Fault Finding
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Original Question
I guess that fault finding should be a kind of fallacy. It goes like this.
Tom goes out side.
Mom: It is a bad decision, because you may get Covid-19.
Tom stays home.
Mom: it is a bad decision, because you should have some fresh air.
It's always wrong no matter what Tom does.
Is that correct that it's a fallacy? What is its name? How to handle it?
Thanks a lot.
Answers
3This is a Linguistic Presupposition, like when did you stop beating your wife? When faced with such a situation, I found that giving the person an all-knowing smile, and saying: “Why do you think I used to beat my wife?”
This puts the onus, the burden of proof, back on the one who made the pronouncement.
This sounds like Double Bind. Not really a fallacy.
I don't see a logical fallacy at all, except perhaps cherry picking by choosing alternate reasons for supporting opposing positions.
I'm not sure Mom's logic is bad – it seems that she's more inclined to find fault than be supportive. (I suspect Mom isn't the only one highly skilled in seeing the down side of things.)
Mom correctly identifies at least one risk associated with each option and then stops short of actually assessing and comparing those risks (catching COVID from being out in public vs. being unhealthy from lacking fresh air). She does have a point in each situation; however, just because there's some degree of risk associated with a particular option doesn't mean that risk is too great to accept.
I might be able to criticize Mom for a number of things ... just not for bad logic.
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