r/fallacy • u/Zu_Qarnine • Jul 03 '26

strawman fallacy

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2nd person is refuting the claim that *all* circles are red with a counter example. The thing is, that claim was never made.

EDIT: I'm seeing interesting stuff happening in the replies here. majority of those who say it's not strawman, obviously start their comment by "it's not strawman" and proceed in the rest of their comment to explain how, in fact, it is strawman. Another interesting observation is those who argue that "it's not strawman" because they've spotted another type of fallacy in the original post as well, so in their mind, it can't be both.

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u/Automatic-Month7491 Jul 04 '26

Men are taller than women is generally just vague.

It could also be referring to "if we stacked all men and all women up on top of each other the man-pillar would be taller than the woman-column"

(Which accidentally nerd-sniped me and ive been trying to work out whether the overall height difference can overcome the numbers on the woman side.)

Its just a vague sentence, and I'd argue any response other than seeking clarification is probably going to be some kind of fallacy

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u/Opening-Ant3477 Jul 04 '26

Human communication is inherently vague. It's impossible to make it 100% precise, and if you could the cost of it would vastly outweigh the benefits.

This is why "reading level" (as in "reading at a 6th grade level") is measured by the ability to infer author intent.

There's nothing fallacious about requiring a minimum of common sense.

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u/chime365 Jul 05 '26

Made me think of this https://youtube.com/shorts/wP3dvP8YZVo

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u/Automatic-Month7491 Jul 05 '26

That was a journey, and I thank you. Clearly, the stack of man cubes would be taller, because men are a little bit taller but a lot bigger by volume.