Fu-Pow
07-06-2004, 11:04 AM
A lot of you guys on this forum seem to be very fond of attacking the poster instead of attacking the poster's argument.
There are three major forms of Argumentum Ad Hominem (Attack on the Person):
(1) ad hominem (abusive): instead of attacking an assertion,
the argument attacks the person who made the assertion.
example: "You are an idiot you don't know what you're talking about."
(2) ad hominem (circumstantial): instead of attacking an
assertion the author points to the relationship between the
person making the assertion and the person's circumstances.
examples:
-Attack on lineage
-Attack on skill level
-Attack on experience
(3) ad hominem (tu quoque): this form of attack on the
person notes that a person does not practise what he
preaches.
example: "You can't know anything about XMA because you don't practice XMA."
Let's examine the different forms and how they relate to "flame wars":
1)abusive- This is just basically and insult. There's no surer way to get a flame war started then to just start slinging the insults.
2) circumstantial-Because of the nature of this forum (ie it is virtual not physical and largely anonymous) there is little we can do to prove or disprove skill level, experience and lineage.
It's better to stay away from these topics and stick to the argument at hand. Which is essentially the only thing that exists in this virtual space.
3)tu quoque- This argument has some validity to martial arts in a very general way ie you could say "You've never practiced a (grappling, striking, korean, japanese, etc art so you don't know what your talking about.) However, this can quickly devolve into Reductio Absurdum or "Reduction to the Absurd" when you say "You've never practiced X-art with X-teacher during this period of time so you're in no position to evaluate."
Argumentum Ad Hominem falls under the larger category of Changing the Subject.
To read more about this and other wonderful logical fallacies go to:
http://www.datanation.com/fallacies/index.htm
There are three major forms of Argumentum Ad Hominem (Attack on the Person):
(1) ad hominem (abusive): instead of attacking an assertion,
the argument attacks the person who made the assertion.
example: "You are an idiot you don't know what you're talking about."
(2) ad hominem (circumstantial): instead of attacking an
assertion the author points to the relationship between the
person making the assertion and the person's circumstances.
examples:
-Attack on lineage
-Attack on skill level
-Attack on experience
(3) ad hominem (tu quoque): this form of attack on the
person notes that a person does not practise what he
preaches.
example: "You can't know anything about XMA because you don't practice XMA."
Let's examine the different forms and how they relate to "flame wars":
1)abusive- This is just basically and insult. There's no surer way to get a flame war started then to just start slinging the insults.
2) circumstantial-Because of the nature of this forum (ie it is virtual not physical and largely anonymous) there is little we can do to prove or disprove skill level, experience and lineage.
It's better to stay away from these topics and stick to the argument at hand. Which is essentially the only thing that exists in this virtual space.
3)tu quoque- This argument has some validity to martial arts in a very general way ie you could say "You've never practiced a (grappling, striking, korean, japanese, etc art so you don't know what your talking about.) However, this can quickly devolve into Reductio Absurdum or "Reduction to the Absurd" when you say "You've never practiced X-art with X-teacher during this period of time so you're in no position to evaluate."
Argumentum Ad Hominem falls under the larger category of Changing the Subject.
To read more about this and other wonderful logical fallacies go to:
http://www.datanation.com/fallacies/index.htm