Appeal to tradition is a common fallacy

Fallacy

In logic and rhetoric, a fallacy is usually an incorrect argumentation in reasoning resulting in a misconception or presumption. By accident or design, fallacies may exploit emotional triggers in the listener or interlocutor , or take advantage of social relationships between people...

 in which a thesis is deemed correct on the basis that it correlates with some past or present tradition. The appeal takes the form of "this is right because we've always done it this way."

An appeal to tradition essentially makes two assumptions that are not necessarily true:

• The old way of thinking
  Thought
  "Thought" generally refers to any mental or intellectual activity involving an individual's subjective consciousness. It can refer either to the act of thinking or the resulting ideas or arrangements of ideas. Similar concepts include cognition, sentience, consciousness, and imagination...
  
   was proven correct when introduced, i.e. since the old way of thinking was prevalent, it was necessarily correct.
  • In actuality this may be false — the tradition might be entirely based on incorrect grounds.
• The past justifications for the tradition are still valid at present.
  • In actuality, the circumstances may have changed; this assumption may also therefore be untrue.

The opposite of an appeal to tradition is an appeal to novelty

Appeal to novelty

The appeal to novelty is a fallacy in which someone prematurely claims that an idea or proposal is correct or superior, exclusively because it is new and modern. In a controversy between status quo and new inventions, an appeal to novelty argument isn't in itself a valid argument...

, claiming something is good because it is new.

Examples

• "Gay marriage is a bad idea because gay marriage has no historical precedent."

Rebuttal: To reject the fallacy as inherently fallacious, one would argue that even a lack of precedents would not, by itself, justify keeping the policy, as innovations, such as lending libraries and professional police and firefighting forces, have turned out to have been valuable changes in policy. To bring up the factual incorrectness of the claim by mentioning ancient and modern examples of legal same-sex marriage does not rebut the fallacy as a fallacy, it merely debunks the factual claim without bothering to address the underlying fundamental flaw in logic.

• "Gay marriage is acceptable because gay marriage does have historical precedent."

Rebuttal: The presence of precedents does not, by itself, justify maintaining or reviving a policy. Were precedent sufficient justification on its own, then practices such as slavery and gender-selection infanticide could be justified by the same argument.

• "These rules were written 100 years ago and we have always followed them. Therefore, there is no need to change them."

Rebuttal: the society in which the rules were written has changed, and thus those rules may no longer be applicable.

• "Murdering innocents is wrong, because it has been considered so since the dawn of civilization."

Rebuttal: Had it always been considered correct, we could still use ethical reasons to start condemning it now.

• "Men should always pay for dates, because men have always paid for dates."

Rebuttal: Until recently, men were the only sex that could earn substantial income and wealth. Consequently, they were the only sex that had the ability to pay for dates, and it became customary to do so. This however, is no longer the case. The financial disparity that once existed between the two sexes to justify such a tradition no longer exists today. Thus, this tradition may no longer be applicable; and may be quite abusive given the current circumstances.

• "Women should stay at home, because women have always stayed at home."

Rebuttal: Women stayed at home because of very limited alternative functions in society due to gender based discrimination. However, this is no longer the case today. Therefore, it would be incorrect to derive the same conclusion based on history when the current circumstances are indeed different. Under modern economic conditions, a family might actually receive greater benefit from an additional household income than someone who simply stays home.

In all of these cases, the fallacious statement in question misses the point of why something is said to be right or wrong. For example, the statement that "men should pay for dates because this shows humility on the part of the man," whether correct or not, is an argument with supporting arguments that are not circular and can be directly addressed.

See also

• Social inertia
  Social inertia
  Social inertia is a term that applies the concept of inertia to psychology and sociology. It is used to describe the resistance to change presented by societies or social groups, usually due to habit...
  
  
• Traditionalism
  Traditionalism
  Traditionalism may refer to:*The systematic emphasis on the value of Tradition*Traditionalism *Traditional values, those beliefs, moral codes, and mores that are passed down from generation to generation....
  
  
• Common sense
  Common sense
  Common sense is defined by Merriam-Webster as, "sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts." Thus, "common sense" equates to the knowledge and experience which most people already have, or which the person using the term believes that they do or should have...
  
  
• Inductive reasoning
  Inductive reasoning
  Inductive reasoning, also known as induction or inductive logic, is a kind of reasoning that constructs or evaluates propositions that are abstractions of observations. It is commonly construed as a form of reasoning that makes generalizations based on individual instances...
  
  
• Cargo cult
  Cargo cult
  A cargo cult is a religious practice that has appeared in many traditional pre-industrial tribal societies in the wake of interaction with technologically advanced cultures. The cults focus on obtaining the material wealth of the advanced culture through magic and religious rituals and practices...