On Classifications of Fallacies

Abstract

Research suggests to me the conclusion that three fundamental kinds of fallacies are-interrogative, premisory, and inferential. However, in this article, the focus will be on premisory fallacies. In particular, the article aims to show that there are four distinct kinds of premisory fallacies, begging the question, inconsistency, falsity, and omission. The article begins with a very brief review of some schools of thought about classifying fallacies; then it turns to the task of reviewing some actual classifications of fallacies to see what the tendencies are; five tendencies are found; from them emerges the conclusion that incomplete information is distinct from false premise and from inference, that begging the question is distinct from all three, and that inconsistent premises, false premise, incomplete information I and begging the question form a natural constellation of premisory fallacies, distinct from the fallacy of many questions and from the fallacies of invalid inference. Appended is a bibliography of recent and contemporary writings on the topic of fallacies.