Drills for the skills a scorecard measures: building an argument, answering a strong one, and spotting bad reasoning.
Paste an argument. Get its skeleton, its hidden assumptions, its strongest objection, and a rebuilt version.
Face one strong argument at a time, in a philosopher's voice if you like, and practice answering it.
Thirty-odd ways arguments go wrong, how to spot them, how to counter them, and a quiz.
Straw man
Misrepresenting an opponent's position as a weaker or more extreme version, then refuting that version instead of the real one.
Ad hominem
Attacking the person making the argument, their character, motives, or background, rather than the argument itself.
Circumstantial ad hominem
Dismissing an argument because the speaker has an interest in its conclusion being true.
Tu quoque
Deflecting a criticism by pointing out that the critic is guilty of the same thing, as if hypocrisy refuted the claim.
Appeal to authority
Treating a claim as established because an authority endorses it, when the authority is not a relevant expert or the question is one on which experts disagree.
Appeal to popularity
Arguing that a claim is true because many people believe it, or false because few do.
Appeal to nature
Claiming something is good or right because it is natural, or bad because it is unnatural.
Appeal to emotion
Substituting an emotional reaction such as pity, fear, or outrage for a reason to accept a conclusion.
Appeal to tradition
Arguing that a practice is right or a belief is true because it is old or has always been done that way.
Appeal to ignorance
Concluding that a claim is true because it has not been proven false, or false because it has not been proven true.
False dilemma
Presenting only two options as if they exhausted the possibilities, when other alternatives exist.
Slippery slope
Claiming that a first step will inevitably lead to a chain of consequences ending in disaster, without showing why each link must follow.
Begging the question
Assuming the conclusion in one of the premises, so the argument goes in a circle.
Loaded question
Asking a question that presupposes something contested, so that any direct answer concedes the presupposition.
Equivocation
Using a word in two different senses within the same argument while treating it as if it kept one meaning.
No true Scotsman
Protecting a generalization from a counterexample by redefining the category so the counterexample no longer counts.
Hasty generalization
Drawing a broad conclusion from a sample that is too small or unrepresentative to support it.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Concluding that because one event followed another, the first caused the second.
Correlation as causation
Inferring that because two things vary together, one causes the other, ignoring common causes, reverse causation, or coincidence.
Composition
Inferring that a whole has a property because its parts do.
Division
Inferring that a part has a property because the whole does.
Red herring
Introducing an irrelevant issue to divert attention from the question at hand.
Whataboutism
Responding to a criticism by pointing to a different wrong, usually committed by the critic's side, instead of answering the criticism.
Motte and bailey
Advancing a bold, hard-to-defend claim, then retreating to a modest, easily defended one when challenged, and treating the defense of the modest claim as vindicating the bold one.
Moving the goalposts
Demanding more evidence after the originally requested evidence has been supplied, so the standard can never be met.
Genetic fallacy
Judging a belief true or false, good or bad, on the basis of its origin rather than its merits.
Is-ought fallacy
Deriving a conclusion about what ought to be done purely from premises about what is the case, with no bridging normative premise.
Special pleading
Applying a principle to others while exempting oneself or one's own case without a relevant justification.
False analogy
Arguing that because two things are alike in some respects, they are alike in the respect at issue, when the similarities are superficial or the differences are decisive.
Shifting the burden of proof
Making a claim and then demanding that the opponent disprove it, rather than offering support for it.
Sunk cost fallacy
Continuing a course of action because of what has already been invested in it, rather than because of its future prospects.
Texas sharpshooter
Selecting a pattern from a mass of data after the fact and presenting it as if it had been predicted, ignoring the data that do not fit.
Anecdotal evidence
Using a personal story or isolated case to counter or establish a general claim that systematic evidence addresses.
Middle ground fallacy
Assuming that the truth must lie between two opposing positions simply because they are opposed.
Gambler's fallacy
Believing that independent random events are influenced by previous outcomes, so that a run of one result makes the opposite result due.