Appeal to Consequences

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Contents 1 Synonyms 2 Explanation 2.1 Example 3 Avoiding This Fallacy 4 Subfallacies 5 External Links 6 Examples in creationist arguments

Synonyms

• Ad Consequentiam/Argumentum ad consequentiam
• Appeal to Consequences of a Belief
• Argument from Adverse Consequences
• Pragmatic Fallacy

Explanation

The Appeal to Consequences fallacy occurs when an argument suggests that a premise cannot be accurate because the consequences of the premise's truth would be unpleasant or otherwise undesired (i.e. an Appeal to Force), or that a premise is likely to be accurate because the conclusion would be good or desirable (i.e. Wishful Thinking).

Example

1. If evolution is true, then humans are just intelligent, bipedal apes.
2. I don't want to be an ape.
3. Therefore, evolution is untrue.

This is fallacious because the listener is so unhappy with the prospect of being an ape, that they refuse to accept evolution as true based on their feelings about the consequences of that truth. In reality, of course, premises are accurate even if we want them to be inaccurate, and premises are inaccurate even if we want them to be accurate.

Avoiding This Fallacy

Truth matters in logical debates; our emotions or feelings about the truth do not. While human emotions, feelings, and values will always influence what we decide to do based on our knowledge of the situation, that knowledge cannot be unduly influenced by our emotions or values if it is to be true knowledge.

Subfallacies

• Wishful Thinking
• Appeal to Force

External Links

• Fallacy Files [1]
• Wikipedia [2]
• Stephen Downes [3]

Examples in creationist arguments

• Survival of the fittest implies might makes right
• Evolution leads to social darwinism
• Evolution is racist
• Evolution teaches that we are animals and to behave as such
• Evolution encourages eugenics
• Hitler based his views on Darwinism
• Evolution encourages promiscuity and lust
• Homosexuality receives approval from evolutionists
• Crime rates etc. have increased since evolution began to be taught
• An evolved mind is fallible, its conclusions untrustworthy
• If man comes from random causes, life has no purpose or meaning
• Without a literal Fall, there is no need for Jesus and redemption
• Learning creationism stimulates mental health, joy, and morals
• The proposition that human beings are created in the image of God is one of the bedrock principles on which Western civilization was built
• Death and suffering before humanity implies an unmerciful God
• God would have pronounced death and suffering very good
• Christ's death was unjust if physical death wasn't the penalty for sin
• Evolution is the foundation of an immoral worldview