fallacy

«fallacy» in Mova's school dictionary: a false idea that many people believe — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

noun (a fallacy, fallacies)

meaning for a pupil

1) A fallacy is a false idea that many people believe. tree →

2) In logic, a fallacy is a mistake in reasoning that makes an argument wrong, even if it sounds convincing. tree →

sense in the lessons

In ethics and logic lessons, pupils learn fallacies like «everyone does it, so it's right» (bandwagon), attacking the person instead of the argument, and the «gambler's fallacy» (thinking after five heads, tails is «due» — in fact each coin toss is still 50-50). Spotting fallacies helps with news and adverts.

examples

• It is a fallacy that we only use ten percent of our brains. tree →
• «Everyone's doing it» is a fallacy, not a reason. tree →
• The gambler's fallacy fools lots of people. tree →
• She pointed out the fallacy in his argument. tree →
• It's a common fallacy that bats are blind. tree →
• Name-calling instead of answering is a fallacy. tree →

note

Plural: fallacies. Adjective: fallacious (formal). In maths probability, past coin tosses do not change the next toss.

In the corpora

• Thinking a result is "due" because it hasn't come up for a while is called the gambler's fallacy.
• The gambler's fallacy is thinking a result is "due" because it hasn't happened for a while.
• The sunk cost fallacy is spending more because you have already spent; money spent is gone whatever you do next.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «fallacy» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.