argumentum ad populum
Sign in to saveAlso known as appeal to the people, appeal to the masses, appeal to belief, appeal to the majority, appeal to democracy, appeal to popularity, argument by consensus, consensus fallacy
fallacy of claiming that a proposition must be true because many or most people believe it
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
In argumentation theory, an argumentum ad populum (Latin for 'appeal to the people') is an informal fallacy that asserts a claim is true, good, or correct because many people allegedly think so.
Alternative names
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “argumentum ad populum” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.