xxiii.       Fallacy of Accent

“This is the number of ways in which we might fail to mean the same thing by the same names or expressions.” – Aristotle

A fallacy of accent is a fallacy of ambiguity – or more specifically, one of pronunciation leading to ambiguity. In English, an example is difficult to find, but in Ancient Greek three accents now used to denote Greek pronunciation were not written in Aristotle’s time, merely inferred in context and from knowledge of the spoken language. This being the case a greater number of words which were pronounced differently were written the same – an environment more conducive to persuasive or convincing use of the fallacy.

The fallacy of accent can also include ambiguities introduced through the alteration of the emphasis on different words in a sentence.

Homograph – two words written the same with different meanings

Homophones – two words sounding the same with the same meaning

Eg. “I resent that letter.” (from Gary N Curtis’s Fallacy Files)

xxiv.       Fallacy of Amphiboly

‘to throw both ways’

The obfuscation of meaning through grammatical, semantic ambiguity

eg. “Croesus, you will destroy a great kingdom.”
xxv.        Fallacy of Composition

The assumption that what is true of the parts must be true of the whole.

xxvi.       Fallacy of Division

The assumption that what is true of the whole must be true of the parts.

xxvii.      Fallacy of Equivocation

The fallacy of four terms

The obfuscation of an issue through the use of key words in an argument in more than one way.

xxviii.    Fallacy of the Middle Ground

The fallacy of the middle ground is based on the assertion that a proposition is true simply because it falls between two more extreme propositions. The principle of moderation is however not necessarily fallacious.

Eg. Some people claim that God is all powerful, all knowing, and all good. Other people claim that God does not exist at all. Now, it seems reasonable to accept a position somewhere in the middle. So, it is likely that God exists, but that he is only very powerful, very knowing, and very good. That seems right to me. – (from Nizkor.org)

xxix.        Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle

An argument which asserts that two things are similar, without giving an explanation of how they are similar.