The Logical Fallacy's definitions

Socratic

The adjective meaning "like Socrates" or "Socrates-like". Usually applied to nouns that are involved in critical thinking.

The Socratic Method involves asking and answering questions to stimulate critical thinking and to draw out ideas and underlying presumptions.

by The Logical Fallacy September 23, 2016

feeding the alligators

When one exposes themselves to fiction that stimulates our negative qualities (like horror fiction) so that they can work through them in a healthy and harmless environment as catharsis.

Serial killers and other murderers appeal to the impulse Stephen King calls "feeding the alligators," and Carl Jung called "integration of the shadow self," but it all means the same thing: that entertaining our own dark side can be therapeutic.
-- 8-Bit Philosophy

by The Logical Fallacy May 27, 2017

Woody

An adjective meant to describe a word pleasant to the sound or pronunciation. Opposite of Tinny.

"Yes, you can't beat wood. Gorn."
"What's gone, dear?"
"Nothing, nothing -- just like the word, it gives me confidence. Gorn. Gorn -- it's got a sort of 'woody' quality about it. Gorn. Go-o-orn. Much better than 'newspaper' or 'litter bin'."
-- Graham Chapman, "The Woody Sketch" from Monty Python's Flying Circus

by The Logical Fallacy October 12, 2016

Psychovores

An animal or person that eats emotions, psychic energy and mental nutrients.

The terror of their sudden appearance seemed to galvanize the hellish creatures, sharpening their appetites as the air chilled further and the day seemed to turn overcast in moments. Harry didn't even want to contemplate the amount of power needed to do that as more than a hundred starving psychovores bore down on a crowd of schoolchildren.
-- Chapter 39 of "Harry Potter and the Nightmares of Futures Past"

by The Logical Fallacy July 9, 2017

passive goth

A person who has a passive fascination with gothic subjects (the night, despair, the night, wearing black, Hot Topic, Tim Burton, the night, etc.), but compared to an active goth, could not be identified as goth immediately on sight. They tend to not take the more dramatic lifestyle commonly associated with other goths, and are considered "moderate" in comparison. Can usually be identified by wearing all black and/or having a dark sense of humor. Not to be confused with emos or beatniks.

"You see that guy over there?"
"Who?"
"The art student in a black sweater and sunglasses."
"Oh, you mean the passive goth."
"Passive goth?"
"Yeah, you know, a goth that you wouldn't think was a goth till you ask them about how their day went. Shit gets creepy really quick."

by The Logical Fallacy July 8, 2016

Nazinflation

When the term "Nazi" is used to describe one's enemies so often and so easily, the definition itself becomes diluted and everyone now qualifies as a Nazi.

"There are two possibilities here: either the term 'Nazi' has been so overused in a process I call Nazinflation that the term is now meaningless, or everyone is actually a nazi. I'm glads my ideas are finally catching back up, I just wasn't expecting so many of my followers to be Slavic, or Brown, or JEWS! I'm not trying to gatekeep here, I'm just genuinely confused."
-- Nazi, jREG, "Nazi Doesn't Know Who To Support"

by The Logical Fallacy December 30, 2023

Day of 1000 Cuts

A type of bad day that consists primarily of mishaps and general problems that one knowingly has no right to openly complain about, either being too minor and inconsequential to be worth getting upset over or are because of that person's own poor decisions, until the person in question's temper boils over.

I overslept, I forgot to pack a lunch,I stub my toe on the way out, I have to drive for an hour while keeping a fly trapped with me in the car out of my face, I remember that I have to get an oil change, all of my ceramic pots exploded in the kiln because of air-bubbles in them, I leave my homework in my car and only remember until after I make it to class and then I have to sit in traffic in an hour, a firetruck overseeing the wreck taking up three lanes on the freeway. "Death by 1000 Cuts"? Well mine was a Day of 1000 Cuts.

by The Logical Fallacy October 4, 2018