How many fallacies are included in the question?
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Original Question
Is there anyone out there who still believes climate change isn’t real? What would it take to convince you that humankind is actually to blame? Seriously, it’s bad.
This is a different venue, and I do not propose to argue the merits of the issue (such as they are), but wonder how often you've seen/heard this kind of question used to "bully" an answer the questioner obviously wants?
Argumentum ad populam comes first to mind....
Answers
2Exactly. These are substantive questions, not logical questions, and are handled by doing research.
There are three implied claims in this question:
1. Climate change is real and there's compelling evidence to support it.
2. There's compelling evidence humans are to blame for climate change.
3. Climate change is bad (I don't think that's a controversial claim, but I had to outline all the implied claims).
So far, those are just claims that need support. If the arguer stops there and doesn't provide support for those claims, there would just be a bunch of unsupported claims and a sort of an appeal to emotion fallacy as the arguer is trying to evoke certain negative feelings in the opponent in order to accept the claims, which is substituting reason with feelings. If, on the other hand, the arguer proceeds to give satisfying and adequate support for the claims, they would have a good, fallacy-free case.
Regarding your suggestion that there may be an argumentum ad populum fallacy, that would depend on the implied argument the person was trying to make. The question "Is there anyone out there who still believes climate change isn’t real?" may have the implied argument: "The vast majority of people believe climate change is real. Therefore, it is real," in which case there would be an appeal to popularity fallacy. However, the implied argument could be (this is the implied argument in my opinion): "There's so much good evidence for climate change. Therefore, it's real," and in that case there won't be an appeal to popularity fallacy. You simply have to ask for further clarification about implied claims/arguments to have a clear idea of the argument and then proceed to evaluate for fallacies.
1. Climate change is real and there's compelling evidence to support it.
2. There's compelling evidence humans are to blame for climate change.
3. Climate change is bad (I don't think that's a controversial claim, but I had to outline all the implied claims).
So far, those are just claims that need support. If the arguer stops there and doesn't provide support for those claims, there would just be a bunch of unsupported claims and a sort of an appeal to emotion fallacy as the arguer is trying to evoke certain negative feelings in the opponent in order to accept the claims, which is substituting reason with feelings. If, on the other hand, the arguer proceeds to give satisfying and adequate support for the claims, they would have a good, fallacy-free case.
Regarding your suggestion that there may be an argumentum ad populum fallacy, that would depend on the implied argument the person was trying to make. The question "Is there anyone out there who still believes climate change isn’t real?" may have the implied argument: "The vast majority of people believe climate change is real. Therefore, it is real," in which case there would be an appeal to popularity fallacy. However, the implied argument could be (this is the implied argument in my opinion): "There's so much good evidence for climate change. Therefore, it's real," and in that case there won't be an appeal to popularity fallacy. You simply have to ask for further clarification about implied claims/arguments to have a clear idea of the argument and then proceed to evaluate for fallacies.
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