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The Concept of Fallacy is Empty

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Model-Based Reasoning in Science, Technology, and Medicine

Part of the book series: Studies in Computational Intelligence ((SCI,volume 64))

Summary. Do model-based approaches to reasoning have a stake in accounting for errors of reasoning? If mainstream logic is anything to go on, a theory of bad reasoning is wholly subsumed by a theory of good reasoning, with the former construed as the complement of the latter. In an older tradition (e.g., Mill’s System of Logic), errors are best considered as a stand-alone component of any psychologically real approach to logic. Such is the assumption of this essay. Historically, logic’s almost exclusive preoccupation with error is to be found in what it may chance to say about fallacies. In the tradition that has come down to us since Aristotle, fallacies are errors of reasoning that are attractive, widely-distributed enough to be called “universal”, and difficult to correct, that is, possessed of signi.cant levels of incorrigibility.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, King's College, London, UK

    John Woods

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  1. John Woods
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Pavia, Pizza Botta 6, 27100, Pavia, Italy

    Lorenzo Magnani

  2. Sun Yat-sen University, 510275, Guangzhou, P.R.China

    Ping Li

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Woods, J. (2007). The Concept of Fallacy is Empty. In: Magnani, L., Li, P. (eds) Model-Based Reasoning in Science, Technology, and Medicine. Studies in Computational Intelligence, vol 64. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-71986-1_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-71986-1_3

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