Any time most anyone opens their mouth to speak…results in crimes against logic.
Being contrary is not the path to truth. Seeing truth requires intuitive insight and cannot be explained by the narrow, rationalist approach of science. Prejudice, properly executed and no matter if you are right or wrong, will give you a reputation, not for bigotry, but for wisdom. For example, dress your prejudice under the guise of science and no one may notice your opinion is wholly ‘unsupported’ by evidence. Ill-conceived prejudice will attempt to substitute sanctimony or other grand irrelevancies for evidence.
Why is insisting on your ‘right to an opinion’ such a popular argumentative ploy especially since opinion is rarely supported by evidence. People feel their opinion is sacred and everyone is obliged to handle them with great care…not so. When confronted with counterarguments to our opinion we too often do not pause to wonder if we might be wrong after all, and instead we take offense at being confronted. There are no rights without responsibilities, and this includes our right to an opinion.
The law gives all American citizens a right to life. And your right to life means that everyone else has a duty/responsibility not to kill you. Ever wonder why an abortion rights law has never been voted on nationally? Six white men and one white woman on the U.S. Supreme Court decided abortion was legal decades ago with no parameters on killing the unborn which has so far turned out to be the genocide of African-Americans. Some say this is what the founder of Planned Parenthood set out to do decades ago.
When anyone claims they have ‘a right’, you must ask, “So what duties and obligations does this right impose on others?” Does it do harm to others as in the case of abortion? This is a good test if there is or should be any such right.
No opinion is neither false nor should be suspect just because the person holding the opinion has a motive for holding it. You can spot someone trying to dissuade you from believing someone’s opinion when they use the word “just”. For example, they will argue, “Oh, you’re just saying that.” Or “Their new policy is just an attempt to win votes.” Remember, using the word “just” in an argument has no magical power to refute yet people try using it all the time to persuade.
Beware of ‘authority’ fallacies when someone refers to someone as an expert as if they are all powerful or have the right to make certain decisions. An expert may only likely be right about ‘some’ matter of fact but not of ‘all’ matter of fact. New authority figures may be just as unreliable as old authority figures. Politicians acting as authority figures too often invoke the word ‘democracy’ to seek support for their views without valid and reliable evidence to support their views because they do not have to. A politician’s trade is persuasion not for truth but to expedite… no matter what.
When an expert says, “It is not a matter of opinion but a matter of fact.” A fact does not depend on opinion. However, a fact may only contain a kernel of truth and the rest may be made up of a ‘consensus of opinion’ at that point in time which may change at any time in the future based on new information or data that comes to light.
Victims of tragedy are neither likely experts of opinion nor should they be elevated to expert opinion based on their anguish. Suffering does not make you an expert opinion. Victims’ beliefs do not make them more likely to be right.
Beware of transferred expertise. Being an expert in one area does not make you an expert in a wholly different area. Most of us only use 10% of our intellectual capacity because Albert Einstein said so. How Einstein was in a position to know this we cannot say but everyone knows how smart Einstein was meaning having a glorious aura may intimidate and bewilder the normally clear thinker…so never assume.
Mystery is used as an undiscriminating license to persuade you to believe and rules out what is coherent and well-supported by evidence. Cry mystery all you like. This will not stop you from being wrong.
The most famous argument is ‘Pascal’s Wager’ or using the words ‘odds are’. This means no matter how improbable the truth, by going with the ‘odds’ Pascal said this is always the best bet…however unlikely or improbable the truth.
Using the argument ‘but still’ acknowledges the possible truth of the argument but then the person using the ‘but still’ argument too often goes on to ignore the truth of the argument for no reason except that they wish to persuade you to draw a different conclusion. However, the fallacy of the ‘but still’ argument is if an opinion is ‘self-evident or obvious’ then you would not need to point it out with the ‘but still’ argument which makes the ‘but still’ argument illogical, unreasonable and therefore nothing more than just an opinion unsupported by evidence and therefore suspect at best. A statement as if it is ‘fact’ is nothing more than ‘opinion’ if it cannot be supported by valid and reliable evidence.
If during a discussion with someone they are making you feel that you are not so much incorrect but that you are insensitive to an issue then you are probably dealing with a ‘respectable bigot’ hell-bent on moral positioning, better known today as virtue signaling. For those who DO attain virtue does not mean they can be trusted to know ‘the path’ to attain virtue and thus may mislead you.
Ambiguity is used to ‘move’ an argument without the help of any supporting evidence to an argument laden with moral evaluation. For example, the words ‘living in poverty’ is too often misused to make you think someone is struggling to feed, clothe and shelter themselves. Someone is generally labeled by the government as ‘living in poverty’ if their household income is only 60% of the national median household income which results in 35% of all children in the USA are therefore ‘living in poverty’. However, if the absolute wealth of those ‘living in poverty’ delivers adequate welfare and opportunity to those ‘living in poverty’ then it is not at all sure that something must be done or that policy must be changed to rid everyone from ‘living in poverty’ because those that really need help in feeding, clothing and sheltering themselves would ‘odds are’ likely be those ‘living BELOW the poverty line’.
Playing with words is overwhelmingly seductive and always easier than tackling reality. The equivocator tries to change the world by replacing old words with nice new ones. A ‘shithouse’ does not make it smell any better by calling it a ‘public convenience’ and a ‘cripple’ still will not be able to stand up by calling a crippled person ‘alternatively-abled’. Prohibition on using the ‘N-word’ will not eliminate racism or improve the lives of African-Americans. The privileged person says, “I need to use the bathroom.” The poor person says, “I need to shit or I need to piss.”
Let us digress. Where did the words ‘shit’ and ‘fuck’ come from? When England was shipping manure to America for fertilizer, in the beginning, they put the manure at the bottom of the ship and all other goods on top of the manure but then found out this spoiled the goods shipped on top of manure. However, if they shipped the manure on top and all other goods on the bottom then goods would not generally spoil so every ship would write the words S.H.I.T. on the side of their ships so crews loading manure would know to ‘ship high in transit’.
The word ‘fuck’ came from England too when centuries ago the King of England had the power who could be allowed to fornicate and who could not be allowed. So, for those who were allowed they would simply declare they could ‘fuck’ meaning they had the right to ‘fornicate under consent of the king’.
Now, back to crimes against logic. ‘Begging the question’ occurs when people fail to get to the root of their disagreement which forces you to scrutinize your fundamental assumptions which is often where the disagreement lies. Most people, including the ruling elites, will not confront questions or their own assumptions and too often instead take their ‘favored answer’ for granted then simply talk straight past those who disagree. This explains its popularity with the ruling elites. For example, everyone favors tolerance…but only of what should be tolerated. And it cannot tell us what should be tolerated and what should not be tolerated, thus favoring tolerance is as empty as it is pompous. For example, the virtue of generosity does not consist in giving away others’ money but requires you to give away your own money meaning there are too few truly generous people.
Statistics are the chemical weapons of mass persuasion. Even when the numbers are right, they too often do not show what they are alleged to show meaning statistics lie and liars use statistics. Too often alleged statistical facts provide little information about the precise measures used to get the stats or how the statistical facts/results were even determined. If cases of a virus have increased 50% can be very frightening and persuasive leading to changes in policy. However, this may be misleading if there were only 50 virus cases last week and now this week there are 100 cases equaling a 50% increase out of a population of a million people. Everyone enjoys being shocked by amazing statistics until you uncover ‘shoddy sample selection’ that lay behind the amazing stats. Just do not make the mistake of acting on amazing stats…ignorance can be expensive.
What is wicked is false and what is beneficial is true. Of course not. Righteousness is not above the truth. Cultural relativism is any belief widely held at a point in time but does not make it automatically true. You must not allow yourself to get carried away and contract ‘the fever’ and start believing that what you believe is infallible.
Seriously, it is hard to argue against sincerity. However, the idea that you cannot argue against the ‘morally sincere’ displays a lack of moral seriousness. Rationality is a way of thinking that may give your beliefs the greatest ‘chance’ of being true. However, the self-centered disdain for truth will be exposed by people who hold an opinion because they want to keep the company of others who share the same opinion, or because they feel it makes them more respectable, or because they have expressed the opinion in the past and they would be embarrassed by a ‘U-turn’ or change in opinion, or the world would suit them better if the opinion were true, meaning perhaps it is better to comfort yourself with fantasies rather than believe the truth. However, approach matters this way and give up any pretensions to intellectual or moral seriousness as it exposes that you are not serious about reality. Remember, those you ‘really care about’ need to understand reality and the ‘persuasive’ world in which we live.
SUPPLEMENTAL SOURCE: THE BOOK: CRIMES AGAINST LOGIC BY PHILOSOPHER JAMIE WHYTE