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Is Flew’s No True Scotsman Fallacy a True Fallacy? A Contextual Analysis

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Modeling and Using Context (CONTEXT 2017)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 10257))

Abstract

In this paper, I discuss ways where context can help to explain why the No True Scotsman ‘Fallacy’ may not always be fallacious. I discuss different focus areas of context from speaker’s meaning, the syntactical position of the inserted term ‘true’, to dialectical contexts involving dialogues about classification and definition.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For example, van Eemeren and Houtlosser (2007), pp. 59–67, and van Eemeren (2011), pp. 141–161.

  2. 2.

    Paglieri (2016).

  3. 3.

    Flew (1975), p. 56.

  4. 4.

    Flew (1975), p. 49.

  5. 5.

    Flew (1975), p. 53.

  6. 6.

    Flew (1975), pp. 55–56. This quote he cites from Flew and Macintyre (1955), pp. 96–100.

  7. 7.

    Paglieri (2016), p. 1. Paglieri cites further evidence of the need for this strategy from Godden and Zenker (Informal Logic 2015, 35: 88–134), who have argued that “reinterpreting alleged fallacies as non-fallacious arguments requires supplementing the textual material with something else, e.g., probability distributions, pragmatic considerations, dialogical context.” p. 1, my emphasis.

  8. 8.

    Paglieri (2016), p. 4.

  9. 9.

    Paglieri (2016).

  10. 10.

    Paglieri (2016).

  11. 11.

    Flew (1975), p. 54. The quote referred to by Flew comes from Propositions 6.1–6.11 from the Tractatus.

  12. 12.

    For example, it is listed as a fallacy (of an ‘Ad Hoc Rescue’) in The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://www.iep.utm.edu/fallacy/#NoTrueScotsman, accessed 26 February, 2017; the popular The Fallacy Files website lists is as the subfallacy of Redefinition¸ http://www.fallacyfiles.org/redefine.html, accessed 26 February, 2017; it is listed as a Fallacy of Presumption and a circular argument at Logical Fallacies, http://www.logicalfallacies.info/presumption/no-true-scotsman/ accessed 26 February 2017, and the site Your Logical Fallacy Is calls it an appeal to purity, http://www.logicalfallacies.info/presumption/no-true-scotsman/ accessed 26 February, 2017. The popular philosophy magazine Philosophy Now names it as an informal fallacy in a short article Bad Arguments That Make You Smarter, Henrik Schoeneberg, August/September edition (2016) pp. 26–27.

  13. 13.

    Stevenson (1938, 1944). The subsequent literature on PD’s is quite broad. Of note are papers by Macagno and Walton (2008a, 2008b), Walton and Macagno (2009), Zarefsky (2006) and Aberdein (2000, 2006).

  14. 14.

    Govier (2009), p. 77.

  15. 15.

    Govier (2009).

  16. 16.

    Cf. Aberdein (2006), p. 8.

  17. 17.

    Flew compares Wittgenstein’s attribution that tautologies “say nothing” to the Speaker of the NTSM. Su2 is “not really making any assertion at all about what is or is not supposed to happen in the universe around us,” (1975), p. 54.

  18. 18.

    Aberdein (2006), p. 4.

  19. 19.

    Aberdein (2006).

  20. 20.

    Aberdein (2006). About the alleged fallaciousness of PDs, Aberdein cites Walton (2005), p. 173.

  21. 21.

    Macagno and Walton (2003) for example, lists Hallden’s position that the author of a PD tries to find the real or true meaning, that is, true X seeks to find an “essence definition”. For Schiappa, PD’s have nothing to do with essences but reveal our perceptions of the world where defining imposes a theory on reality where every term and definition is persuasive because “they frame the situation in a particular way”. Burgess-Jackson’s theory pertain to the inherent vagueness of terms where PD’s precisify and increase or decrease the extension of the term.

  22. 22.

    Van Rees describes strategic maneuvering as holding in tension two aims, of dialectical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness (2006). Cf. Zarefsky (2006).

  23. 23.

    For the legislation see, ‘The Scotch Whiskey Regulations 2009’, http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2009/2890/regulation/3/made. Accessed 30 December, 2016.

  24. 24.

    Guala (2014), p. 57.

  25. 25.

    Guala (2014).

  26. 26.

    Khalidi (2013), p. 1 citing Searle (1995).

  27. 27.

    Khalidi (2013), citing Hacking (1995, 1999).

  28. 28.

    Khalidi (2013), citing Griffiths (2004).

  29. 29.

    Schiappa (2003), p. 3 Schiappa here cites Searle (1969), pp. 51–52.

  30. 30.

    Schiappa (2003), p. 177.

  31. 31.

    Schiappa (2003), p. 50.

  32. 32.

    Schiappa (2003).

  33. 33.

    Schiappa (2003).

  34. 34.

    Macagno and Walton (2008b) p. 211.

  35. 35.

    I would like to thank two anonymous referees for their valuable insights and comments of a previous draft of this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Philosophy and Theology, University of Notre Dame Australia, Sydney, NSW, 2007, Australia

    Robert Ian Anderson

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Pierre and Marie Curie University , Paris, France

    Patrick Brézillon

  2. University of Maine , Orono, Maine, USA

    Roy Turner

  3. University of Genoa , Genoa, Italy

    Carlo Penco

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Anderson, R.I. (2017). Is Flew’s No True Scotsman Fallacy a True Fallacy? A Contextual Analysis. In: Brézillon, P., Turner, R., Penco, C. (eds) Modeling and Using Context. CONTEXT 2017. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 10257. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57837-8_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57837-8_19

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