User:Prof. Murphy et al

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[edit] {{strawman}} : 'Straw man' and other logical fallacies

Proposed inline templates for logical fallacies. This proposal is repeated here:

In order to improve the quality of articles and reduce reversion wars, it would be useful to have a selection of inline templates with which to denote various logical fallacies. Line-based (not by section or article), use of these would help identify and resolve conflicts amicably, help save time in the Talk pages (thereby encouraging incremental improvemets), and help avert major page revisions. My sense is this is technically easy (the coding), but will require some thought for implementation. (Otherwise I'd do it myself; but I'm seeking guidance here from more seasoned Template builders.) As Wikipedia becomes more mature, measures to improve stability and quality are increasingly important. These inline templates may help achieve this.

For example, perhaps the most common form of rhetorical fallacy and abuse is the Straw man argument. To start with, could someone please create an inline template, {{strawman}}, with which to mark such arguments? At a minimum, all it really has to do is insert the words [ StrawMan ] at the point of insertion in an Article. It could do more, of course. Just to brainstorm here: e.g., it could add the article to a (new) page to be called, perhaps, [Category:Articles with logical fallacies#Straw man] or [Category:Articles with straw man fallacies]. It could automatically make mention of the sentence in the Discussion page, along the lines of:

==Logic Improvements==
  • "User [#user] suggests there may be a Straw man fallacy in this sentence: "[#sentence]". Please help to clarify the logic."

Etc. We might start with {Straw man} as an experiment. If it works well, then here are a few other fallacy templates to add later: RedHerring, Ad hominem, Correlation, PostHoc, Affirming, Majority, Ignorantiam, Circular, Equivocation. Others can be added. There should be presumably be a "Template:Fallacies" page, which lists all such templates. Presumably these would go in [Category:Wikipedia maintenance templates] and/or [Category:Wikipedia cleanup templates].

Thank you! Prof. Murphy et al 19:36, 21 May 2006 (UTC)