Reductio Ad Absurdum

In the world of debate and rhetoric, reductio ad absurdum is a logical fallacy that occurs when someone has the audacity to argue that something can’t be true by pointing out that it would be absurd for it not to be true.

This reductio ad absurdum is often used as a debating technique and can lead to some pretty hilarious arguments. The best part about this argument, however, is how easy it is to use—you just have to know where not to use it! So if you’re ever debating with someone who’s using this technique on you, here’s what you need to know:

1 Reducing to an Absurdity Example

You are preparing for a party and you want to make your guests feel welcome. You decide that the only way this will happen is if they bring their own drinks, but only if they don’t mind sharing their drinks with each other. This seems like a great solution, right?

Let’s say that the average person drinks an entire bottle of vodka and then goes home sick in the morning with a hangover, so we’re talking about two people drinking one bottle each day for four days straight (which would be 192 shots).

If I do this math correctly, it means that everyone who comes over my house tonight will have drunk 192 shots worth of alcohol by Monday morning!

An Argument for Actually Making Dinner

There are a lot of reasons why you shouldn’t make dinner.

You’ll get tired of making the same thing over and over again, which means you’ll miss out on what’s new and exciting in your kitchen.

Your life is busy enough as it is; adding another thing to do won’t help with any of the other things you need to do. But if we’re going to talk about how much time cooking takes away from other tasks—which I’m sure we’re both aware of—then let’s be honest: We’ve all been there before at some point in our lives, where being too busy means that our entire day is spent doing something else but not getting anything done (besides watching Netflix). And that’s no good! So let’s fix this right now by making dinner together instead!

2 The Problem with Arguing by Reducing to an Absurdity

Reductio ad absurdum is a type of argument that has a flaw in it. The flaw can be in the premises, or in the conclusion. In this case, it’s an argument that proves a point by showing that the opposite of that point leads to an absurd conclusion. For example:

“If you don’t believe in God, then you must be insane.”

This can be used as an example of reductio ad absurdum because if we assume that everyone who doesn’t believe in God is insane (and thus there would be no one left on earth), then we have already proven our original premise wrong—which means we need more evidence than just saying “Well…this person thinks they’re not insane!” To show this flaw further: *“If I say something true about myself today (e.g., my wife died today), then tomorrow I’ll say something false about myself (e.,g., my wife didn’t die).”

3 How to Respond to the Reductio Ad Absurdum Fallacy

The Reductio Ad Absurdum (RA) is a common logical fallacy that occurs when the opponent of an argument attempts to discredit its validity by comparing it to an absurd or inconceivable scenario. The RA fallacy can be countered by explaining why your opponent’s argument is wrong, and then proving that their position is valid in some other way.

For example: “You’re saying that we should cut taxes on businesses so they’ll hire more people? That seems like an absurd claim.” You might respond with “How about this? We should cut taxes on businesses so they’ll build more factories.” Your opponent might say: “But what if there aren’t enough places for workers to live?” You can then explain how this would be solved by expanding housing availability through public investment in infrastructure projects like roads, bridges and railroads—and perhaps even suggesting legal reforms around zoning laws as well (which may require some political action).

You need to be very careful when you use reductio ad absurdum as a debating technique. This is because it’s a logical fallacy and it can be used to show that your opponent’s position is false, which isn’t always what you want.

4 You should avoid using reductio ad absurdum if:

Your opponent hasn’t made any claims about reality (they haven’t said anything about how the world works). For example, if someone says that all people who don’t believe in God are evil and stupid, then this would not count as an argument against their claim since they haven’t actually said anything about reality at all!

The opponent hasn’t actually given any evidence for their claim (for example, if there were two different ways of doing something but only one way was better than another one). In this case we wouldn’t say “but obviously…” or “it does seem like…” because these phrases aren’t arguments; they just provide examples rather than proof!

5 Conclusion

The reductio ad absurdum is a logical fallacy that can be used as a debating technique to make your opponent look bad. It is often used for humorous effect, but it can also be argued that the person who invokes reductio ad absurdum is trying to trick their opponent into believing something that isn’t true.