مغالطه‌های پرکاربرد Quotes

“The over-whelming preponderance of people have not freely decided what to believe, but, rather, have been socially conditioned (indoctrinated) into their beliefs. They are unreflective thinkers. Their minds are products of social and personal forces they neither understand, control, nor concern themselves with. Their personal beliefs are often based in prejudices. Their thinking is largely comprised of stereotypes, caricatures, oversimplifications, sweeping generalizations, illusions, delusions, rationalizations, false dilemmas, and begged questions. Their motivations are often traceable to irrational fears and attachments, personal vanity and envy, intellectual arrogance and simple-mindedness. These constructs have become a part of their identity.”
― Richard Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“Most people lie about small things but would be afraid to lie about big things. But manipulators know that if you insist on a lie long enough, many people will believe you — especially if you have the resources of mass media to air your lie. All skilled manipulators are focused on what you can get people to believe, not on what is true or false. They know that the human mind does not naturally seek the truth; it seeks comfort, security, personal confirmation and vested interest. In”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“The more intense the belief, the less likely that reason and evidence can dislodge it.”
― Linda Elder Richard Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“Fallacies are “foul ways” to win arguments, yet they are winning arguments and manipulating people everyday. The mass media are filled with them. They are the bread and butter of mass political discourse, public relations, and advertising. We all at times fall prey to them. And many live and breathe them as if they were the vehicles of sacred truth. Your”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“For example, before World War II, the U.S. government called the department that wages war the “War Department.” After the war, they decided to call it the “Defense Department.” This change has come about because the government does not want to admit that it starts wars. Rather it wants to manipulate people into thinking that it only defends the country against aggressive others. In short, politically, the word “defense” sells better than the word “war.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“People are often ready to accept a false dilemma because few feel comfortable with complexity and nuanced distinctions. They like sweeping absolutes. They want clear and simple choices. So, those skilled in manipulating people, face them with false dilemmas (one alternative of which is the one the manipulator wants them to choose, the other alternative clearly unacceptable). They present arguments in black or white form.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“Remember these rules: Don’t say all when you mean most. Don’t say most when you mean some. Don’t say some when you mean a few. And don’t say a few when you mean just one.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“People”
― Richard Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“In a world of fair-minded critical thinkers, the list of those who reasoned best and the list of those with the most influence in the world would be one and the same. But we don’t exist in an ideal world of intellectually disciplined, empathic thinkers. We live in fundamentally uncritical societies, societies in which skilled manipulators, masters of intellectual tricks and stratagems, are the ones who tend to achieve position, status, and advantage.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“There are many manipulators highly skilled in telling “big” lies and thus in making those lies seem true. For example, if one studies the history of the CIA, one can document any number of unethical deeds that have been covered up by lies (see any volume of Covert Action Quarterly for documentation of the misdeeds and dirty tricks of the CIA in every region of the world).14 Virtually all of these unethical acts were officially denied at the time of their commission. Dirty”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“We are clever; you are cunning. We support freedom fighters; you support terrorists. We set up holding centers; you set up concentration camps. We strategically withdraw; you retreat. We are religious; you are fanatic. We are determined; you are pig-headed. There are literally thousands of words that fall into good-when-I-do-it-bad-when-you-do doublets. Most people are not skilled in detecting doublespeak. Dirty”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“It is hard to prove people wrong when they can’t be pinned down. So instead of focusing on particulars, manipulators talk in the most vague terms they can get away with. This fallacy is popular with politicians. For example, “Forget what the spineless liberals say. It’s time to be tough: tough on criminals, tough on terrorists, and tough on those who belittle our country.” They make sure they don’t use specifics that might cause people to question what they are doing (for example, who exactly you are going to be tough on, and what exactly do you intend to do with these people when you get “tough” with them.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“The worst deeds and atrocities can disappear from historical accounts (or be made to appear minor) while fantasies and fabrications can be made to look like hard facts. This is what happens in what is sometimes called “patriotic history.” The writing of a distorted form of history is justified by love of country and often defended by the charge of negativity (“You always want to focus on what is wrong with us! What about what is right about us?!”). The fact is that human memory is continually working to re-describe events of the past in such a way as to exonerate itself and condemn its detractors.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“Manipulators look for ways to make their opponent, or his position, look ridiculous (and therefore funny). People like a good laugh and they especially like laughing at views that seem threatening to them. A good joke is almost always well received, for it relieves the audience of the responsibility to think seriously about what is making them uncomfortable.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“The US government has often spread disinformation — for example, to justify sending Marines into Central or South American Countries to depose one government and put a more “friendly” government into power. The fact that these stories will be discredited years later is of no consequence, of course, to the fabricators of such stories. Disinformation often works. The discrediting of it is usually too late to matter. Years later, people don’t seem to care.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation

“The function of generalizations is quite simple. Without generalizations we could not explain anything. Things would occur around us for no reason that we could fathom. We would stand around in a stupor, unable to relate anything to anything else, for a generalization is simply a way to take some set of things (that we don’t understand) and compare them with something we do understand by means of some “abstract” words.”
― Richard W. Paul, The Thinker's Guide to Fallacies: The Art of Mental Trickery and Manipulation