Detective: Bill has been accused of committing the burglary at the warehouse last night. ███ ██ ███ ███ ████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ██ ████ ████████ ████ ████ ███ ███ ██████ ███ █████████
The detective concludes that Bill did not commit the warehouse burglary last night. The basis for this conclusion is that no one saw Bill near the scene of the crime.
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of mistaking an unsupported conclusion for a false one. In this case, while we don’t have enough evidence to conclude that Bill was guilty, we can’t jump from that to definitively conclude that he was innocent.
For example, perhaps he is guilty, but no one saw him because he stealthily evaded detection after committing the crime.
The reasoning in the detective's ████████ ██ ████ ██████████ ██ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ███ ████████
treats evidence that ██ ██████████ ██ ███ █████████ ████████ ██ ██ ██ ████ ████████
The detective doesn’t do this—eyewitness evidence of the burglar’s identity is relevant.
merely attacks the █████████ ██ ██████ ████████
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of ad hominem (attacking the source); it isn’t applicable here because the detective doesn’t say anything about the accusers’ character.
fails to provide ███████████ ████████ ███ ███ ██████ ████ ████ █████████ ███ ████████
Since the conclusion is that Bill did not commit the burglary, failing to provide evidence that he did commit it could not possibly be the flaw in the argument.
treats a lack ██ ████████ ███████ ████ ██ ██ ██ ██████████ ████
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of mistaking a lack of support for a false conclusion. The detective notes that one form of evidence that would prove a theory (Bill’s guilt) true is missing. He erroneously concludes from that that the theory must be false.
fails to establish ███ ████ ████████ ██ ███ ███████
The detective doesn’t need to establish the true identity of the burglar to conclude that Bill isn’t the burglar.
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