red herring

[Ralph Miller]

No: HPFGUIDX 145287

Corey:
"What did you mean by a red herring?"

Martha:
>> I think the term "red herring" means a story or event 
deliberately set up to distract attention away something else.  
For example, we were all made to believe that Snape was after 
the stone in the first book, when the perpetrator was actually 
Quirrell.  Setting up all the suspicion about Snape was a "red
herring", to distract us from other suspects.  I have no idea 
where the phrase comes from! <<


RM:
You are correct. According to the "Fallacy Files":
The name of this fallacy comes from the sport of fox hunting in 
which a dried, smoked herring, which is red in color, is dragged 
across the trail of the fox to throw the hounds off the scent. 
Thus, a "red herring" argument is one which distracts the audience 
from the issue in question through the introduction of some 
irrelevancy. This frequently occurs during debates when there is 
an at least implicit topic, yet it is easy to lose track of it. By 
extension, it applies to any argument in which the premisses are
logically irrelevant to the conclusion.

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/redherrf.html