The Poisoning the Well Argument | Rapp Report 2-Minute Daily 0019 | Andrew Rappaport | SFE | Striving for Eternity

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The Poisoning the Well Logical Fallacy

Another common logical fallacy you will often see when discussing things, whether it be religious in nature or political, is a logical fallacy known as poisoning the well. Poisoning the well is basically where someone is going to try to reject the entirety of an argument because of something that they say right up front, so that you will hopefully, if they're successful, think that because of whatever they said, everything else you say is going to be wrong.

This is a very common logical fallacy, and it's one that actually can be noticed quite easily because it will start with an argument that is looking to reject everything that is stated afterwards, because of something that could actually be true, but may have nothing to do with the rest of the argument.

So you could have someone who would argue that you're having a discussion on, say, abortion, and the person says, well this person is just against abortion, so you can't trust anything that they say. Well, the argument is, because you must be biased, therefore anything you say to defend your position would be biased and wrong.

Simply noticed, however, is the person who is making that argument would also be biased in that example. But poisoning the well is an attempt to try to discredit the entire argument by pointing out one fact.

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