In Chapter 6 of the Epstein text I came across a section that is called "False Dilemma". Epstein states, " A false dilemma is a bad use of excluding possibilities where the 'or' claim is false or impossible. Sometimes just the dubious 'or' claim itself is called a "false dilemma" (118). An example of a bad argument or a false dilemmas would be when the claim doesn't list all the possibilities. An example of a false dilemma would be:
My Girlfriend says, " You watch too much football all Sunday morning until the last game Sunday night and instead you should be doing something productive like using the new treadmill you just purchased. Either you limit your Sunday morning to one game and then do something productive for the rest of Sunday or the t.v. has to go.
I say : You can't take the t.v. away from me just for watching football.
My girlfriend says, " So you agree to limit your football to one game on Sunday"
Even though my girlfriend it trying to make an argument to stop me to watch football its not a very good one because she her claim doesn't state all the possibilities of what will happen if I don't stop watching football. So the example above is an example of a "False dilemma".
I like your post because it is very informing on what a false dilemma really is. It reminds me of the same false dilemma that came up when I was at my girlfriends place last weekend. On Sunday all I wanted was to watch some of the Raiders game in the morning and my girlfriend brought up the whole thing about why guys like to watch football so much on Sundays. She said to stop watching football or else we were going out to do what she wanted to do. I do not think that some girls realize that football is the only thing that most guys watch on tv all week.
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