Fallacy of distribution

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A fallacy of distribution is a logical fallacy occurring when an argument assumes there is no difference between a term in the distributive (referring to every member of a class) and collective (referring to the class itself as a whole) sense.

There are two different kinds of this fallacy:

• Fallacy of composition - assumes what is true of the parts is true of the whole
• Fallacy of division - assumes what is true of the whole is true of its parts (or some subset of parts)

While fallacious, arguments that make these assumptions may be persuasive because of the representativeness heuristic.

[edit] See also

• Existential fallacy
• Fallacy of the undistributed middle
• Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny

Informal fallacies v • d • e
Special pleading | Red herring | Gambler's fallacy and its inverse Fallacy of distribution (Composition | Division) | Begging the question | Many questions
Correlative-based fallacies:
	False dilemma (Perfect solution) | Denying the correlative | Suppressed correlative
Deductive fallacies:
	Accident | Converse accident
Inductive fallacies:
	Hasty generalization | Overwhelming exception | Biased sample False analogy | Misleading vividness | Conjunction fallacy
Vagueness:
	False precision | Slippery slope
Ambiguity:
	Amphibology | Continuum fallacy | False attribution (Contextomy | Quoting out of context) Equivocation (Loki's Wager | No true Scotsman)
Questionable cause:
	Correlation does not imply causation | Post hoc | Regression fallacy Texas sharpshooter | Circular cause and consequence | Wrong direction | Single cause
Other types of fallacy