Hello folks, and welcome to yet another installment of Logical Fallacies Bootcamp! This series seeks to enlighten folk about common logical fallacies both formal and informal, so that they can recognize them when they encounter them out in the world or on the internet, and also examine their own thinking to avoid falling into the pitfalls of a logical fallacy themselves. I’m shooting for publishing these twice weekly, hopefully Wed. & Fri., and links to previous installments are at the bottom of this page if you’ve missed any installments so far or want to revisit them.
I hope you’ve all donned your kilts and brought your pipes, because today we’re visiting the No True Scotsman Fallacy.
In essence, the fallacy runs like this:
“No X would Y.”
“But A and B are Y!”
“Ah, but no TRUE X would Y!”
The No True Scotsman fallacy is an effort by the party using it to avoid conceding a point or admitting to an error by redefining terms to exclude selected examples of exceptions to their statement.
This fallacy is credited to British philosopher Antony Flew, and Flew’s first example of the fallacy appears in his 1966 book, God & Philosophy, and he later further elaborated on the concept in later writings.
The most famous example (inspired by Flew’s example in his 1966 book) runs something along these lines:
Angus: No Scotsman would ever put sugar on his porridge!
Duncan: But my uncle Sean puts sugar on his porridge!
Angus: Ah, but no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge!
The implication is that Duncan’s uncle is, by definition, NOT a true Scotsman because of course, no TRUE Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.
And another later example, direct from Flew himself:
"Imagine Hamish McDonald, a Scotsman, sitting down with his Press and Journal and seeing an article about how the 'Brighton Sex Maniac Strikes Again'. Hamish is shocked and declares that 'No Scotsman would do such a thing'. The next day he sits down to read his Press and Journal again and this time finds an article about an Aberdeen man whose brutal actions make the Brighton sex maniac seem almost gentlemanly. This fact shows that Hamish was wrong in his opinion but is he going to admit this? Not likely. This time he says, 'No true Scotsman would do such a thing'."
This particular fallacy has elements of “shifting the goalposts” to it by redefining the terms to maintain the purity of the argument. You could also say it has elements of the Begging the Question fallacy in that the statement assumes its own truthfulness — and in fact involves changing the terms of truthfulness on the fly, if necessary, to maintain the supposed truthfulness of the statement.
So let’s look at a couple real-world examples:
“Anyone who claims to be a Republican but who doesn’t endorse Donald Trump is a RINO!”
An example of “maintaining purity” by excluding anyone that doesn’t fit the desired profile by declaring them to NOT be, in this case, a “true Republican,” but rather just a Republican In Name Only, or RINO.
“No real Christian would ever support abortion.”
Obviously not true, but allows the speaker to “other” those inconvenient Christians out there that disagree with their point of view by declaring them not to be “true Christians.” You may also see No True Scotsman arguments made that are not quite as blatant as saying “no real X would do/believe Y.” For example, taking the abortion example above, we could retool it along these lines and it is still a No True Scotsman argument.
“People who support abortion have lost their way and are not following Jesus.”
This is a longer-winded way of saying “No true Christian would…,” but you can see that by excluding anyone that doesn’t fit the profile by “supporting abortion” as “not following Jesus,” this creates a No True Scotsman statement.
So when is a “no true X would Y” statement NOT a fallacy? When Y is actually part of what defines X. For example, “no true vegan would eat meat” is a perfectly true and not at all fallacious statement, because by definition, a vegan does not eat meat. It is literally a characteristic that defines that group, and so is not an example of the No True Scotsman fallacy.
So, to finish up here are some definitely Not True Scotsmen, the Irish Rovers, singing about a True Scotsman.
Next time on Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Ad Hominem!
Links to previous installments of this series:
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: The Strawman
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: The Slippery Slope
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Begging the Question
Logical Fallacies Bootcamp: Poisoning the Well