the "no true Scotsman" problem solved

[Trajk Logik]

This thread has somehow become even more stupid since it was taken over by some new weird fucker.

Then go ahead and leave the thread as you haven't made any valid points that falsify what I have said.

To quote the link above again:

...fallacious reasoning can damage the credibility of the speaker/writer

Consider your credibility damaged.

[Atla]

All meaningful philosophy is linguistic.

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

[Atla]

Out of curiosity I googled the expression "a fallacy is an improper use of language", it says 0 hits. Maybe if I rearrange the words?

https://pressbooks.pub/lcubbison/chapte ... s/#201aaf4

4. What is an informal fallacy?
Informal fallacies take many forms and are widespread in everyday discourse. Very often they involve bringing irrelevant information into an argument or they are based on assumptions that, when examined, prove to be incorrect. Formal fallacies are created when the relationship between premises and conclusion does not hold up or when premises are unsound; informal fallacies are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence.

It is easy to find fairly well-accepted lists of informal fallacies, but that does not mean that it is always easy to spot them. Some moves are always fallacious; others represent ways of thinking that are sometimes valid and reasonable but which can also be misused is ways that make them fallacies.

We commit logical fallacies when we use language, and only when we use language. If you want to talk about ways of thinking, then thinking typically includes talking to yourself in your mind, but not always. We can think in colors, shapes, sounds, smells, feelings, etc., of which words are made of. Words are scribbles you see, or sounds you hear. So we effectively think in sensory data. Those scribbles and sounds invoke other ideas that are not typically other scribbles and sounds. When I write the scribbles, "Santa Claus" on the screen, and you read it, what comes to your mind - the visual of a fat man in a red suit, or more scribbles?

A misuse of language would be one in which no image or sensory data other than the scribbles themselves you are looking at, comes to mind. The scribbles do not invoke an image in your mind of what the scribbles refer to, if they refer to anything at all. It can be because the reader doesn't understand the scribbles, or that the writer used the scribbles incorrectly.

With the NTS, both people are not using the same definition of Scotsman which is the cause of the confusion. The imagery they have of a Scotsman is not the same, so they end up talking past each other and no fallacy is ever committed because they both reject each other's definition effectively not invoking their idea of a Scotsman in each other's minds. They are not invoking a conceivable Scotsman in each other's minds because they are using definitions that the other rejects.

Seems to me that you and Advocate are going to great lengths to show what the formal fallacy is in the NTS.

But there is no formal fallacy in it. The NTS isn't about definitons and it isn't about improper use of language. Seems to me that the NTS is simply the name of a dick move where I will endlessly narrow what I consider to be a Scotsman (substitute with anything), whenever I'm presented with a counterexample that I don't like.

[Flannel Jesus]

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

This is a question I've pondered quite a lot. Obviously not ALL thoughts are in language, but... I mean, I could see a world where Iwanna is right and even apparently linguistic thoughts first occur in non linguistic ways, but I can also see a world where we do have thoughts that are fundamentally at the level of language to begin with.

I have a strong inner voice, and if there is something non-language beneath a lot of these thoughts, I don't know what it is, I don't know how to access it clearly without the language layer.

[FlashDangerpants]

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

This is a question I've pondered quite a lot. Obviously not ALL thoughts are in language, but... I mean, I could see a world where Iwanna is right and even apparently linguistic thoughts first occur in non linguistic ways, but I can also see a world where we do have thoughts that are fundamentally at the level of language to begin with.

I have a strong inner voice, and if there is something non-language beneath a lot of these thoughts, I don't know what it is, I don't know how to access it clearly without the language layer.

You familiar with Fodor's LOT?
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/language-thought/

This book is worth a read
https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262529815/ ... 0reference.

[Iwannaplato]

This is a question I've pondered quite a lot. Obviously not ALL thoughts are in language, but... I mean, I could see a world where Iwanna is right and even apparently linguistic thoughts first occur in non linguistic ways,

I don't experience it as first, as in chronologically first, but what the words/language actually are/is. I spent quite a while working on the phenomenology of language and what I found was actually going on when using language wasn't what I thought it was. I started with new metaphors, from poetry, because there the brain/mind is trying very hard to make sense of these things and what normally happens at an incredibly fast rate is slowed down and 'visible'. Then I moved on to everyday language.

but I can also see a world where we do have thoughts that are fundamentally at the level of language to begin with.

I have a strong inner voice, and if there is something non-language beneath a lot of these thoughts, I don't know what it is, I don't know how to access it clearly without the language layer.

So, it's not quite beneath either, though that's a decent metaphor for it. But I sense we are getting at an emergence issue here. Language had to be made out of portions of the brain that were not intended for language and did other stuff. Motor and sensory (in the broadest sense) and emotional parts of the brain. If you spend time going into what is happening with language, well, at least this is what I found in me and was matched by at least some researchers, you find this, perhaps even frighteningly at first, batching of experiences. You don't find this hard word with nice boundaries around it. The words are eliciting and elicitations of stuff that non-verbal proto-humans experienced, but didn't organize like we do.

Whether it is strong or weak emergence is another topic. But phenomenologically, as far as I can tell, it's barely emergence at all. To keep balance on a bicycle we combine thousands of tiny movements and adjustments without even noticing them. You could sort of think of, taking a slight turning to the left as the word 'bird', metaphorically. We have batched these mixes of sensory, emotional, motor experiencings and they happen as a batch and this happen unbelievably fast, and we don't notice most of the iceberg AT ALL.

[Iwannaplato]

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

Or they only do, though my point was more about what language really is. And then there are those who only validate the verbal thinky thingie. Like that's who they are and if they think the words I believe X, it means they believe X, as if their body language and feelings and all the rest aren't really them (also). And then there are people who can think, for example, in images. Temple Grandin goes into her thinking quite a bit in her books and compares herself there with animals who she thinks think in images also.

It's actually an interesting issue in a philosophy forum because I think the identification with words leads to a lot of conflict and confusion in discussion dynamics. Iambigious, I think, is very confused in this area.

[Atla]

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

This is a question I've pondered quite a lot. Obviously not ALL thoughts are in language, but... I mean, I could see a world where Iwanna is right and even apparently linguistic thoughts first occur in non linguistic ways, but I can also see a world where we do have thoughts that are fundamentally at the level of language to begin with.

I have a strong inner voice, and if there is something non-language beneath a lot of these thoughts, I don't know what it is, I don't know how to access it clearly without the language layer.

I think there are at least two issues here. First, I think the MBTI is onto something with the order of cognitive functions. Some people start with thinking, it's their primary function. So they are very immersed in thinking, it defines them a lot. They think and the rest flows from it.

For example for me it's totally different, my order as an ENFP (probably) seems to be intuition-feeling-thinking-sensing, so thinking for me is only tertiary. I'm not very good at it. I mostly just try to express intuitions, impressions mainly, and maybe some feelings, in thoughts and language.

I've seen people who had primary or secondary thinking, to be able to do things with thinking, that are simply beyond my capabilities.

Secondly, as IWP noted, language isn't actually very natural. We invented it a few thousand years ago but it's still more like a "pathology". It's a way of expressing stuff, experiences. But now that we do have language to express stuff, and we use it all the time, I think in some people this can all flip and they start to really "exist" through language, psychologically. So I'd say they are thinking in language.

[Trajk Logik]

Out of curiosity I googled the expression "a fallacy is an improper use of language", it says 0 hits. Maybe if I rearrange the words?

https://pressbooks.pub/lcubbison/chapte ... s/#201aaf4

4. What is an informal fallacy?
Informal fallacies take many forms and are widespread in everyday discourse. Very often they involve bringing irrelevant information into an argument or they are based on assumptions that, when examined, prove to be incorrect. Formal fallacies are created when the relationship between premises and conclusion does not hold up or when premises are unsound; informal fallacies are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence.

It is easy to find fairly well-accepted lists of informal fallacies, but that does not mean that it is always easy to spot them. Some moves are always fallacious; others represent ways of thinking that are sometimes valid and reasonable but which can also be misused is ways that make them fallacies.

We commit logical fallacies when we use language, and only when we use language. If you want to talk about ways of thinking, then thinking typically includes talking to yourself in your mind, but not always. We can think in colors, shapes, sounds, smells, feelings, etc., of which words are made of. Words are scribbles you see, or sounds you hear. So we effectively think in sensory data. Those scribbles and sounds invoke other ideas that are not typically other scribbles and sounds. When I write the scribbles, "Santa Claus" on the screen, and you read it, what comes to your mind - the visual of a fat man in a red suit, or more scribbles?

A misuse of language would be one in which no image or sensory data other than the scribbles themselves you are looking at, comes to mind. The scribbles do not invoke an image in your mind of what the scribbles refer to, if they refer to anything at all. It can be because the reader doesn't understand the scribbles, or that the writer used the scribbles incorrectly.

With the NTS, both people are not using the same definition of Scotsman which is the cause of the confusion. The imagery they have of a Scotsman is not the same, so they end up talking past each other and no fallacy is ever committed because they both reject each other's definition effectively not invoking their idea of a Scotsman in each other's minds. They are not invoking a conceivable Scotsman in each other's minds because they are using definitions that the other rejects.

Seems to me that you and Advocate are going to great lengths to show what the formal fallacy is in the NTS.

But there is no formal fallacy in it. The NTS isn't about definitons and it isn't about improper use of language. Seems to me that the NTS is simply the name of a dick move where I will endlessly narrow what I consider to be a Scotsman (substitute with anything), whenever I'm presented with a counterexample that I don't like.

As described in the link I provided, INFORMAL fallacies, which the NTS is, are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence. You asked, I provided, now you seem to be performing a dick move where you endlessly reject any evidence I provide you that it is an issue of language use and evidence, with evidence being the definition in a dictionary.

It is about definitions, without which it becomes subjective and one can endlessly narrow what they consider to be a Scotsman without committing any fallacy. As one of the comments I quoted in the video that Flash provided, "Scotsman" can be subjective, and you and Flash seem to be going out of your way to argue just that, in which case there would be no fallacy.

[Trajk Logik]

Personally I think that people who think in language are disadvantaged in philosophy. It's limited and limiting.

If you look closely enough, thinking in language is thinking in stuff that isn't language. But people are mostly in too much of a hurry to see what's going on in there. And then there's also thinking when no language is present.

I'm not sure, I think there are people who really think in language. Or at least seem to be. Scary..

This is a question I've pondered quite a lot. Obviously not ALL thoughts are in language, but... I mean, I could see a world where Iwanna is right and even apparently linguistic thoughts first occur in non linguistic ways, but I can also see a world where we do have thoughts that are fundamentally at the level of language to begin with.

I have a strong inner voice, and if there is something non-language beneath a lot of these thoughts, I don't know what it is, I don't know how to access it clearly without the language layer.

What form does language take? Think about a language you don't know. What does it look like, or sound like? Scribbles and noises. It's not until you've learned the rules for using the scribbles and noises does it become meaningful. Without meaning, it's just scribbles and sounds.

The NTS, and any other use of language, is just scribbles and sounds unless there is something the scribbles point to, or represent. What do they represent? What is it about? As such, when thinking in language, we are thinking in scribbles and sounds, which is just an extension of how we actually think in sensory data.

To learn a language you need to be able to see, hear, or feel AND think. You don't need language to think, or else how can you learn a language in the first place? You observe the context in which the sounds are made, or the scribbles are written. You then use the scribbles and sounds in similar contexts and fine-tune you usage based on how others respond. Language provides a way to consolidate complex concepts into simpler symbols to make communicating such complex topics much easier and efficient. Try drawing a picture of this discussion and you will see how language is much better at representing the ideas we are expressing.

Language evolved out of how organisms observe the behavior of others and how their behavior can communicate something about the environment, as in their tail is up means there is a predator in the bushes, and use that to your benefit.

https://vimeo.com/72072873
This story is of a man that did know know any language until he was an adult. It's obvious that he could think before language. To me, this case is evidence there is thinking before language and language is an extension of thinking.

[Atla]

As described in the link I provided, INFORMAL fallacies, which the NTS is, are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence. You asked, I provided, now you seem to be performing a dick move where you endlessly reject any evidence I provide you that it is an issue of language use and evidence, with evidence being the definition in a dictionary.

It is about definitions, without which it becomes subjective and one can endlessly narrow what they consider to be a Scotsman without committing any fallacy. As one of the comments I quoted in the video that Flash provided, "Scotsman" can be subjective, and you and Flash seem to be going out of your way to argue just that, in which case there would be no fallacy.

You can read something like this:

No true Scotsman, or appeal to purity, is an informal fallacy in which one attempts to protect their generalized statement from a falsifying counterexample by excluding the counterexample improperly. Rather than abandoning the falsified universal generalization or providing evidence that would disqualify the falsifying counterexample, a slightly modified generalization is constructed ad-hoc to definitionally exclude the undesirable specific case and similar counterexamples by appeal to rhetoric. This rhetoric takes the form of emotionally charged but nonsubstantive purity platitudes such as "true", "pure", "genuine", "authentic", "real", etc.

or

No true Scotsman arguments arise when someone is trying to defend their ingroup from criticism (ingroup bias) by excluding those members who don't agree with the ingroup. In other words, instead of accepting that some members may think or act in disagreeable ways, one dismisses those members as fakes.

and you have honestly no idea what you just read? You write too much to be trolling but who knows.

[Trajk Logik]

As described in the link I provided, INFORMAL fallacies, which the NTS is, are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence. You asked, I provided, now you seem to be performing a dick move where you endlessly reject any evidence I provide you that it is an issue of language use and evidence, with evidence being the definition in a dictionary.

It is about definitions, without which it becomes subjective and one can endlessly narrow what they consider to be a Scotsman without committing any fallacy. As one of the comments I quoted in the video that Flash provided, "Scotsman" can be subjective, and you and Flash seem to be going out of your way to argue just that, in which case there would be no fallacy.

You can read something like this:

No true Scotsman, or appeal to purity, is an informal fallacy in which one attempts to protect their generalized statement from a falsifying counterexample by excluding the counterexample improperly. Rather than abandoning the falsified universal generalization or providing evidence that would disqualify the falsifying counterexample, a slightly modified generalization is constructed ad-hoc to definitionally exclude the undesirable specific case and similar counterexamples by appeal to rhetoric. This rhetoric takes the form of emotionally charged but nonsubstantive purity platitudes such as "true", "pure", "genuine", "authentic", "real", etc.

or

No true Scotsman arguments arise when someone is trying to defend their ingroup from criticism (ingroup bias) by excluding those members who don't agree with the ingroup. In other words, instead of accepting that some members may think or act in disagreeable ways, one dismisses those members as fakes.

and you have honestly no idea what you just read? You write too much to be trolling but who knows.

What I see is something that supports what I have said, just in a much more drawn out fashion. How is what is being described NOT dependent on a misuse of language (as in making a universal generalization that does not match what is generally understood to define what it is they are talking about) or NOT dependent on evidence (definitions)? I mean, your first description mentions evidence. So the question is do you understand what you are even quoting?

If you think about it, the first premise, "No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge" is actually the faulty conclusion of a prior logical fallacy - a category mistake.

[Atla]

As described in the link I provided, INFORMAL fallacies, which the NTS is, are more dependent on the misuse of language and of evidence. You asked, I provided, now you seem to be performing a dick move where you endlessly reject any evidence I provide you that it is an issue of language use and evidence, with evidence being the definition in a dictionary.

It is about definitions, without which it becomes subjective and one can endlessly narrow what they consider to be a Scotsman without committing any fallacy. As one of the comments I quoted in the video that Flash provided, "Scotsman" can be subjective, and you and Flash seem to be going out of your way to argue just that, in which case there would be no fallacy.

You can read something like this:

No true Scotsman, or appeal to purity, is an informal fallacy in which one attempts to protect their generalized statement from a falsifying counterexample by excluding the counterexample improperly. Rather than abandoning the falsified universal generalization or providing evidence that would disqualify the falsifying counterexample, a slightly modified generalization is constructed ad-hoc to definitionally exclude the undesirable specific case and similar counterexamples by appeal to rhetoric. This rhetoric takes the form of emotionally charged but nonsubstantive purity platitudes such as "true", "pure", "genuine", "authentic", "real", etc.

or

No true Scotsman arguments arise when someone is trying to defend their ingroup from criticism (ingroup bias) by excluding those members who don't agree with the ingroup. In other words, instead of accepting that some members may think or act in disagreeable ways, one dismisses those members as fakes.

and you have honestly no idea what you just read? You write too much to be trolling but who knows.

What I see is something that supports what I have said, just in a much more drawn out fashion. How is what is being described NOT dependent on a misuse of language (as in making a universal generalization that does not match what is generally understood to define what it is they are talking about) or NOT dependent on evidence (definitions)? I mean, your first description mentions evidence. So the question is do you understand what you are even quoting?

If you think about it, the first premise, "No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge" is actually the faulty conclusion of a prior logical fallacy - a category mistake.

Hehe okay you must be trolling. Well the joke is on you, a good troll writes little and gets long responses. But for you it seems to be the opposite.

[commonsense]

You can read something like this:



or



and you have honestly no idea what you just read? You write too much to be trolling but who knows.

What I see is something that supports what I have said, just in a much more drawn out fashion. How is what is being described NOT dependent on a misuse of language (as in making a universal generalization that does not match what is generally understood to define what it is they are talking about) or NOT dependent on evidence (definitions)? I mean, your first description mentions evidence. So the question is do you understand what you are even quoting?

If you think about it, the first premise, "No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge" is actually the faulty conclusion of a prior logical fallacy - a category mistake.

Hehe okay you must be trolling. Well the joke is on you, a good troll writes little and gets long responses. But for you it seems to be the opposite.

I usually try to abstain from hurling ad hom’s, but this one nearly writes itself: Trajk Logik is a tragic slave to bad logic.

[Trajk Logik]

You can read something like this:



or



and you have honestly no idea what you just read? You write too much to be trolling but who knows.

What I see is something that supports what I have said, just in a much more drawn out fashion. How is what is being described NOT dependent on a misuse of language (as in making a universal generalization that does not match what is generally understood to define what it is they are talking about) or NOT dependent on evidence (definitions)? I mean, your first description mentions evidence. So the question is do you understand what you are even quoting?

If you think about it, the first premise, "No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge" is actually the faulty conclusion of a prior logical fallacy - a category mistake.

Hehe okay you must be trolling. Well the joke is on you, a good troll writes little and gets long responses. But for you it seems to be the opposite.

Yet, you have someone in this thread that has done just what you define a good troll as being in Flash. Flash is good at being a troll, and I'm bad at being a troll, which is another way of saying I'm not a troll.

Just go back and read the responses Flash has provided. His initial responses to both Advocate and I were straw-men and ad-homs. A majority of his posts are short containing no philosophical arguments and only personal attacks, where as mine are philosophical propositions and questions that you seem to be incorrectly interpreting as rhetorical.

None of what you've said is a falsification of anything I've said, and your avoidance of the questions I've asked shows how intellectually dishonest you are. If this thread were a Philosophy class you'd fail.

Oh, and here's another link you can reject for no reason other than you have an emotional attachment to the idea that "TrajkLogik is wrong in everything he says" that supports what I've been saying:
https://www.fallacyfiles.org/scotsman.html

See how the NTS is a sub-fallacy of the Redefinition fallacy? But yeah, keep coming back and digging your hole.

I usually try to abstain from hurling ad hom’s, but this one nearly writes itself: Trajk Logik is a tragic slave to bad logic.

Thanks for the example of "Saying it doesn't make it so". You can also give yourself whatever name you want, but that doesn't make it so. You actions define you and you have displayed that you have anything but commonsense. Thanks for participating.