Table 2-1 Summary Table of Fallacies |
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In contrast to the above-listed informal fallacies, formal fallacies in the modern interpretation are formally invalid arguments that people tend to mistake for valid arguments.
Example: Every man is an animal, a donkey is an animal; therefore, a donkey is a man.
This would be regarded as a case of the “fallacy of undistributed middle” in the modern textbook, whereas Buridan treats it as a case of the “fallacy of accident” (which he obviously interprets differently than the modern author, who talks about “fallacy of accident” among informal fallacies).
Question: does the modern division between formal and informal fallacies coincide with the Aristotelian division between fallacies of words (in dictione) and fallacies apart from words (extra dictionem), despite the obvious discrepancies between their subdivisions?