The Fallacy Detective: Thirty-Eight Lessons on How to Recognize Bad Reasoning by Nathaniel Bluedorn

The Fallacy Detective: Thirty-Eight Lessons on How to Recognize Bad Reasoning Reviews

• 
  Brian Hill, UK

  I've learned so much from this book. Lots of examples too to really help you understand each fallacy. Groundbreaking. Very talented authors. When you master communication, you master life.
• 
  Susanh

  Husband bought this as a school resource for the kids, very helpful and fun.
• 
  HudsonGal

  I love the idea of this book: breaking down logical fallacies and propaganda techniques in bite size lessons for kids. As a homeschooling mom, I thought it would be the perfect supplement to our family unit study on civics and the 2020 election. In some ways, it was helpful. My kids did learn many new concepts. However, the execution in places left a lot to be desired.
  
  To start, the authors frequently use a snarky sense of humor that is much too wry for their target audience to comprehend. It makes it unclear at times whether they are joking or not and the child is left wondering, “Was this example a logical fallacy or wasn’t it?”
  
  Of greater concern are racially problematic passages and illustrations, including a primitive “jungle man” who is clearly Caucasian with large facial features and a grass skirt and hat and passages with such offensive “ethnic dialect” I had to skip over it as I read aloud to my children. Had I known of these passages, I would not have purchased this product and I highly recommend that the publishers edit out these passages in the future or pull the book.
  
  The book also has a clear political bias. Progressive policies are exclusively presented as logical fallacies throughout the book whereas conservative policies are a toss up: sometimes they are poorly presented through fallacy or propaganda, but often they are the examples that you would answer “not a fallacy” for.
  
  In summary, I would not recommend purchasing this product, as it contains some logical fallacies and propaganda of its own, and I will not be purchasing any other products from the Bluedorns.
• 
  M.

  I have been longing for an easy, fun, readable explanation into this area. This is great book that looks at logical fallacies. Well written with humour that helps keep it an enjoyable and educational read.
• 
  tony

  Great book
• 
  JGer

  I used this book while homeschooling this year. It started off quite good, but by the end I was fed up with it. If you're not American you should know that many of the examples only make sense if you know American history and politics. Any time the name Tony is used in an example you can bet there's a mafia reference or a threat of violence. The examples and descriptions are getting pretty weak by the end of the book and can be contradictory. Some of the review questions are just nonsense. The authors seem to enjoy a lot of old timey references and I am surprised to see they are under 80 years old.
• 
  Oriana

  We used this book for my grade 7 child as we are a new homeschool family and I wanted to introduce him to the idea of logic. He loves working his way through it. The book is funny and fun, and leads to great discussion. I have learned a lot as well, and enjoy browsing through the pages. Highly recommended!
• 
  LG

  This book gives examples of situations and how to reason your way through it. I would hope all parents continually do that for their kids and selves, but if you don't, this book is for you!
• 
  Su L

  It's a very organized, high value book. I'm a teacher and want to help kids reason better. I find that it's helping me a lot.