Appeal to "reality" fallacy?

Hi,

I study online deliberation and a very common argument I see is an appeal to a supposed order of things which in turn one is supposed to adhere to with one choices: not giving credit to possible alternative routes because "let's be realistic, X is inevitable" or "it is not X-ist (racist, sexist, what have you) it is realistic".

It seems to me a type of argumentation that exclude critical thoughts similarly to thought-terminating cliche, false dilemma, middle ground or "there is no alternative" fallacies, but in a specific way and a very widespread one. However, I do not see any list of fallacies mentioning it. Would you categorize it as a thought terminating cliche' or other fallacy? It has some similarity to a consequence fallacy and the appeal to nature fallacy ("reality has certain characteristics therefore the best choice is to adhere to them").

I wonder if it is missing from fallacies list because it can (partially!) be subsumed under others, or it doesn't seem a fallacy to others or maybe it is a "cultural" bias of the logic community which may tend to believe in objective reality and an "appeal to reality" fallacy would seems to question such a thing!

Thanks you,
Cat

Hi Cat,

Good questions. I think each of the examples you raise could fit an number of fallacies (or no fallacies) depending on precise wording. For example,

Let's be realistic; X is inevitable.

This is a binary factual claim that is either true or false (unless there are conditions stated as in inevitability in certain situations). The hunt for fallacies would come into play when we use that as a premise and follow it with a conclusion, such as

Let's be realistic; death is inevitable, therefore, we should not try to prevent it.

Here we can point out the fallacious reasoning that connects inevitability with indifference (an argument one might hear from a nihilist). Affective drives (i.e., the emotional realm; human desires, biological drives, etc.) are often ignored from argumentation from the strictest of logicians or those attempting to use nothing but the cognitive aspect of reason; but as human beings, we cannot ignore this ever-so-important domain. Likewise, scientific facts such as human men (as a group) are physically stronger than women (as a group) are not sexist; they are realistic. However, again, using them as a premise along with a conclusion leads to fallacies. For example,

Because men are stronger than women, women should not be hired for jobs that require heavy lifting.

See what we did? We took a fact about reality and attempted to use it as a justification for our conclusion. One can call a "non-sequitur" on this one, that is, the fact that men are strong is irrelevant to the argument that women should not be hired for jobs that require heavy lifting (if women were incapable of performing the duties of the job due to their lack of strength, that would be a different argument).

So I hope I at least indirectly answered your question, in that while there is no specific fallacy for the examples you presented, extending those examples to draw conclusions could lead to many different fallacies depending on the exact argument being made.