How we can all make the Celestial Forum a better place

[_dartagnan]

I'm no expert in logic, but this sounds like a "circumstantial ad hominem" argument, which goes something like this:

Person A makes claim X.
Person B asserts that A makes claim X because it is in A's interest to claim X.
Therefore claim X is false.

or

Person A makes claim X.
Person B makes an attack on A's circumstances.
Therefore X is false.

Actuall what Zarefsky is saying is: "Ad hominem arguments may sometimes provide valid reasons for questioning the arguments put forward by others." So the issue is not about declaring it false. I don't for a second think any of my "ad hominems" or "juvenile comments" have in any sense refuted arguments. Of course not. JAK's arguments, if that is what you want to call them, have been dealt with and have been shown to be based in ignorance in previous posts. Just because he likes to repaste his favorite themes in various threads, pretending they have never been addressed or refuted, doesn't mean I like to continue writing up long refutations every single time just to prove I can keep up. It is as if he is trying to compensate for his ignorance by showing us he can at least win the posting marathon. But false statements never become true via repetition.

Yes, it gets annoying for me to see this over and over and I might make a snarky remark now and then (knowing perfectly well marg will use this as an excuse to derail about ad homs). That's just part of my personality that I doubt anyone here will ever appreciate. But I do so for a reason, and I believe that reason is valid. JAK has done enough to destroy his own credibility, and I simply reiterate this point because it needs to be known that he cannot be taken seriously.

[_marg]

Source: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html



Thanks Trevor,

I was hoping to come back to this thread and see that Shades had responded to my questions so that it would indicate to me he was genuinely interested in both furthering this discussion productively and in coming to a meeting of the minds on what is fallacious ad hominems. At this point I don't know if he's interested or not. He's had time to respond, he's responded elsewhere on the board.

So Shades argued that what I pointed out as ad homs of Kevin's post was not what he considered ad homs except for one example. I responded that I hadn't mentioned the word "fallacious". I believe on its own "ad hominems" means "to the man".

Dart writes :

"As far as ad hominem is concerned, I follow David Zarefsky's take, professor of argumentation and debate at Northwestern University:

"it is not even the case that ad hominem arguments are always fallacious. Ad hominem arguments may sometimes provide valid reasons for questioning the arguments put forward by others. One such instance would be if the person putting forward an argument had a bias or vested interest that prevented them from being impartial about the claim they were putting forth.""

I too follow David Zarefsky’s take. One of the reasons I did not write “fallacious” is because this thread started out with the issues presented by Shades of what mistakes marg, dart and JAK made. Therefore just about anything in this thread addressing or critiquing the way marg, dart or Kevin argues could be considered on-topic..therefore not fallacious, because it is pertinent to the topic. Of course most discussions start out as issues which are not about individuals in discussion. This is why I asked Shades to review the list I wrote of ad hominims by CC & Gad in the thread Logic and Theology because that topic was not about individuals, nor for example was the topic “Evidence for Jesus. Attacking individuals instead of the argument is fallacious ad hominem, unless the topic starts out as attacking individuals being the topic.

What I am discussing here is greater than how Kevin argues, I am talking concepts with Kevin being used as the main example. The issue though is whether ad hominems are moderated for or not in the Celestial, because you say they are and I say they are not. I pointed out Kevin’s response as containing ad hominems, his post was essentially one attack after another directed "to the man" or ad hominal, so yes his post was ad hominal. Whether any of the attacks were justified and were on topic is another issue. First we'd have to establish what is the main issues, and then the sub issues. Since this thread started out essentially as an attack of marg, dart and JAK, any attack can pretty much be argued as on topic to some extent.

So this thread had evolved to a sub argument from the original opening post, to my claim that excessive fallacious ad hominems are not moderated out of the Celestial and hence an individual may prevent a discussion from progressing. Shades, your response is a counter to that, you say the Celestial is moderated for ad hominems, I'm assuming you mean fallcious ones, and that what I view as fall. ad hominems is simply the opinion of the other person. Well first of all, all ad hominems are opinion of the other person, sometimes they are relevant to an argument, more often than not in discussion/argument they are employed as a tactic to shift focus off the issues to the person instead. That is faulty reasoning, hence fallacious.

I have always said in my discussions on ad hominems that occasionally they are not a problem, but excessively, they are harrassment. They are disruptive as well and can derail a thread. They certainly are a waste of time for all involved. Since in moderation determinination of what is excessive is a judgment call, one way of dealing with it is to not allow ad hominems at all in the Celestial. That is simply a suggestion, what you actually do, I have little interest in.

I’ll look at your post later Shades and probably respond to your words as well as further elaborate on ad hominems. Once again thanks Trevor for your input.

[_Trevor]

Actually what Zarefsky is saying is: "Ad hominem arguments may sometimes provide valid reasons for questioning the arguments put forward by others."

My bad. I should have read this with more care. It looks like the Nizkor list essentially follows his point.

So the issue is not about declaring it false. I don't for a second think any of my "ad hominems" or "juvenile comments" have in any sense refuted arguments. Of course not. JAK's arguments, if that is what you want to call them, have been dealt with and have been shown to be based in ignorance in previous posts. Just because he likes to repaste his favorite themes in various threads, pretending they have never been addressed or refuted, doesn't mean I like to continue writing up long refutations every single time just to prove I can keep up. It is as if he is trying to compensate for his ignorance by showing us he can at least win the posting marathon. But false statements never become true via repetition.

Yes, it gets annoying for me to see this over and over and I might make a snarky remark now and then (knowing perfectly well marg will use this as an excuse to derail about ad homs). That's just part of my personality that I doubt anyone here will ever appreciate. But I do so for a reason, and I believe that reason is valid. JAK has done enough to destroy his own credibility, and I simply reiterate this point because it needs to be known that he cannot be taken seriously.

Well, none of us are perfect. Sometimes I have a difficult time resisting the urge to point out the aspects of your posts that annoy the daylights out of me. Still, I am trying. I have a theory that some people deserve silence in response to their posts, since the stuff they post is largely pointless. Failing that, I want to be able to respond cooly, even when things they post really irritate me. I don't think stoking the ire of others or myself is healthy. Maybe, just maybe, if bad posting habits are not rewarded, they will reduce in number. I do not believe, however, that they will simply disappear.

[_Trevor]

I’ll look at your post later Shades and probably respond to your words as well as further elaborate on ad hominems. Once again thanks Trevor for your input.

No problem, marg. My advice would be not to bite, when presented with this kind of bait. Kevin's weakness is that he overindulges in exactly the kinds of things that are annoying you. And, he likes to go to extremes, like when he calls arguments he does not agree with "patently absurd" (a tactic that not infrequently undercuts his own position). I say just deal with it in a healthy way. Kevin is Kevin.

Shades is obviously not overly concerned with the fact that Kevin's behavior drives you and others to distraction. Shades might naturally be sympathetic with Kevin, but given the fact that he doesn't rein in Coggins7, rcrocket, and other posters who litter this board, Shades is not being especially egregious in not taking Kevin to task. And, I'll take Kevin over those two any day of the week.

[_marg]

I’ll look at your post later Shades and probably respond to your words as well as further elaborate on ad hominems. Once again thanks Trevor for your input.

No problem, marg. My advice would be not to bite, when presented with this kind of bait. Kevin's weakness is that he overindulges in exactly the kinds of things that are annoying you. And, he likes to go to extremes, like when he calls arguments he does not agree with "patently absurd" (a tactic that not infrequently undercuts his own position). I say just deal with it in a healthy way. Kevin is Kevin.

Well the way this started out Trevor and it's still at this point by the way, is that we were ignoring Kevin for the most part. But then the thread got moved, and I enquired and apparently Shades, Liz and others think "we" did something wrong. Shades has implied that much in this thread as well. His opening post in this thread is an attack on myself, JAK and Kevin, though the attack there is for different reasons. And he has continued to say I must have done something such that the thread got moved. So by persisting in this what I'm finding out is that if someone wants to harrass someone on this board they can. Shade's only policy for attacks is to move threads, though now if one person is attacking the thread will stay. I knew that about the Terrestial and Telestial level allowed attacks, but I thought, Shades was interested in keeping the Celestial above that. I'm apparently wrong about that.

JAK is an exceptionally excellent critical thinker. I've read his post enough years to appreciate that. I am very appreciative of what I've learned from him. Being as he is good at critical thinking he is also a target by those who disagree with him and want him silenced which is what Kevin has said. To give an analogy, its like in hockey (which I don't even watch by the way) but when there is a really good player the other team will send guys out to attack the good player. Without protection from team mates that excellent player wouldn't have a hope, he'd be attacked constantly to the point that he couldn't play. That is the sort of thing on a much smaller scale developing here. This is what Kevin is doing. He's not giving his opinions of people he disagrees with, he's not refuting the arguments he is focusing on attacking. It's a little better now that the mods aren't going to be trigger happy and move threads around at whim, especially in favor of Kevin, but still the Celestial is a waste of time to be part of if someone is going to be intent on harassing.

I'm saying a couple of things to Shades, one is that "we" didn't do anything wrong. I take exception to his opening post and he has continued with that accusation in further posts. I didn't focus on Kevin in my pm's to Shades as I explained in a previous post, my focus was the moderation. As I say the details I've discussed in a previous post in this thread.

If this thread is about how to make the Celestial a better place, then all those things that Shades mentions in the opening post are crap to put it bluntly. Kevin didn't use direct words, that was never the problem. I didn't focus on Kevin, my focus was always on moderation. JAK focusses on critical thinking in argumentation so understandably he'd assume that explaining God is an axiom from which all other religious theories are built would be acceptable to present in discussions. Shades's complaint is that he's not applying good etiquette. Meanwhile this board voted against the notion that people should be allowed religious assumptions in discussion and Shades reversed that proposal as a consequence. But if Shades is so concerned about etiquette enough to request JAK to not apply critical thinking and allow religious assumptions unchallenged then where is his protest or interest in curtailing harassment with excessive ad hominems?

If anything will make the Celestial a better place, it would be elimination of ad hominems. They can turn into harassment enough to drive people from a board, they waste people's time, they derail discussions, they are intellectually dishonest, tactical, disingenous and deserve no support in a forum which purports to be heavily moderated with a focus on scholarly, polite respectful discussions.

Shades is obviously not overly concerned with the fact that Kevin's behavior drives you and others to distraction. Shades might naturally be sympathetic with Kevin, but given the fact that he doesn't rein in Coggins7, rcrocket, and other posters who litter this board, Shades is not being especially egregious in not taking Kevin to task. And, I'll take Kevin over those two any day of the week.

Trevor, #1, this isn't all about Kevin and #2 what goes on in Terrestial and Telestial is supposedly different than Celestial.

I still take exception to Shade's opening post. I will repeat, it all started with the thread Evidence for Jesus being moved and me enquiring of him what was done wrong and him basically brushing me off. Even in this thread, he still is saying it was moved due to me, JAK and Dart. so little has changed. Now he's added additional complaint in his opening post. I really am pissed off that JAK has put in a good deal of time and effort into his posts, on occasion I have, neither one of us resort to game playing, frequent fall. ad homs in lieu of topic, and yet we are being crap upon. And by people who I haven't notice put much time into their posts themselves. in my opinion they all have a nerve. And if this thread is truly all about improving the Celestial, making it a place for productive discussions, then what Shades should be focussing on is not us, we were not the problem, he should be focussing on curtailing ad homs.

[_richardMdBorn]

Marg JAK is an exceptionally excellent critical thinker.

That is NOT the case.

Example 1

JAK:

According to the doctrine of “Immaculate Conception” (Christianity), Joseph was not the father of the claimed “Messiah” in Jesus.

Here is one doctrinal statement of Immaculate Conception

The doctrine is that neither Mary nor Joseph were biologically connected to Jesus. Mary was a “virgin.” The doctrinal claim is that the whole of Jesus was immaculate Conception and birth. Mary was merely the carrier of God’s creation.

http://www.mormondiscussions.com/discuss/viewtopic.php?t=5698&start=63

Is spite of being proven wrong several times in this thread, JAK still doesn't seem to get it.

Example 2

JAK And the fact that nothing was written of Jesus until 30 to 110 years after his death is strong evidence that there never was a historical Jesus.

http://mormondiscussions.com/discuss/viewtopic.php?p=118207&highlight=jak#118207

He later cited a web site which contradicted his point. I commented

Your own link contradicts your point:

50-60 1 Thessalonians 50-60 Philippians 50-60 Galatians 50-60 1 Corinthians 50-60 2 Corinthians 50-60 Romans 50-60 Philemon

All of these are at most 20-30 years after Jesus’ death.

http://mormondiscussions.com/discuss/vi ... 286780ed21

A good critical thinker would either not make these mistakes or would withdraw his statement when the mistakes were pointed out to him.

[_Trevor]

It seems to me that the mistake we are all making is to take this a little too seriously. I am in agreement with those who say that this is first and foremost a form of entertainment. When I am not having fun, I should look for fun elsewhere, and I do!

I think this board has a lot going for it, but in the end it means almost nothing in the grand scheme. Hey, I am as guilty as anyone when it comes to getting riled up with others, but it is really not worth it. If the board does not work, then it will kill itself. Inasmuch as it functions relatively well, it will continue to jog along.

I certainly would not judge a person's critical thinking skills based on ignorance of the byzantine byways of Catholic theology. So mistakes are made. Big deal. This is a discussion board, not an international crisis.

[_marg]

A good critical thinker would either not make these mistakes or would withdraw his statement when they were pointed out to him.

A good critical thinker need not be an expert on minutia or particular definitions, often times it is general concepts which are much more important to understanding. Of course coming to an agreement on the definition of words is important in most discussions. And that is generally worked out as part of the preliminary. There is no point arguing over something with each person having a different concept of what those words mean. The definition of "immaculate conception" is a minor, non critical sub argument in the previous discussion regarding biblical contradictions. I really don't want to get into the minutia of the sub argument on what "immaculate conception" means in Catholic doctrine. In any event it is myth defined. And the definition is one which evolved. Good for you that you know what the definition is of that Catholic doctrine.

[_marg]

It seems to me that the mistake we are all making is to take this a little too seriously.

Hey did I sticky this thread?

I am in agreement with those who say that this is first and foremost a form of entertainment. When I am not having fun, I should look for fun elsewhere, and I do!

Well actually I don't look upon this board as entertainment. I think lots of people do, and probably they especially like to see arguments with people attacking one another. The only entertainment I get out of it, is reading of posts by people I think, think well. I really don't look for posts by posters who don't.

I think this board has a lot going for it, but in the end it means almost nothing in the grand scheme. Hey, I am as guilty as anyone when it comes to getting riled up with others, but it is really not worth it. If the board does not work, then it will kill itself. Inasmuch as it functions relatively well, it will continue to jog along.

Well I had a choice, ignore Shade's post, even though I disagreed with it or address it. Of course ignoring it is the easiest option. But if he's going to sticky it, he must think it is important, and in that case I'm not going to walk away quietly.

I certainly would not judge a person's critical thinking skills based on ignorance of the byzantine byways of Catholic theology. So mistakes are made. Big deal. This is a discussion board, not an international crisis.

Yes, I agree and addressed this in previous post.

[_Trevor]

Hey did I sticky this thread?

Fair enough.