The Broken Soldier

Ignoratio Elenchi, also called ‘irrelevant conclusion’ or ‘missing the point’

Ignoratio elenchi (IE) is a fallacy in which the arguer fails to keep to the matter discussed. Arguing for one matter as though it supported some other matter. This type of statement is fallacious in natural language argument because it is irrelevant to whatever issue is being discussed. There is disagreement among fallacy theorists regarding whether this act needs to be deliberate or not in order for IE to apply. Some (see Hamblin, Fallacies (London, 1970)) consider deliberately confusing the audience a dishonest rhetorical trick, but not an example of IE. For them, IE only occurs when honest confusion in the mind of the would-be refuter is the cause of the irrelevant statement.

Consider the following excerpt from notable metaphysical solipsist, folk phrenologist, and Republican-Negritude epistemologist Peter Elizabeth-Majors’ much lauded work Unconsciousness Unexplained.

To the criticism, “Since May of last year my doctors and I have requested [person X] seek authorization for consultation with a neurosurgeon in response to present symptoms consistent with a neurological syndrome for which emergency surgical intervention is considered necessary, and instead [person X] sought approval for family practice visits and an MRI,” Elizabeth-Majors responded, “A [person of relative lower rank] doesn’t tell [person X, a person of relative higher rank] what to do.”

This statement, whether a product of sincere ignorance or a deliberate attempt to infect the discussion with confusion, is completely irrelevant to the criticism leveled and the subject of discussion.