One More Foul. Pardon me: One more FALLACY

As I started reading Gandhi’s famous speech at Kingsley Hall, I was not able to spot the fallacies as quickly as I thought I would. Nevertheless as I read it several times, I found what I believe could be examples of fallacies. Gandhi was able to use fallacies hidden within his other use of rhetoric.  When in his speech he says, “It is not a blind law, for no blind law can govern the conduct of living being….” Other than using the fallacy of antecedent, as Daniel Solano said in his blogs, he could also be using the fallacy of many questions. When Gandhi says that there is a law, but not a “blind law”, he is already stating that there is something “governing everything”. Then he says that “no blind law can govern the conduct of living being”, here as Daniel said he is using fallacy of antecedent because if Gandhi says it, he probably is talking from background knowledge and how “blind laws” haven’t work in the past. So yes, he is using fallacy of antecedent, but also the fallacy of many questions, because he squashed two issues into one, “so that a conclusion proves another conclusion” (Heinrichs, 147). Other than this he also used tautology. Congrats Gandhi, three fallacies in one, just one more so you get your fourth foul, and out (just kidding).

The use of tautology was also very constant, as he kept repeating throughout the speech the same ideas. As Heinrichs said, when using tautology “the proof and the conclusion agree perfectly… because they are the same thing” (146). An example could be when he said, “humble and mute acceptance of divine authority makes life's journey easier even as the acceptance of earthly rule makes life under it easier.” As you can see I made the word “easier” in italic, because it is one of the reasons I believe it could classify as tautology: repeating words. Other than repeating words, the two ideas expressed in this sentence ended up with same conclusion. This was not the only example of tautology Gandhi presented. As the speech kept unraveling, he repeated more than once,  “that people don’t know who rules” and in other words, “villagers…did not know who ruled.” I’m not going to keep on exposing the types of fallacies used, not because I’m fearless, but because I wasn’t able to find more.

Oh look, I myself used a fallacy: “he repeated more than once.”

Gandhi, you and I have more in common that you could ever know.



*Note after having class: not sure anymore if my first example classified as a fallacy of many questions is correct, just saying!