Fallacy of accent

Cogito ergo sum Logic and rhetoric

Key articles

Logical fallacy Syllogism Argument

General logic

Cherry picking Quod erat demonstrandum Overprecision Loaded language Implicit bias Appeal to age

Bad logic

Ham Hightail Anecdotal evidence Golden hammer Suppressed correlative If-by-whiskey Argument from ignorance v - t - e

This fallacy is about the misleading accentuation of words. For other uses, see Accent. Not to be confused with Fallacy of accident.

The fallacy of accent (also prosody, accentus, misleading accent) occurs when the meaning of a text is changed by what word or words are stressed, and either (1) a word different than the author's intent is stressed or (2) it's unknown which word should be stressed. The meaning of a word or set of words may be drastically changed by the way they are spoken, without changing the words themselves.

The fallacy was first coined by Aristotle, who pointed out that a word with one spelling could have different pronunciation and different meaning, which effectively created multiple words. Because the written Greek of Aristotle's time had no diacritical marks, it was occasionally impossible to tell the author's intent.

It is an informal fallacy and a fallacy of ambiguity, in that it removes context that is necessary to understand the statement.

Examples

Different sentences

Who took the test?

1. I didn't take the test yesterday. (Somebody else did.)
   
2. I didn't take the test yesterday. (I did not take it.)
   
3. I didn't take the test yesterday. (I did something else with it.)
   
4. I didn't take the test yesterday. (I took a different one.)
   
5. I didn't take the test yesterday. (I took something else.)
   
6. I didn't take the test yesterday. (I took it some other day.)

Can you imagine?

Situation 1:
Amy: I can imagine Cal doing that; it's possible.
Bob: Yes, it's possible to imagine him doing that.

Bob is flatly agreeing with Amy.

Situation 2:
Amy: I can imagine Cal doing that; it's possible.
Bob: Yes, it's possible to imagine him doing that.

Bob is implying that it's possible, but unlikely, that Cal will do that.

Situation 3:
Amy: I can imagine Cal doing that; it's possible.
Bob: Yes, it's possible to imagine him doing that.

Bob is implying that it's impossible that Cal will do "that" outside of Amy's imagination.

Who does Amy love?

1. Amy said "I don't really love you now."

   Amy is implying that she loves somebody else.

2. Amy said "I don't really love you now."

   Amy is implying that her love is decreased, but still exists.

3. Amy said "I don't really love you now."

   Amy is implying that she still feels something for the speaker, but not love.

Not just one word

At an ice-cream parlour c.1982C.E.:
I've never seen a woman eat a banana like that.

Spurred-on by the risqué implication of possible sex-acts, eleven or so of us seemingly exhausted the different sentences implied by accenting a single word in that ur-sentence, then proceeded on to accenting two or more words, ending with

I've never seen a woman eat a banana like that.

The speaker claims to have experienced someone or something other than a woman literally or figuratively eating something other than a banana via some means other than vision. (In this case the speaker was a man likely claiming to have experienced unseen fellatio from another man.)

Size matters

It would be illegal to give away

Free Beer!

Different words

Accent 1	Meaning 1	Accent 2	Meaning 2
accent	an emphasis on a word	accent	to emphasize a word
increase	the act of becoming larger	increase	to become greater
insult	a disrespectful statement	insult	to speak disrespectfully
invalid	an ill person	invalid	(of an argument) faulty
record	a log of events	record	to keep track of events

See also

• Fallacy of ambiguity
• Fallacy of amphiboly
• Equivocation
• Quote mining

External links

• Attacking Faulty Reasoning, T. Damer
• On Sophistical Refutations, Aristotle