Argument from precedent is a common argument in discussion, often used by committees or in meetings. It consists in saying that to act correctly in circumstances X would be inadvisable, in case others consider that this would set a precedent for acting in circumstances Y, where (it is argued) X and Y are superficially similar but (on close examination) are radically different. The Microcosmographia Academica, published in 1908, cited this as one of the reasons why "nothing should ever be done for the first time".
The fallacy is similar to the slippery slope argument.
Famous quotes containing the words argument, setting and/or precedent:
“My argument is that War makes rattling good history; but Peace is poor reading.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)
“Dandyism is the last flicker of heroism in decadent ages.... Dandyism is a setting sun; like the declining star, it is magnificent, without heat and full of melancholy. But alas! the rising tide of democracy, which spreads everywhere and reduces everything to the same level, is daily carrying away these last champions of human pride, and submerging, in the waters of oblivion, the last traces of these remarkable myrmidons.”
—Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)
“I am heartily tired of this life of bondage, responsibility, and toil. I wish it was at an end.... We are both physically very healthy.... Our tempers are cheerful. We are social and popular. But it is one of our greatest comforts that the pledge not to take a second term relieves us from considering it. That was a lucky thing. It is a reform—or rather a precedent for a reform, which will be valuable.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)