MORE Bad Arguments

My own supplement to various resources on logical fallacies.

In many cases below, I will refer to the H-1B work visa controversy, as it is one that I am highly familiar with, having been a major critic of the program. Thus it provides an easy source of examples for me.

In a nutshell, here is the issue: The tech industry wants Congress to increase the yearly cap on new visas, saying there is a tech labor shortage. The critics counter that there is no shortage, and that the employers simply want a source of cheap, immobile labor. This is in turn related to the issue of international graduate students at U.S. universities, who tend to be hired as H-1Bs after graduation, a typical reason the foreign students come to the U.S. for study.

NOTE CAREFULLY: The fact that someone uses bad arguments for or against a certain issue does NOT imply that his/her stance on the issue itself is wrong. H-1B, for instance, is a complex issue, and reasonable people may disagree with each other on it.

General Issues

Statistical Issues