Literature – Critique John Leo's "In Defense of Lies" ultimately makes a poor argument for his point, which is that facts and fiction are routinely mixed by lies in our society and that this lying is made acceptable by intellectually dishonest defenses. He uses inductive reasoning in a poor attempt to convince us of the sweeping dishonesty throughout our universities and society. He also uses fallacies such as non sequiturs, ad hominem attacks against individuals and circular argument, along with "expert testimony," distorted quotations and homemade, non-numbered statistics to prove a sweeping point which is not successfully made. Leo could have written an excellently persuasive article about some disturbing incidents of dishonesty but ultimately aimed too broadly and failed to make his argument that facts and fiction are routinely mixed by lies in our society and that this lying is made acceptable by intellectually dishonest defenses.
John Leo's "In Defense of Lies" ultimately makes a poor argument for his point, which is that facts and fiction are routinely mixed by lies in our society and that this lying is made acceptable by intellectually dishonest defenses. He uses inductive reasoning to make his ultimate point but fails in that attempt due to his non-sequiturs, ad hominem attacks against individuals and circular argument, along with improperly used "expert testimony," distorted quotations and homemade statistics that do not logically support his argument. The article succeeds in proving that there are some disturbing incidents of dishonesty but fails in proving Leo's ultimate argument.
Good or Poor Argument
John Leo's "In Defense of Lies" is ultimately a poor argument for the issue that he seems to define, which is that facts and fiction are routinely mixed by lies in our society and that this lying is made acceptable by intellectually dishonest defenses. Although Leo gives some disturbing examples of lying and defense of lying, his article is not persuasive enough to make his case or win his argument, mostly because he overreaches and makes sweeping generalizations that are not necessarily supported by his examples.
b. Induction or Deduction?
Inductive reasoning reaches a conclusion "from the bottom up" through specific examples; deductive reasoning reaches a conclusion "from the top down" with general statements. Leo uses deductive reasoning for one point, which works, but inductive reasoning for his main argument, which does not work. He successfully uses deductive reasoning to show one point, that there are some serious examples of important individuals lying and other important individuals excusing those lies. Leo reaches the conclusion from deductive reasoning by using specific examples in which people lied and the lie was excused, for example: Joseph Ellis lying about being in Vietnam, and the excuses by Edmund Morris that everybody does it, President Reagan did it and the urgent desire Ellis felt to convey the 60's divisiveness; President Reagan lying about being at the liberation of Nazi concentration camps, and the lie was excused because of the genuineness of Reagan's emotions; Patricia Smith's fabrication of heartfelt stories as a columnist, and the lie was excused because she felt in her heart that the stories were true. However, Leo unsuccessfully uses inductive reasoning for his larger argument by making sweeping statements about how widespread dishonesty is, for example on college campuses, though that is not adequately supported by his examples.
c. Fallacies
A serious fallacy in Leo's article is the non-sequitur -- the argument in which the conclusion does not necessarily follow the premises. For example, Leo speaks of the writer who falsely wrote about the oppression of the poor in Central America but whose lies were excused because she supposedly did it for a good cause and won a Nobel Prize. From that, he says, "This cynical attitude is strong these days on campus, where postmodern theory erodes basic truthfulness by holding that facts and truth don't really exist." He then tries to support that argument by quoting Two University of Pennsylvania professors who claim, "We are all engaged in writing a kind of propaganda. Rather than believe in the absolute truth of what we are writing, we must believe in the moral or political positions we are taking with it." According to Leo, this means that "Feelings and political stances count. Facts and truth don't." The non-sequitur is his conclusion that there is a cynical attitude on campus, with postmodern theory eroding basic truthfulness. That conclusion does not necessarily follow from his example of the dishonest Nobel Prize winner or the two university professors. This is a sweeping condemnation of universities that is not warranted by the examples he cites.
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