. He realized the Platonic-Socratic notion of good and truth shaped western culture (mostly influencing Christianity). These platonic notions were idealized, perfect, and allegedly out of the empirical world (and even more important than the empirical world).
According to Nietzsche, Plato’s notion of good evoked a struggle between body and soul. Therefore, turning the Western culture more ascetic (it made us deny physical or psychological desires in order to attain a spiritual ideal or goal).
It made our culture praise privation as a sign of honor, virtue, and etc., while it tried to censor elements of the empirical world like the human body. Throughout its history, the Vatican, for example, censored the representation of sexual organs in art by using fig leaves to cover them.
So, what Nietzsche calls attention to is that, in the Socratic tradition, everything would be of lesser importance than purely metaphysical discussions (and some fallacies seems to point us in this same direction).
But, thankfully, things seem to be changing a lot.
