From: Kalkor (kalkor@kalkor.com)
Date: Mon Sep 29 2003 - 15:25:23 MDT
[Kalkor]
Ok, I've trimmed and copied and snipped a bit, to change this particular
discussion from one about an argument to one about argument. If anyone has
any problems with my snipping, please let me know.
So, my original proposal for this discussion, which I have purposefully left
out of this iteration of the thread (so that I can re-propose it in a
different manner), was this:
If the argument, "lots of people agree with this guy so he must be correct"
is fallacious, then wouldn't the approximate converse, "lots of people
disagree with this guy so he must be incorrect" also be fallacious?
[Hermit]
Any fallacy has to be based on the fact that the underlying information is
not accurate and relevant or that an argument is unsound or not compelling.
As academia works on the basis of consensus, the number of academics
accepting a work is relevent.
[snip]
So his rejection not being in question, and the number rejecting him being
relevent, I don't think that argumentum ad populam applies.
[Kalkor]
As Hermit points out, a fallacy just tells us that the argument is
inaccurate, irrelevant, unsound, or not compelling. (if this is not a
complete list, please help me here guys ;-})
So, where would an argument such as, "His work is not regarded
as exceptional by any significant academic group and his character is viewed
as flawed." fit into our scheme? On the one hand, since it's an academic in
discussion, whether he's viewed as correct by the rest of academia is surely
relevant. On the other hand, not being regarded as exceptional does not
necessarily imply being regarded as substandard (argumentum ad ignorantiam).
Furthermore, would the argument "his character is viewed as flawed (by an
academic group)," have ANY relevance to any discussion other than about the
character of a man?
[Jonathan Davis]
It is also a fallacy, know as Argumentum ad Odium (See
http://gncurtis.home.texas.net/emotiona.html ) and related to Argumentum ad
Numerum (see http://www.infidels.org/news/atheism/logic.html#numerum).
[Kalkor]
Jonathan pointed us to some fallacy taxonomy websites, and I will quote from
the second one:
[quote]
Argumentum ad numerum
This fallacy is closely related to the argumentum ad populum. It consists of
asserting that the more people who support or believe a proposition, the
more likely it is that that proposition is correct.
[/quote]
The approximate converse of this would be to assert "the fewer people who
support or believe a proposition, the less likely it is that the proposition
is correct." This is one of the explicit foundations behind the scientific
method, afaik. The proposition being, in most cases, "the results from the
experiment do not falsify the hypothesis."
I don't see the Ad Odium in this particular argument, but I've seen it in
others. Thanks for the links, Jonathan. I'll be doing some work on my
taxonomy after reading the second one a bit more.
[Blunderov]
I think there is a difference between ad populem (everybody says so) and
'peer review' which is an accepted part, as I understand, of the
scientific method. Of course peer review does not guarantee a 'correct'
opinion, but it does seem probable that any such opinion will at least
be based on the best available information on any given subject.
We will often have to trust in the best efforts of experts in a field,
and then compare them to each other, in order to derive our own
conclusions - it simply is not possible to read everything.
I read once that a physician-specialist, for instance, would have to
spend eight hours a day reading in order to just remain current in his
specialty. In an ideal universe everyone would read everything, but
given that this is impossible we will probably have to accept the peer
review process as being the best we can do.
One of the most important things we CAN do however is to sharpen and
maintain our ability to reason. In this way we can gain the most benefit
from that which we do have the time to read. Also it will give us a
criterion for deciding what it is not necessary or rewarding to read.
The debate between Jonathan and the Hermit was interesting to me not so
much because of the subject (about which I know next to nothing) but
because of their, mostly, adherence to the formal methodology of
argument. This was educational for me and, I imagine, other Virians.
It could have been, IMHO, even more educational from a specifically
Varian point of view had they more resolutely couched their value
judgments in terms of Scruton's conformity, or lack thereof, to the
Virian ideals.(Not that they made no attempt to do so, but it did seem
to become a bit diffused from time to time.)
[Kalkor]
Well said, and I agree. I, too, know very little about the subject of
discussion, but observing the techniques IN the discussion is always
educational for me here. Keep it up, guys!
Kalkor
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