Volume 6 · The Unfinished Syllabus · Essay 95

Fallacy of Known Intent

A fallacy is a shortcut with a pothole in it. Fallacy of Known Intent is one of the busier potholes on the road of reasoning.

Once you can name this fallacy, you will hear it everywhere — in advertisements, in debates, in your own head at 2 a.m. Do not despair. Hearing it is the beginning of escaping it.

Watch a master carpenter teach an apprentice. He does not lecture; he lets the boy hold the wrong end of the saw until the wood itself becomes the teacher.

Learning is the one wealth that survives every partition of fortune. And when you forget it — you will — the world will remind you. It is a faithful tutor.