sophistry

[ sof-uh-stree ]

/ ˈsɒf ə stri /

a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning.

a false argument; sophism.

Origin of sophistry

1300–50; Middle English sophistrie < Middle French, equivalent to sophistre sophister + -ie -y³

an·ti·soph·ist·ry, noun

One of the arguments for intervention arising from the Syria strikes relies on a bit of sophistry.

What Israel's Attack Doesn't Mean For American Intervention In Syria |Ali Gharib |May 6, 2013 |DAILY BEAST
No amount of rouge will ever camouflage rhetoric and sophistry.

Letter to a Young Critic: William Giraldi Defends True Criticism |William Giraldi |September 5, 2012 |DAILY BEAST
But there is a sophistry which attends all the passions, especially those into which the populace enter.

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. |David Hume
People unpleasantly refer me back, and to escape I have to invent some sophistry.

The Journal of a Disappointed Man |Wilhelm Nero Pilate Barbellion

It is his inability to discover the true mode of investigation that accounts for much of Rousseau's sophistry.

The Rise of the Democracy |Joseph Clayton
In our attempt to reconcile God's conduct with morality, we resort to sophistry.

Morality Without God |M. M. Mangasarian
It is always acceptable to my mind, and, stripped of all sophistry and oblique conditions, it would appear the same to every mind.

The Speech of Monkeys |R. L. Garner

sophistry

/ (ˈsɒfɪstrɪ) /

a method of argument that is seemingly plausible though actually invalid and misleading
the art of using such arguments

subtle but unsound or fallacious reasoning

an instance of this; sophism