DKC Atlas Forum

[Aaendi]

I trick that a lot of trolls use to get around the logical fallacy of "ad hominem attacks" is by taking personal attacks like "You are stupid/gay/retarded" and simply changing the wording to "Your argument is stupid/gay/retarded" just to insult the other person, without technically breaking the rules. When I first started going on the internet, I didn't understand the difference between an "adhominem" insult, and a "non-adhominen" insult, so when somebody told me "your opinion is full of crap" I would respond "you're full of crap," and I used to wonder why my insult was always considered "trolling" while the other was considered a "valid argument." Now I know that the entire difference between "trolling" and stating a "valid argument" is all just a difference between saying "you" and saying "your opinion."

So here's the question. Why are some types of insults considered logical fallacies, and some are considered valid arguments? Shouldn't all insults be considered logical fallacies?

[Katastrophe Kong]

I'm pretty sure ad-hominems and insults are the same thing.

lol, spell-check thinks I'm trying to spell Eminem.

[Phyreburnz]

I think "your opinion is full of crap" is just as bad as "you're full of crap," in most circumstances. The reason being is that one should always include logic and reasoning when responding. I always prefer to remain calm in debating (which I do an awful lot of... trying to cut down) and not swear, which is really out-of-the-ordinary for me, because I swear all the time! But anyway, when I argue with people, I try to shy away from people that don't actually debate, and just project. Now if somebody would say "your opinion is crap because of A, B, and C," that is much more acceptable.

Also, I think insults all kind of have to deal with the individual, and how they take it. But over the internet, I think more people should try to be as direct as possible, because a lot of things don't translate well into text, especially sarcastic tones.

[Simion32]

My viewpoints:
--Yeah, just don't try to argue your point about anything unless you are backing it up with scientifically document-able facts (to support (not prove - can't do that) your opinion). I try not to call people out on this (unless they just spew straight BS) because people are afraid of being wrong.

--You cannot "win" an argument, as all arguments are contests of opinion, and not about "finding who has the facts right". It's always construed as "I'm right, and you're wrong VS no you're wrong" mentality. If you were strictly checking against facts there would be nothing to argue over in the first place.

--When you are trying to prove something, don't forget that all facts are ultimately derived from opinions about what's going on, and these are deemed "facts" but are never actually provable. Make sure your argument doesn't fall apart when looking from outside the box (Bible circular logic is a great example).

--About the only thing you can 100% concretely prove is a mathematical equation (scientific assumptions/theories notwithstanding - those are still only proven via empirical evidence, not actual concrete proof). But even then, the rules of that math still come from our imagination, so we're still creating assumed facts within a fairytale land of "mathematical rules".

[Phyreburnz]

--When you are trying to prove something, don't forget that all facts are ultimately derived from opinions about what's going on, and these are deemed "facts" but are never actually provable.

I have to disagree, Simion. You're forgetting the scientific method and laws, and theories (yes, theories, because gravity is a theory, which I don't think many people try to dispute). Science helps a lot with answering questions and giving facts; fact: oxygen is transferred through the body via blood, chlorophyll is used by plants to make food from the sun, etc, etc. Also, we look at history when debating (or we should), because we know that when we don't look at history, the past tends to repeat itself. History is tricky, because we have to look at several sides of the same story. But history definitely contains facts: extreme example, the holocaust happened. Definitely not an opinion. Fact. We can also look at the laws and customs of other countries to create arguments, which is one of the best methods of arguing. I use this all the time. A few years ago, I did a report for an English class about drug legalization. In this report, I used statistics comparing America's drug problem with that of other countries with more and less strict laws (for that, I also looked at the past, comparing today's anti-drug laws with those of the prohibition era in the 1920s). Statistics, while are never 100%, are always helpful, too. Example: a little over half the population of the planet is female.

[Cody]

^ yeah. In science, a "theory" isn't just a theory. It's something tested and tested and tested with no known faults in the evidence. See: theory of relativity, gravity, evolution.

I can see where Simion is coming from, though.

[Simion32]

Yeah, I sort of screwed up what i was trying to explain in that post... (myself = )

I'm saying that in general (due to subjective experience) these interpretations can be skewed by opinion and are no longer pure facts. They are not the core fact set, only the general idea combined with personal bias. This is what I was talking about.

Such as, theories can be disproven given evidence. If you use some other model that explains a theory's subject matter more succinctly, or find evidence that defeats the current scientific model, you must drop the old one to remain as factual as possible. Otherwise you're just hallucinating in a sea of opinions.

Like I said, look outside the topic box to make sure your argument still holds.

EDIT: Of course there's the esoteric side of my argument, but that's a little bit dense to absorb.

[Aaendi]

Now if somebody would say "your opinion is crap because of A, B, and C," that is much more acceptable.

A lot of people abuse that too. I've had experiences where people said stuff like "Your opinion is gay, because you shave your legs" and thought they had a valid argument.