Genetic fallacy
Template:Short description The genetic fallacy (also known as the fallacy of origins or fallacy of virtue)<ref name="Fallacious Arguments">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> is a fallacy of irrelevance in which arguments or information are dismissed or validated based solely on their source of origin rather than their content. In other words, a claim is ignored or given credibility based on its source rather than the claim itself.
The fallacy therefore fails to assess the claim on its merit. The first criterion of a good argument is that the premises must have bearing on the truth or falsity of the claim in question.<ref>Attacking Faulty Reasoning: A Practical Guide to Fallacy-Free Arguments (Third Edition) by T. Edward Damer, chapter II, subsection "The Relevance Criterion" (p. 12)</ref> Genetic accounts of an issue may be true and may help illuminate the reasons why the issue has assumed its present form, but they are not conclusive in determining its merits.<ref>With Good Reason: An Introduction to Informal Fallacies (Fifth Edition) by S. Morris Engel, chapter V, subsection 1 (p. 198)</ref>
In The Oxford Companion to Philosophy (1995), it is asserted that the term originated in Morris Raphael Cohen and Ernest Nagel's book Logic and Scientific MethodTemplate:Hsp<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> (1934). However, in a book review published in The Nation in 1926, Mortimer J. Adler complained that The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant was guilty throughout of "the fallacy of genetic interpretation." Adler characterized the genetic fallacy generally as "the substitution of psychology for logic."<ref>Mortimer J. Adler, Philosopher at Large: An Intellectual Autobiography (New York: Macmillan, 1976), pp. 86–87.</ref>
ExamplesEdit
From Attacking Faulty Reasoning by T. Edward Damer, Third Edition Template:Abbr 36: Template:Quote
There are numerous motives explaining why people choose to wear wedding rings, but it would be a fallacy to presume those who continue the tradition are promoting sexism.
Another example would be from How to Win Every Argument: The Use and Abuse of Logic (2006) by Madsen Pirie, p. 82:
As the author points out, private developers may well have legitimate and knowledgeable opinions on such a matter.
See alsoEdit
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- Appeal to noveltyTemplate:SndThe argument that a newer idea is superior
- Chronological snobberyTemplate:SndThe argument that an older idea is inferior
- Template:Annotated linkTemplate:SndThe argument that an older idea is superior
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- Etymological fallacyTemplate:SndAn assertion that the historical meaning of the word is its only true meaning
- "Not invented here"Template:SndA dismissal of "foreign" ideas because they did not originate from the speaker's country, social group, or organization
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