Don Quixote

Don Quixote’s speech and thought are marked by obvious fallacies as a result of his profound state of confusion regarding reality and fiction. His characteristically faulty reasoning is displayed when he is offered some salted fish in an inn: 

They asked him if he’d like some of this troutling, because that was all the fish there was. ‘If you have a goodly number of troutlings,’ replied Don Quixote, ‘they will serve me as well as a trout, because it makes no difference to me whether I am given eight separate reals or a single piece of eight. What is more, it might even be that these troutlings are like veal, which is better than beef, or like kid, which is better than goat. But whatever this fish is, let it be served [...]' 

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When Quixote returns to his village, badly injured and exhausted, the doctor and barber attempt to test his sanity. Though he at first appears quite lucid and reasonable, he soon launches into a defense of knights errant and expresses his belief in fantastical creatures such as giants. When asked about the size of giants, he responds with a characteristic mix of logos and fallacy: 

‘With regard to giants,’ replied Don Quixote, ‘there are different opinions as to whether they ever existed or not [...] I cannot speak with certainty as to the size of Morgante, although I suspect that he cannot have been very tall; and I am inclined to this opinion by reading in the history where his exploits are described in detail that he often slept under a roof, and since he found houses in which there was room for him it is evident that he was not excessively large.’

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