Document Type
Paper
Start Date
15-5-1999 9:00 AM
End Date
17-5-1999 5:00 PM
Abstract
Various logic texts offer explanations of a fallacy identified as an appeal to tradition. The identification of this fallacy should be scrutinized for any faulty reasoning. Whether this fallacy is committed depends on the kind of relation asserted be tween the present and the past. An understanding of its relations clarifies when an appeal to tradition could be fallacious. This is illustrated by the views of Socrates, Bentham, Scruton, and others. I argue tradition transfers something from the past to the present. Whether the transfer is fallacious depends on what and how something is transferred.
Creative Commons License
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Response to Submission
Claude Gratton, Commentary on Gough
Reader's Reactions
Mark Gellis, Commentary on Goodwin (May 1999)
Included in
Does an appeal to tradition rest on mistaken reasoning?
Various logic texts offer explanations of a fallacy identified as an appeal to tradition. The identification of this fallacy should be scrutinized for any faulty reasoning. Whether this fallacy is committed depends on the kind of relation asserted be tween the present and the past. An understanding of its relations clarifies when an appeal to tradition could be fallacious. This is illustrated by the views of Socrates, Bentham, Scruton, and others. I argue tradition transfers something from the past to the present. Whether the transfer is fallacious depends on what and how something is transferred.
