Conclusion which denies premises 37the original claim usually beg the question or subvert the argu-
ment, 'Everything in the universe must have a cause outside of
itself ...' The intention is clearly to establish a cause which is
outside of the universe and therefore needs no cause to account
for it. Unfortunately, the rewording admits several faults.
- The new version is more complex and is not obviously true.
- The universe is not in the universe, it is the universe.
- 'Everything in the universe' is the universe.
This allows us to translate the opening line as: 'The universe must
have a cause outside of itself.' Given such an assumption, it is
hardly surprising that we go on to prove it.
There are many simpler versions in popular currency, none of
them free from the basic inconsistency of allowing the preferred
answer to be the one permitted exception.
No matter how many stages you take it back, everything must have had
a beginning somewhere. Cod started it all.
(He, presumably, did not have a beginning somewhere.)Nothing can go on forever. There must have been a god to start it.
(One who goes on forever, of course.)When using the conclusion which denies premises, you
should bear in mind three things. First, the more distance there is
between your opening line and your conclusion, the less likely
are your audience to spot the contradiction. Second, they will
often allow a speaker to make statements about 'everyone'
without applying them to the speaker himself. Third, if your
conclusion is about things which are usually admitted to have
exceptional properties, your fallacy has a better chance of
escaping detection.