The complete list

Every logical fallacy, cognitive bias, rhetorical device, and debate tactic on fallacy.is, grouped by category. 32 entries. Each has a short URL you can paste into any discussion.

Logical fallacies (21)

Errors in reasoning that make an argument invalid or misleading, regardless of the conclusion.

  1. Ad Hominem Attacking the person making an argument instead of the argument itself.
  2. Anecdotal Evidence Drawing a general conclusion from a single story or personal experience.
  3. Appeal to Authority Using a person's status as proof of a claim, instead of the evidence behind the claim.
  4. Appeal to Emotion Substituting an emotional reaction for an argument about the facts.
  5. Appeal to Ignorance Treating the absence of evidence against a claim as evidence for it, or vice versa.
  6. Bandwagon Treating how many people believe a claim as evidence that the claim is true.
  7. Cherry Picking Presenting only the evidence that supports your case and ignoring the rest.
  8. Circular Reasoning Supporting a claim with the claim itself, dressed up in different words.
  9. Equivocation Using a word in two different senses within the same argument, as if they were the same.
  10. False Cause Concluding that one thing caused another based on correlation or sequence alone.
  11. False Dichotomy Framing a choice as two options when more exist.
  12. False Equivalence Treating two things as equivalent when they differ in ways that matter to the argument.
  13. Genetic Fallacy Judging a claim by its source, origin, or history instead of its content.
  14. Hasty Generalization Drawing a broad conclusion from a sample too small or unrepresentative to support it.
  15. Loaded Question Asking a question that smuggles in an unproven assumption the answerer can't address without conceding it.
  16. No True Scotsman Redefining a category on the fly to exclude counterexamples, protecting a claim about the category.
  17. Post Hoc Assuming that because one thing followed another, the first caused the second.
  18. Red Herring Introducing an irrelevant topic to distract from the actual argument.
  19. Slippery Slope Claiming a small step will inevitably cause a chain of extreme consequences, without showing why.
  20. Straw Man Replacing someone's argument with a weaker version, then knocking down the weaker version.
  21. Tu Quoque Dismissing a critique by pointing out that the critic is guilty of the same thing.

Cognitive biases (5)

Predictable patterns in how the mind distorts judgment — useful to name, hard to avoid.

  1. Confirmation Bias The tendency to notice, remember, and trust evidence that supports what you already believe.
  2. Dunning-Kruger Effect A pattern where people with limited competence in a domain tend to overestimate their ability in that domain.
  3. Gambler's Fallacy Believing that past random outcomes change the odds of future independent ones.
  4. Sunk Cost Fallacy Continuing a course of action because of what has already been spent on it, rather than what it still offers.
  5. Survivorship Bias Drawing conclusions from the things that made it through while ignoring the ones that didn't.

Rhetorical devices (1)

Techniques used to persuade rather than reason. Some are fair; many are traps.

  1. Whataboutism Deflecting a criticism by raising a different criticism of the critic or their side.

Debate tactics (5)

Moves people make in arguments — dodges, traps, and bad-faith patterns worth naming.

  1. Gish Gallop Burying an opponent in a flood of claims, too many and too fast to refute in real time.
  2. Motte and Bailey Defending a bold claim by retreating to a weaker, related claim when challenged, then returning to the bold claim later.
  3. Moving the Goalposts Dismissing evidence that meets your demand, then demanding new, harder evidence.
  4. Sealioning Hounding someone with relentless, polite requests for evidence to exhaust them rather than to understand.
  5. Shifting the Burden of Proof Demanding your opponent disprove your claim instead of supporting it yourself.