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Name the fallacy

Ad hominem, straw man, false dilemma, post hoc, slippery slope: read a short argument and name the one move it makes. Fresh wording each time.

  • Logic
  • Untimed
  • Endless levels

How it plays

Each question is a short argument about an everyday matter — a bus lane, a library, a lucky pen — that makes one classic bad move. Name it. The working gives the definition and points at the step where the move is made.

Levels start with the commonest (attacking the person, the straw man, the false choice, after-therefore-because, the irrelevant expert, the popular belief), then add slippery slopes, circles, "you too" and hasty generalisations, then composition, division and the appeal to nature. Past those, the wording gets subtler and the clock tightens.

Every argument is written from a template to make exactly one move; names that overlap with it (a "you too" is also an attack on the person) are never offered beside it. The wrong options are the names it is most often confused with. This is the least mechanical game here: an item that turns out ambiguous is withdrawn, not argued.

Keys

Space starts and skips ahead · 1–9 pick · Enter submits · Esc stops. On a phone, tap.

What it trains

This makes recognising and naming these argument patterns quicker and surer. It is practice with these templates, not a measured gain in reasoning elsewhere.

Learn

How to get better at name the fallacy: the method, the techniques, what each new level asks of you, and the traps the wrong answers are made of.

Your approach to each question

  1. Find the step. Every argument here makes one bad move, usually in one sentence — the reply in a dialogue, or the “so” in a single line. Point at it before you read the options.
  2. Say what that step does, in your own plain words: “attacks the speaker”, “says it came after, so it was caused”, “only two choices”. A plain description is nearer the name than any guess.
  3. Then match your description to a name. If two options both seem to fit, ask the question that splits them — whose claim is attacked, how many people are cited, which way the property moves.

Techniques and tricks

  • Claim or person?

    When one speaker answers another, check what the answer is about. About the speaker — their school marks, their manners — is ad hominem. “You do it too” is tu quoque. About a bigger, sillier version of the claim is a straw man.

    e.g. “So Asha wants our roads to crumble to dust” after Asha asked for a little less road spending: straw man

  • Hold the two claims side by side

    For a suspected straw man, put what was said next to what was attacked. Look for the words that grew: a little → none, one month → for ever, try → force.

  • Count the voices

    One famous person vouching for a claim outside their field is an appeal to authority. Millions believing it, or a best-seller, is the bandwagon. Two cases turned into a rule about everyone is a hasty generalisation.

    e.g. “A prize-winning physicist says this herbal tea cures colds” — a real expert, but not in this: appeal to authority

  • Which way does it move?

    If a property passes from the parts to the whole, it is composition. If it passes from the whole to the parts, it is division. Find the word for the whole and the word for the part, then see which comes first.

    e.g. “Every player is excellent, so the team is excellent” is composition; “The city is noisy, so every street is noisy” is division

  • Listen for the signal words

    Each move has a habit. “Either … or” with two options: false dilemma. “Next … then … soon”: slippery slope. “After”, “since” or “started … and has … ever since”: post hoc. “Natural”: appeal to nature.

  • Reason or repeat?

    Read the reason, then read the conclusion. If they say the same thing in different words, or each is propped up only by the other, it is circular reasoning.

    e.g. “It is the best plan, because no other plan is as good” — the reason is the conclusion again

As the levels climb

  • The ladder opens with the six commonest: ad hominem, straw man, false dilemma, post hoc, appeal to authority and the bandwagon. The next level adds slippery slope, circular reasoning, tu quoque and hasty generalisation.
  • Two levels on, the last three arrive: composition, division and the appeal to nature. When a set is new, it makes up a larger share of the questions, so expect to see the new names often for a while.
  • Once all thirteen are open, the wording gets subtler: the move is told rather than spoken, the expert is a real expert in the wrong field, and the straw man distorts a one-month trial into “for ever”. Look for the step, not for a giveaway word.
  • If Time pressure is on, each question starts at 25 seconds and the clock closes about 7% a level as you climb, down to half. By then you need the splitting questions above to be instant.

Traps to avoid

  • Straw man against ad hominem — each is the other’s favourite lure. If the reply misquotes the claim, it is a straw man even if it is rude; if it never touches the claim, it is ad hominem.
  • Slippery slope against false dilemma. A slope is a chain of steps getting worse; a dilemma is a fork with two branches. Count: several steps or two choices?
  • Composition against division. Both involve a whole and its parts; only the direction differs. Each is offered as the lure for the other, so check the direction every time.
  • Post hoc against the bandwagon: a lucky pen that “works” is about one thing following another, not about how many people believe it. Ask whether time order or popularity is doing the work.
  • Calling an out-of-field expert ad hominem. Nothing in the argument attacks anyone; it leans on a person’s standing, which makes it an appeal to authority.

How to practise

  • Use “Kinds of question” to drill a confusable pair alone: tick only Composition and Division, or only Straw man and Ad hominem, until you never mix them, then tick all thirteen again.
  • Raise “Options shown” to 8 once 4 is easy. With more names on screen you have to know the move, not eliminate your way to it.
  • Before you look at the options, say the move in one sentence. Then read the working’s “Here:” line and compare it with what you said.
  • Turn Time pressure on, at Relaxed, only when every name is right without it. Speed here comes from the splitting questions, not from reading faster.

Levels

It is untimed unless you turn the clock on. There is no last level: at least one dial turns without end. Your level is judged on your last ten answers, every ten: 90% moves you up, below 80% moves you down, which holds most people near four in five right.

All of it is in the settings beside Start — how many answers a judgement looks at and how often it recalibrates, the thresholds, the time, which questions, how many options, and whether you see each verdict at once or review them together at the judgement. You can also jump to any level.

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