ERROR AND FALLACIES 297 



inference can always be expressed in a hypothetical judgment show 

 ing forth the necessary dependence of consequent on antecedent : 

 and that judgment, stated in general terms, is the axiom or canon 

 of the form of inference in question. Hence, to accept a formally 

 invalid inference as valid, is to mistake for an evident axiom 

 or canon some judgment that is neither evident nor true. In 

 fact, every logical fallacy may be analysed into the acceptance by 

 the mind of some false judgment as true. 1 



When tacit assent to an implied false judgment, whether this 

 be a canon or a premiss, 2 leads to further error, we shall call such 

 false assumption a fallacy ; as also the assumption of a false pre 

 miss at any stage in a reasoning process : provided always there 

 is a semblance of validity or truth about the judgment so accepted. 

 This latter condition is essential to a fallacy. Only by being 

 deceived can the mind be led into error ; and it can be deceived 

 only because error can assume for it the semblance of truth. 

 When, therefore, a judgment is manifestly false, an argument 

 plainly inconclusive, some rule or canon of correct thinking openly 

 violated, there is no fallacy, because there is no deception. An 

 argument which openly violates some formal rule of infer 

 ence is sometimes called a paralogism, or, also, a case of &quot; non 

 sequitur &quot;. 



We have said that a false judgment, simply as such, cannot 

 properly be called a fallacy, that the latter is to be sought rather 

 in the grounds and motives which induced us to assent to the false 

 judgment as true. We can, however, distinguish between the logical 

 grounds or reasons, and the psychological motives, for our assent 

 to a judgment (198, 225). The logical grounds are designated by 

 the general title of evidence (248) : they appeal directly to the 

 intellect, and are its proper object. The evidence for any proposed 

 judgment is either mediate or immediate. If we assent to a judg- 



1 This is illustrated by Mr. JOSEPH in connexion with the fallacy &quot;post hoc, 

 Propter hoc&quot; : &quot; Nor is it peculiar to this fallacy,&quot; he writes (op. cit., pp. 554-5), 

 &quot; that it can be expressed as a false principle. Equivocation proceeds on the false 

 principle that a word is always used with the same meaning : Accident on the prin 

 ciple that whatever is predicated of a thing may be predicated of its attribute, and 

 vice versa : Secundum Quid on the principle that what is true with certain qualifica 

 tions is also true without them. And the fact that these different types of fallacious 

 inference severally depend on a false, or misleading, principle, is what was meant by 

 calling them loci of fallacy.&quot; 



2 When &quot; the falsity of the premiss can only be ascertained empirically,&quot; Mr. 

 JOSEPH (ibid., 532) will not call its assumption a fallacy. This usage would exclude 

 such inductive fallacies as non-observation or mal-observation. We prefer to extend 

 the term to &quot; any false assumption used as a premiss &quot; (ibid., 535). 



