A formal fallacy is one that may be identified by merely examining the form or structure of an argument.

The following is an example of the fallacy of _____.

People who lack humility have no sense of beauty because everyone who has a sense of beauty also has humility.

The following can be best described as committing ____.

Mr. Flemming’s arguments against the rent-control initiative on the September

ballot should be taken with a grain of salt. As a landlord he would naturally be

expected to oppose the initiative.

The fallacy of _____ is committed when the conclusion of an argument depends on the erroneous transference of an attribute from a whole (or a class) onto its parts (or members).

e.g. "This airplane was made in Seattle. Therefore, every component part of this airplane was made in Seattle."

The fallacy of ____ is committed when the conclusion of an argument depends on the erroneous transference of an attribute from the parts of something onto the whole. 

e.g. "Each player on this basketball team is an excellent athlete. Therefore, the team as a whole is excellent."

The following is an example of the fallacy of _____.

Either we require forced sterilization of Third World peoples or world population will explode and all of us will die. We certainly don’t want to die, so we must require forced sterilization.

The following can be described as committing _____:

Ellen Quinn has argued that logic is not the most important thing in life.

Apparently, Ellen advocates irrationality. It has taken two million years for 

The fallacy of false dichotomy involves an ‘‘either . . . or . . .’’ statement, at least implicitly.

The fallacy of _____ is committed when two (or more) questions are asked in the guise of a single question and a single answer is then given to both of them. The argument is usually intended to trap the respondent into acknowledging something that he or she might otherwise not want to acknowledge.

e.g. Are you more hopelessly stupid today than you were yesterday?