Argument from incredulity, also known as argument from personal incredulity, appeal to common sense, or the divine fallacy, is a
fallacy in informal logic. It asserts that a proposition must be false because it contradicts one's personal expectations or beliefs, or is difficult to imagine.
Arguments from incredulity can take the form:
# I cannot imagine how F could be true; therefore F must be false.
# I cannot imagine how F could be false; therefore F must be true.
Arguments from incredulity can sometimes arise from inappropriate emotional involvement, the conflation of fantasy and reality, a lack of understanding, or an instinctive 'gut' reaction, especially where time is scarce. They are also frequently used to argue that something must be
supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
in origin. This form of reasoning is
fallacious
A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning, or "wrong moves," in the construction of an argument which may appear stronger than it really is if the fallacy is not spotted. The term in the Western intellectual tradition was intr ...
because one's inability to imagine how a statement can be true or false gives no information about whether the statement is true or false in reality.
Examples
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Hanlon's razor
References
{{reflist
Informal fallacies
Paranormal