Slippery Slope
From SkepticWiki
[edit] Definition
Slippery Slope is a situation in which a minor detail may lead to disastrous results. In argumentation, it is the situation where acceptance of a minor detail of the opposing position will greatly weaken one's own position.
The same idea is evoked in the image of a "Camel's nose under the tent". While it seems perfectly harmless by itself to give a small piece of food to the camel, doing so leads inevitably to the more serious problem of having an entire camel in the tent.
A related logical fallacy is that the minor detail of the opposing position must be rejected because it will weaken one's own position.
[edit] Examples
The slippery slope situation in argument is illustrated by the following popular parable:
- Protagonist: Will you have sex with me for a million dollars?
- Antagonist: Sure!
- Protagonist: How about for ten dollars?
- Antagonist: What kind of woman do you think I am?
- Protagonist: We've already established that, now we're just arguing over the price.
In this case, Antagonist has lost the availability of her major argument over what seemed like a minor concession.
A logical fallacy occurs when one rejects the minor concession purely because of the effect on the argument. For example:
- Killing humans is wrong,
- If "abortion is permissible" is accepted, then similar arguments force the acceptance of "killing of humans is permissible".
- Therefore abortion is wrong.
This is a fallacy because it applies meta-logical reasoning to the argument. It is also possible that different arguments apply to 1) and 3), so that 3 could be false, and 1) could be true.
