Entry 4 - Nguyễn Thị Phương Ly

ENTRY 4: ARGUMENT STRUCTURE AND FALLACIES

ITEM 1

"She said that she would dance with me if I brought her red roses", cried the young Student, "but in all my garden there is no red rose."...

(Oscar Wilde - The Nightingale and the Rose)

• Structural fallacy: Denying the antecedent
• Analysis:

If I brought her red roses, she would dance with me. (If A, then B)

There is no red rose. (not A)

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Therefore, she would not dance with me. (not B)

ITEM 2

“Sam is riding her bike in her home town in Maine, minding her own business. A station wagon comes up behind her and the driver starts beeping his horn and then tries to force her off the road. As he goes by, the driver yells “get on the sidewalk where you belong to!” Sam sees that the car has Ohio plates and concludes that all Ohio drivers are jerks.”

Source: http://bus-plunge.blogspot.com/2009/03/logic-and-fallacies-constructing.html

• Content fallacy: Hasty generalization
• Analysis: Sam meets a driver who has bad behavior and the car he drives has Ohio plates. Therefore, she supposes that all Ohio drivers are jerks.

ITEM 3: Advertisement of Toshiba

Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZk8-enTyAo

• Content fallacy: Appeal to popularity
• Analysis: In the advertisement, Tang Thanh Ha – the famous actress in Vietnam goes to a variety of places and asks a great number of people: “Have you got Power?” All of them answer that they have got. The advertisement shows the number of people who own Power – the new product of Toshiba to encourage consumers to buy Power.