Is there a filing lawsuit fallacy?
Historical archive only. New interaction is disabled.
Original Question
One fallacious argument that I have been seeing lately on social media is this:
Person A claims X is true.
Person B claims person A is lying.
Person B claims that a lawsuit has been filed against person A for making claim X.
Therefore, person A is lying and claim x is false.
Anyone can file a lawsuit for optics. Just because a lawsuit was filed does not mean X is true or false and is not evidence for anything other than a lawsuit was filed.
An example would be: "The vaccines are harmful. Follow Dr. Fauci and Bill Gates and see where that leads, there are law suits against both of them over this"
Comments on Question
No, but perhaps there should be. I think this is common enough. Similarly and perhaps more broadly, people fallaciously believe that being accused of a crime is the same as being guilty of a crime. The "new normal" = guilty until proven innocent. Disturbing.
Answers
1Well, yes, it was originally discerned by Oliver Wendall Holmes who wrote:
“THE LIFE OF THE LAW HAS NOT BEEN LOGIC; IT HAS BEEN EXPERIENCE.
In other words Law Does not always conform or indicate logic.
Master Logical Fallacies Online
Take the Virversity course and sharpen your reasoning skills with structured lessons.
View Online Course
An analogous example is, "X said asomthing that is demonstrably not true, therefore X lied." It maybe a falsehood, but unless it was intended to deceive, it is not a lie.