Ad hominem
Occurs when someone treats an attack on a person's character, motives, class, or biography as if it were a refutation of that person's argument.
TacticalEmotional
Foundational
Middle school+
Teaching path
Most common in public debate
A classroom-ready path centered on the moves that appear constantly in campaigns, punditry, and online argument.
Recommended sequence
Use the order below as a lesson sequence, review set, or comparison track.
Appeal to fear
Occurs when someone tries to secure agreement mainly by amplifying danger, threat, or panic rather than by showing that the conclusion is supported.
Emotional
Foundational
Middle school+
Appeal to authority
Occurs when someone treats an authority's endorsement as if it settled the issue, even when the authority is unqualified, the field is divided, or the claim still require...
EvidentialEmotional
Foundational
Middle school+
Bare assertion fallacy
Occurs when a contested claim is simply asserted, often confidently, without the evidence needed to justify it.
EvidentialTactical
Foundational
Middle school+
Cherry picking
Occurs when someone selects only the evidence that supports a conclusion and ignores a wider body of evidence that weakens, qualifies, or reverses it.
TacticalEvidential
Foundational
Middle school+
False dilemma
Occurs when someone presents a limited set of options as if they were the only live possibilities, while reasonable alternatives are ignored or suppressed.
Conceptual
Foundational
Middle school+
False equivalence
Occurs when two things are treated as equivalent in seriousness, meaning, or explanatory weight despite relevant differences that make the comparison misleading.
ConceptualEvidential
Foundational
Middle school+
Moving the goalpost
Occurs when evidence that was supposed to satisfy a stated standard is dismissed and a new, harder standard is introduced so the conclusion never has to be reconsidered.
TacticalEvidential
Foundational
Middle school+
Red herring
Occurs when someone diverts attention from the unresolved issue by switching to a different issue that is easier, safer, or more emotionally useful.
TacticalEmotional
Foundational
Middle school+
Slippery slope
Occurs when someone claims that a relatively small first step will trigger a chain of worsening outcomes without showing why that chain is likely, stable, or hard to stop...
CausalConceptual
Foundational
Middle school+
Straw man argument
Occurs when someone replaces an opponent's actual position with a weaker, more extreme, or simplified version and then refutes that easier target.
Tactical
Foundational
Middle school+
Tu quoque
Occurs when criticism is answered not by engaging the issue, but by pointing to similar hypocrisy or wrongdoing elsewhere.
TacticalEvidential
Foundational
Middle school+