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This thread makes me want to tear my eyes out.

But I'm going to ke ep drinking and lurking until I'm too smasehd to type coherently.

Then I'm going to start posting. It's gonna be fun.

Fortunately for me, you are wrong. Using logical analogies, and taking the argument to the logical extreme, is the very opposite of a strawman (also known as a reductio ad absurdum (or simply refutation by logical analogy)). They expose weak arguments which appear strong at first, for the weaksauce that they actually are.

A strawman is an argument against a position which is not logically equivalent to the actual position against which you are arguing, not an extreme example of the same structure. Also fortunately, noone has shown how the analogy is not logically equivilant.


A categorical one? No. There is merely a difference in degree, but the type of action is the same.

Edited, Oct 14th 2007 10:14pm by Pensive

I'm too lazy to look to far or deep, but strawmen wear many clothes.

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







They are very different, even categorically.

One involves a parent or guardian putting forth rules, regulations, and discipline on their own child. That, whether the child likes it or not, is usually for the childs own well being and in the end leads to the child growing up a well rounded person.

The other involves people who have no relation to the child killing them for no real reason (They weren't trying to stop the child from watching TV shows or trying to make them do their homework).

They aren't even in the same category.

Only an idiot would claim that most anti-abortion advocates claim that all abortions are not permissible, and only an even bigger idiot would claim that, because some pro-lifers believe that all abortions are evil, that all pro-lifers believe that all abortions are evil. This is perhaps more specifically a category mistake, and it is a mistake to generalize to the entire category from a single instance. It is not a mistake to look at one pro-lifer's extreme position, and then take that particular form, and argue against that particular individual.

If you can provide me an example of a place in which I have generalized the arguments against stubs and singdall to anyone else, then I'd be appreciative. Fortunately, I haven't.



Both actions are meant to subjugate another to your will; that's it. Considering them in a different category because one is more pleasant than another is fallacious simply because whether they are pleasant or not is subjective. It's not a matter of why the actions are committed; it's a matter of what happens.

***

Going afk for a while. I'm tired.

In retrospect... I've realized that I only argue with logical manipulations when I'm arguing something outside of a philosophical context, whereas in the philosophical context I've only ever focused on pragmatism and intuitions, and can't stand when people focus on the logic so much as to forget the meaning. That strikes me as kinda weird; it's like I don't have the ability to appraise the context of the argument and just use whatever the other person isn't using. I wonder why that is?

Oh well, time for food.

Edited, Oct 14th 2007 10:49pm by Pensive

The specific intent of the parent isn't relevant to his analogy as far as I can see. It's only that a person is acting in a capacity that an observer is unfamiliar with.



You don't know the soldiers weren't killing them to stop watching TV, or because the soldiers thought at the time the world was a ******** and were sparing them from experiencing it. No more than you know a parent who reprimands their child for tattling is doing it to improve the child rather than get a thrill out of beating the hell out of a kid.

The analogy is pretty simple--A in situation B doing D to E cannot be evaluated ethically by an outside observer F.

Anyway I agree with Pensive.

Feeling a bit horny because someone wrote SCotUS in the Asylum and I keep thinking *******.

Oh but yeah, you're rock solid on this one! Throbbing good work :)