Logical Fallacies

Argumentum ad Ignorantiam is a logical fallacy defined as a “fallacy that a proposition is true simply on the basis that it has not been proved false or that it is false simply because it has not been proved true.”(1) An example of argumentum ad ignorantiam is claming that unicorns do not exist because no one has ever proven that they do exist. Another example is saying that God exists because no one can prove that he does not exist.

I have to confess that I have committed this fallacy before. In my position essay when I stated that Alaska should change from a capitalistic economy to a socialist economy my argument had an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy. I never proved what benefits Alaska would have from a socialistic economy; I only argued what was wrong with a capitalistic economy. By not providing information and not proving why a socialistic economy would be better for Alaska I committed a logical fallacy. I feel that after learning about argumentum ad ignorantiam and the other types of logical fallacies I can better argue my ideas and in the future commit fewer logical fallacies.

(1) http://philosophy.lander.edu/logic/ignorance.html