I guess this would be where this goes. This was an interesting English assignment where I had to write a story incorporating my own definitions and examples of logical fallacies. This is not that good but its possible that some might find it interesting so I decided that I would put it up just for the heck of it.
Logical Fallacies: The Search for a good videogame
One day in the upside-down land of Zealandia, there was a bored person who wanted to do something fun. This person already had their mind made up on the kind of fun that they wanted to have. This teenager had preordered a game from a video game store and this was the day that Huron Milk could pick up the game from the store. Huron’s plan for the day was to arrive at the store, pick up the game, and leave. Unfortunately for Mr. Milk, he didn’t anticipate how crowded the store would be that day. He arrived and found the store was full of people who were waiting for the game or were there for other reasons. Huron realized he would have to wait for a long time before he could pick up the game; because of this, he decided to take a look at some of the other games in the meantime as he waited. He realized the employees were all extremely busy taking care of the influx of pre order customers and there were a lot of misplaced games, so he decided to look at games while reorganizing the games while waiting for his own game. The first games that Huron saw were a series of educational games about logical fallacies with each fallacy having its own game and two boxes one with unacceptable premises and the other with irrelevant premises. The first in the series of irrelevant premises was the genetic fallacy. The description for the Genetic Fallacy was that it occurs when we only judge an argument by its origin. There was a picture of the Bible and of the continent of Europe on the game box with the caption of “Ignore everything that the Bible claims is true, it was written by Europeans who translated it from the original text.” The next part was called Composition which was described as arguing that the parts will be the same as the whole. The picture showed a house for sale with the caption that said the monthly payment for this house is low, therefore the house won’t be expensive. The next game was called Division which was described as the false assumption that the whole matches the parts. The caption showed a hiking backpack with the caption saying the backpack is big, therefore the backpack’s pockets are all going to be big. Huron quickly lost interest in this series of games but decided to read through all the games anyway. The next game was called Ad Hominem with the sub-title of Appeal to the Person, it was described by saying ad hominems do not pay attention to the argument, they target the person who made the argument. The main picture was one of an elephant and a person which was captioned with: you can’t believe what the blind man said about hearing an elephant, he can’t see what he is hearing. This appeal to the person was divided into five different sections called the personal attack, accusation of inconsistency, tu quoque, circumstances, and poisoning the well. Personal Attacks were described as a form of ad hominem where put downs replace counter arguments; there was a little graphic with a school and a thought bubble that said: that idea can’t be good, it came from the idiotic principal. Accusation of inconsistency was described as a type of ad hominem where someone rejects an argument because the other side changed their position on the topic. The example showed a teacher in a classroom with a thought bubble saying that he couldn’t listen to his students’ ideas because they changed every day. Tu Quoque was described by saying someone was two-faced on the topic instead of arguing the topic. There was an image of Garfield who was saying in a thought bubble: why does John want me to go on a diet, I am way more active than he is and yet he isn’t going on a diet. Circumstances were described as using situations and factors as reasons in an argument even though they do not have any say in an argument. The example showed a boy with his mother saying to her: I had no choice but to pull the dog’s tail because it had my head in its mouth. Poisoning the Well was described as a form of ad hominem where the opposition’s inclinations replace the reasons to reject the opposing argument by discrediting their claim and character. The next game in the pack was called Equivocation which was described as the usage of multiple meanings of the same word without a connection or explanation in an argument. There was a picture of a hunter inside of a videogame who was in the process of hunting with the caption being: this game will be easy to track down because I am in an easy game to play meaning the game should just go down without much effort on my end. The next game was called Appeal to Popularity which had the subtitle of appeal to the masses which was described as arguing the guaranteed truth of a claim simply because it is popular. There was a picture of a group of medieval villagers with a woman tied to a stake in the middle of the group with the caption: this woman is about to be burned because the villagers agree that the woman is a witch. The next game was called Appeal to Tradition which was described as putting up an argument that a claim would be guaranteed to be true for being a custom. The picture showed people chained together at the legs working with the caption of: its customary to enslave these animals so they must be inferior to my group of people. The next game was called Appeal to Ignorance which was described as arguing that a lack of support proved or disproved something while the reader had to be able to prove something, not the one making the argument. There was a picture showing the Loch Ness Monster with the caption: there is no way to disprove the existence of Nessie based on this picture because there is nothing showing that this picture was staged, so how about you try to prove to me that Nessie does not exist. The next game was called Appeal to Emotion which was described as the use of feelings as reasons and support for an argument. There was a picture of a crying person in court with the caption: your honor you should believe me and not send me to jail because if you send me to jail then I will commit suicide out of depression. The appeal to emotion was split into three other sections called apple polishing, appeal to pity, and scare tactics. The Appeal to Pity was described as the effort to convince people of the truth of a claim by appealing to their empathy, and care. There was a little bit of text next to a caged animal that said: I am about to be euthanized to make room for other abandoned animals, would you adopt me so that I don’t get killed. Apple Polishing had the description of the drive to influence others to accept an argument by brownnosing them. There was a picture of a student with a gym teacher with the text: you know you look good while you are exercising, maybe if I exercise with you, you might consider taking a second look at my final grade. Scare Tactics are the campaigns to make others think action should be taken by scaring them with something unreasonable. There was an example that showed a courtroom with the caption: if the defendant is not proven guilty, he will personally hunt every single one of you down and kill you until you put him in prison. The next game was called the Red Herring which was described as the usage of irrelevant topics or ideas during an argument. There was a picture of a lumberjack who was saying: we need to chop more trees down because if we succeed we will lower taxes for the rest of the country and lower tariffs on goods from other countries. The next game was called the Strawman which was described as the modifying of an opposing argument to easily counter that position. The picture showed a miner with the caption: the environmentalists want to raise taxes on our already above production cost products which means that they want us to become bankrupt. The final irrelevant premise game was called Two Wrongs Make a Right which was described as the belief that because someone has done someone else has done something morally wrong, you can do the same thing. The picture showed a soldier outside of a military base with the caption: I have the okay to attack this base because people from this base attacked our supply train. The other group of games was grouped under unacceptable premises. The first of these games was called Begging the Question which was described as the repetition of the conclusion in an argument as a premise used to support that conclusion. There was a picture that showed an escalator and some stairs with the caption: you should take the stairs because it will give you exercise and since exercise makes you more athletic you should take the stairs because it will make you more athletic. The next game was called False Dilemma which was described as the insistence that there are only two possibilities when there are more. The picture showed a billboard with the words: The American Flag, either you salute it, or you go to jail for disrespecting the flag. The next game was called the Decision-Point Fallacy which was described as the argument that a specific change marks a transition from one thing to another thing when there is no actual specific thing that shows the change. The picture showed an argument which resulted in one side saying the other had crossed the line and the other side saying there was no line causing a fight to break out between the two sides of the argument. The next game was the Slippery Slope which is arguing without strong or valid support that a sequence of steps will happen after a certain undesirable event. The picture showed a warning sign with the caption: do not go to college, if you do you will be hated by your family and you will become radicalized by the teachers which will cause you to be blacklisted by the government which will then imprison you until you become normal again. The next game was called Hasty Generalization which is the drawing of a conclusion about a whole group based off a small experience. The picture showed a Terminator poster with the caption: Europe must be full of muscular males because the Terminator is played by a muscular male European. The last game was called Faulty Analogy and was described as a weak argument by analogy which does not work because the things being compared are not alike in relevant ways. The picture showed a flea and a tick with the caption: all fleas are small bloodsuckers, all ticks are small bloodsuckers, therefore all fleas are ticks. In the time that Huron spent looking at this pack of games the lines had shortened considerably and once he put the pack where it was supposed to go, he got in the now short line and waited for about ten more minutes. Once he was at the front of the line he asked for his preordered game which the employee gave after a confirmation that Huron had already payed for the game. The salesperson asked Huron if he wanted the games that he was looking at to which Huron replied no and proceeded to finish the transaction. Once he finished the transaction, Huron went home and prepared to have a lot of fun with his new game Command & Conquer 5 The Return of Tiberium.
Sorry for the cliffhanger ending if that is one since tbh I am not sure.
