General discussion, ignorance of basic matters of logic, specious comparisons, Things that are false, Weak Analogy

Some arguments by analogy are like paint by numbers

How often is it that the following three analogies are used in discussions of legalizing gay marriage? 

#1: Laws against gay marriage are analogous to anti-miscegenation laws. Therefore, they are unjust.

#2: Laws against gay marriage are analogous to prohibitions against polygamy.  Therefore, they are just.

#3: Laws against gay marriage are analogous to outlawing bestiality (or marrying one's dog).  Therefore, they are just.

The answer to my rhetorical question is that the use of these analogies is innumerable.  Most of the talking heads debating on TV race each other to the punch — whoever gets one of these analogies out first is the one who's framed the debate properly and thereby has the rhetorical upper hand.  Now, I'm all for rhetorical competitions, but c'mon — you'd think that once the analogies are out there, somebody might… you know… address how apt these analogies are.

Enter Steve Chapman, writing for conservative opinion page, Townhall.com.  Importantly, Chapman supports gay marriage, but doesn't want the courts to impose it on the citizenry.  (One of the first questions that comes to my mind when I hear this sort of talk is what's better (again assuming he supports gay marriage): having a just conclusion imposed on a citizenry that does not want it, or an unjust law imposed on a smaller section of that citizenry… that does not want it either!  If you don't see the point of this question, you don't see the point of judicial review.)  Regardless, Chapman runs the gamut of the analogies, and makes it all worse.  Especially when addressing #2:

Gays argue, correctly, that they can't be expected to change their inborn sexual orientation to get married.  But polygamists can assert that monogamy is impossible for them — and, judging from the prevalence of sexual infidelity, for most people.  Nor does the polygamy ban solve any problems.  Men can already have sex with multiple females, produce offspring with them and furnish them with financial support.  Former NFL running back Travis Henry has nine children by nine different women.  Prohibiting polygamy does nothing to prevent such conduct.  It just keeps people who want to do it responsibly from operating within an established legal framework.  That's why I would legalize polygamy as well as same sex marriage.

Seriously, that is the dumbest defense of gay marriage against the analogy with polygamy I have ever seen.  I could not have even made up a more dunderheaded version.  In no way should the argument be that: well, lots of people are going to have multiple partners, and prohibiting polygamy doesn't prevent that, so we should legalize polygamy so they can do it responsibly.  By analogy, Chapman's reasoning would be: gay marriage bans don't reduce homosexual sex and cohabitation.  But that's not what those bans are out to prevent.  Anti-sodomy laws were supposed to do that, and see how they fared constitutionally?  The same fate would befall anti-multiple-baby-daddy laws.

The best way to defend gay marriage is to break the analogies between gay marriage and polygamy and gay sex and bestiality.  The first is a simple moral difference: there is no established frame of injustice associated with gay marriages.  They are, like modern heterosexual marriages, a relationship between equals.  Polygamous marriages have structural inequalities, and the traditional forms of them have them in spades: younger wives are to play the role of child-rearer, clothes-washer, and concubine.  Once they've borne children, they move up the ladder…  Legalizing institutions that have these legacies is akin to legalizing a form of household slavery.  My good friend Thom Brooks has an excellent survey of polygamy and its problems here.

The disanalogy between gay sex and besitality is simply with consent.  Adult humans can give consent, dogs (or what have you) can't.  End of discussion.

So why are people still wrestling with these analogies?  Part of the answer is because columnists like Steve Chapman, despite being on the right side of the issue, can't put together a non-crazy response to them.

Argument Analysis, General discussion, John McCain, Reporting, Sarah Palin

An Exercise in Scarequoting

2 Comments

Classic downplaying is the strategy of making something look less important or significant.  You can do this with euphemisms, so you can call a pay cut "salary compression," or you can call the victims of indiscriminate use of lethal force "collateral damage."  Another strategy is to employ the terms of regular use, but use scare quotes around the terms.  This method of downplaying at once both acknowledges that some use the term to describe the case, but it also registers your objection to it.  No reasons are given, but it's a clear wink to one's preferred audience, a kind of code to let them know that it's a larger cultural battle in the works. But also note that scarequoting just communicates this challenge to the naming, but not its grounds or even what the alternatives are.  It is a particularly weak and lazy form of criticism, one that effectively relies on the audience to supply their own arguments.

In the wake of the leaked Katie Couric tape, with Couric laughing at Sara Palin's kids names, Douglas MacKinnon re-opens the case that Sara Palin was treated unfairly by the media in '08.  He thinks her performances in the Gibson interview (when she couldn't define the Bush Doctrine) and Couric interview (when, she couldn't name a single news magazine) were because of the treachery of the liberals who ran the interviews.  But the real fault lays with the McCain campaign for not protecting her from these ambushes.  That's weird, as it seems that these questions were hardly surprises and could have easily been turned into cases for Palin to showcase her knowledge of politics and foreign affairs, had she done any homework.  Regardless, MacKinnon has the perfect downplayer setup for his case in his opening paragraph:

As the video popped-up this week of far-left, ultra wealthy, and privileged CBS “News” anchor Katie Couric going after then Governor Sarah Palin while mocking the names of her children, it reminded me all over again how much Palin is owed an apology from the “leadership” of the McCain campaign.

That paragraph without the scare quotes still gets the point across — McCain's campaign advisers should have known that liberals would try to take down their witless VP candidate, and they should have stayed with only Sean Hannity and Greta Van Sustren interviewing her.  But with the addition, really, of no more words but a few extra marks (eight little apostrophes), MacKinnon communicates so much more and expresses (and encourages) real hostility to his opponents.

Here, let me show you.  I'll re-write my last paragraph with the addition of scare quotes.

That paragraph without the scare quotes still gets the "point" across — McCain's campaign advisers should have known that liberals would try to take down their witless VP candidate, and they should have stayed with only Sean Hannity and Greta Van Sustren "interviewing" her.  But with the addition, really, of no more words but a few extra marks (eight little apostrophes), MacKinnon "communicates" so much more and expresses (and encourages) real hostility to his opponents.

See?  It's easy to sound much more outraged by and better informed than your opponents with just a few scare quotes.  No wonder a lazy mind like MacKinnon uses them so… liberally.

Hasty Generalization, weak man

Nut Picking

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I love meta commentary–that's why it's so much fun to read George Will and Charles Krauthammer–that's what they do: they make (usally wrong) observations on the logic of argument.  Well, at least someone is doing it.  For this reason I was glad to run across a phrase close to our heart here, "nut picking."  It appears in a Dave Weigel column in the Washington Post concerning misconceptions about the "Tea Party Movement." 

The tea party is racist.

2. It's a phenomenon that some activists call "nutpicking" — send a cameraman into a protest and he'll focus on the craziest sign. Yes, there are racists in the tea party, and they make themselves known. But tea party activists, in most cases, root them out. Texas activist Dale Robertson, who held a sign comparing taxpayers to "niggars" at a 2009 rally, was drummed out of that event and pilloried by his peers. Mark Williams, formerly the bomb-throwing spokesman for the Tea Party Express (he once told me he wanted to send the liberal watchdog group Media Matters "a case of champagne" for calling him racist), was booted after penning a parody essay that had the NAACP pining for slavery.

Liberal critics of the tea party make the case that conservative opposition to social spending is often racially motivated. That's not new, though, and it's certainly not the basis for the tea party.

"Nut picking" has its origin in a 2006 Kevin Drum post of the Washington Monthly as far as I can tell.  To be precise, it refers to the all-too-common practice of trolling the comments of internet fora–what you humans call "blogs"–for the crazies.  One then alleges that the crazy commentor represents a typical view of the opposition.  Therefore, etc., as the medievals would say.  Real logicians call this practice "weak manning" or more technically, "the selectional form of the straw man."  

Now to be precise again (sorry, it's my job), the claim that the tea party is racist might be justified (badly, let's say) in some instances by nut picking, but it is not the same as nut picking.  Nut picking may be one of the many mechanisms used to produce an unrepresentative sample, upon which one then makes an inductive generalization.   

Ad Hominem Abusive, Begging the Question, hollow man, Straw Man

Straight face

3 Comments

Maggie Gallagher, president of NOM, writes:

Despite the media hoopla, this is not the first case in which a federal judge has imagined and ruled that our Constitution requires same-sex marriage. A federal judge in Nebraska ruled for gay marriage in 2005 and was overturned by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in 2006.

The Proposition 8 case on which the Ninth Circuit's Judge Vaughn Walker ruled Wednesday was pushed by two straight guys with a hunger for media attention, lawyers with huge egos who overrode the considered judgment of major figures in the gay legal establishment, thinkers who feared exactly what we anticipate: the Supreme Court will uphold Prop. 8 and the core civil rights of Californians and all Americans to vote for marriage as one man and one woman.

Judge Walker's ruling proves, however, that the American people were and are right to fear that too many powerful judges do not respect their views, or the proper limits of judicial authority. Did our Founding Fathers really create a right to gay marriage in the U.S. Constitution? It is hard for anyone reading the text or history of the 14th Amendment to make that claim with a straight face, no matter how many highly credentialed and brilliant so-called legal experts say otherwise.

Nevermind the ad homs (ego-driven straight guys!) and the beggings of the question (proper limits of judicial authority!), I don't understand the last sentence.  Allow me to reconstruct:

  1. Many highly credentialed experts, with the proper knowledge and experience, assert x.
  2. no one can seriously claim x.

Pardon my confusion, but it seems like just the right kind of people–qualified straight people with straight faces–have made the assertion, I think that means it has some initial plausibility. 

Now of course, the controversy might be how one interprets "x" in my reconstruction.  And this is where Ms. Gallagher hollow mans–I don't think anyone has made the claim she alleges ("created an [enumerated] right….").  So no one, with a straight face or otherwise, is arguing that the COTUS (anyone ever say that?  They should) utters the phrase "gay marriage."  Of course, as far as I know, it doesn't say "marriage" either. 

via Pandagon via Atrios.

Ad Hominem Abusive, General discussion, ignorance of basic matters of logic, inconsistency, Inexplicable, Lack of Evidence, Plain Bad Arguments, Red Herring, Specious allegations of fallacy, Straw Man, Things that are false, weak man

Bear with me

8 Comments

My colleagues have challenged me to look deeper into the abyss.  I did.  This is what I found (courtesy of Sadly, No!):

In February of 2010, ABC News published an article regarding the 2009 enacted right to carry law in National Parks. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the article struck a tone straight out of a Brady campaign spot. A mosaic of Chicken Little ’sky is falling’ was painted in broad strokes and platitudes. All in response to a common sense measured signed into law by president Obama allowing citizens to carry a concealed firearm in the nation’s National Parks.

It’s a song and dance that we on the right have grown to be accustomed with concerning second amendment rights and the press. Virulent anti-gun groups and mainstream press outlets essentially spout the same talking points. We expect this, we accept this.

But with the recent grizzly bear attack near Yellowstone National Park that killed one and left two injured, one may wonder if the typical progressive, anti-gun canard still holds water?

I for one appreciate his patience.  But in any case, one has to wonder how the extremely rare (but nontheless terrifying) prospect of bear attacks on national forest property undermines the "typical" progressive case against gun rights.  One wonders this, in the first place, because the attack in question occured in a place (Gallatin National Forest) where you can carry unconcealed firearms.  From the National Forest FAQ:

Can I carry a firearm on the national forest? back to top

Possession of firearms. The possession and unconcealed carry of a firearm on the national forest is not restricted by federal law or Forest Service regulations with the exception of “prohibited possessors,” such as convicted felons (see 18 USC 922g (http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=browse_usc&docid=Cite:+18USC922) and ARS 13-3101 (http://www.azleg.gov/FormatDocument.asp?inDoc=/ars/13/03101.htm&Title=13&DocType=ARS). State laws regarding the concealed carry of firearms and the carrying of weapons within or on a motor vehicle apply to all National Forest System lands.

Discharge of firearms. National Forest regulations prohibit the discharge of a firearm within 150 yards of a residence, building, campsite, developed recreation site, or any other occupied area; across a road or any body of water adjacent to a road; into or within a cave; or in any negligent manner that could endanger life or property (see 36 CFR 261.10d) (http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2007/julqtr/pdf/36cfr261.10.pdf). The Tonto National Forest also has areas that are closed to recreational shooting year-round due to proximity to local communities (see Forest Closure Orders). During periods of high fire danger, additional restrictions on the use of firearms may be imposed. None of the temporary or year-round restrictions prohibit the use of a firearm in the lawful taking of game.

So a very rare bear attack on an unnarmed person (who could legally have been armed) somehow undermines the "typical" progressive anti-gun canard (not sure what that is).  Anyway.  It gets more entertaining:

Moments like this are teachable. Liberals love to go down the subjunctive mood route and justify positions within theoretical conditions. But those theoretical positions always fit the progressive mold and worldview. And as any student of history and logic knows there are always two sides to the hypothetical reasoning coin.

Therefore, I can add that if even one of the victims of Yellowstone/Soda Creek Campground grizzly attack had a concealed permit, and had been armed, the outcome early Wednesday morning may have been quite different.

And the anti-second amendment crowd will never admit that.

A teachable moment indeed, but I don't know what I am supposed to have learned.  Few could dispute that the second amendment (like the first, second, third, etc.) admits of some obvious restrictions as to nature and place (among other things).  Everyone knows what those are.  So it's not opposition to the 2nd amendment that's at issue.  It's opposition to the carrying of concealed firearms in certain situations.  But we've already established that this isn't one of them, so the hypothetical doesn't work in the first place.

Besides, how does having a concealed weapon help you in the bear attack scenario? 

Ad hominem tu quoque, Argument Analysis, General discussion, Plain Bad Arguments, YouTube

Tool Quoque

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The Non Sequitur is supposed to be a blog about political media, I know.  But I can't let this pass.  I was converting some old CD's to MP3 format this evening, and I set about to listening to an old Tool album, Aenima.  I'd forgotten how brooding they were and that the lyrics were intermittently profound and stupid.  And then I came to "Hooker with a Penis."  Here are the lyrics, if you need to read along, but here is the core of the song: it's an argument that you can't blame Tool for being sellouts.  The background story is that Maynard, the lead singer, is approached by some kid who accuses him of being a sellout with the latest album, and that the earlier stuff is more authentic:

And in between sips of Coke
He told me that he thought
We were sellin' out
Layin' down
Suckin' up
To the man.

Maynard responds with two separate arguments.  The first is simple garbage talk: that he, Maynard, is actually THE MAN.  So he can't sell out to the man, because he's already the man.  And furthermore, since that's the case, our accuser is ALSO the man.  
Before you point your finger
You should know that
I'm the man
If I'm the man,
Then you're the man
And He's the man as well
So you can
Point that fuckin' finger up your ass.
I suppose that this is a fine argument for people who are heavy-duty Tool-heads, since a good deal of Tool stuff is mystical mumbo-jumbo.  But, for sure, by this sort of reasoning, then Maynard is the accuser, too.  And then, consequently, he ends up telling HIMSELF to point that finger up his OWN ass.  (Logic hint: identity is a transitive relation.)  Not much of a defense, in the end.  The lesson of the first argument: mystical nonsense may be really impressive to badly dressed kids in soda shops, but it makes for crazily bad arguments. 
 
The second argument is a little more interesting, and given our recent spate of discussions about tu quoque arguments, it caught my eye.  The argument has two prongs. The first is basically that Tool had already sold out before their first record, and so the accuser has no legitimate basis to say that the later album is a sellout compared to the first album. The first album was a sellout album, too!   The second line of argument is that the accuser, regardless of the accusations, nevertheless BOUGHT THE RECORDS!

All you know about me is what I've sold you,
Dumb fuck
I sold out long before you ever even heard my name.
I sold my soul to make a record,
Dip shit
And then you bought one.

I see both lines of the second argument out to show that the accuser, regardless of the issue of whether Tool have sold out, actually likes sellout music.  The first line is that since Tool sold out before the first record, and the accuser likes the first record, the accuser likes sellout music.  The second line is that since the accuser BUYS records he admittedly sees as sellout music, he must thereby like sellout music.  Therefore, he has no standing to accuse Tool of being sellouts.
 
Again, I'm sympathetic with many tu quoque arguments, as I think they can show double standards, dishonesty in criticism, and even sometimes actually show that some cases are likely true.  But I'm not sympathetic here.  The first problem is that even if Tool sold out before the first album, that doesn't mean that their second (or later) albums are of the same quality.  Here might be a reasonable response from the accuser: Sure, you may have sold out before the first record, but it didn't start really showing until the second.  I thought you had some shred of dignity and integrity, but I suppose I was wrong about that.  Thanks for setting me straight about the fact that you've always been a sellout.
 
The second problem with the line of argument is the fact that the accuser bought the album hardly means that he has no standing to complain about its quality.  I have many, many CD's collecting dust in the basement  that stink.  The only way to find out if they stink, back then, was to buy them and listen to them.   It was $15 to find out that, for example, Queensryche peaked with Operation Mindcrime.  Or consider any other commodity — if I say that the Big Mac is a terrible hamburger, I'd have had to have tried it.  Which means I'd have had to have bought one.  Would my standing to criticize a Big Mac be undermined by the fact that I bought one?  What would be the only way to sample them, then, without this charge?  Steal them?
 
The third problem with the argument is that even if Maynard has shown the accuser to like sellout music, and even if Maynard has shown that the accuser, THE MAN, and Maynard are all the same, it has not yet mounted much of a defense for sellout music.  If there's something wrong with "sucking up to THE MAN," then showing that we're all THE MAN or that some people like sucking up to the man doesn't do much in the way of defense. 
 
Toolheads, I remember, took this song pretty seriously.  They still do, if you peruse the comments under the YouTube videos for the song. They thought that it showed Maynard at his best, defending himself and his music.  It may show Maynard at his best, but it's hardly a defense.  You know, when you shout a bad argument, even with distorted guitars and heavy base in the background, it doesn't get any better. 
Ad hominem circumstantial, Informal Fallacies, Op-Eds and other opinions, Slippery Slope

Picking the Low Fruit

10 Comments

While feeling guilty about supplanting Scott's great post on Subjunctive Tu Quoques, (which you should read first–and while I'm at it, how did I not know about this? All that time studying particles in Greek! Here's the full link. Bravo.) I thought I might pick some low hanging fruit.

An absolute treasure trove of logical fallacies can be found through the various smear-campaigns of Center for Consumer Freedom. In case you haven't come across these folks before, NYT had a short piece a few months ago describing CCF's campaigns on behalf of various corporate interests against not for profit advocacy groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving and the Humane Society of the United States. I'm sure Christopher Buckley didn't have these guys in mind when he wrote Thank you for Smoking but the comedy at times is equally broad.

Anyway, HSUS is squarely within their sights and sites these days as are any attempts to regulate "humane" conditions for livestock. Enter David Martosko, the mind behind Humanewatch.org, in the Sacramento Bee:

What's really at stake here is that word: "humane." HSUS seems to want a monopoly on it, even though other animal welfare-oriented groups – and plenty of scientists – disagree with its agenda. And that agenda is where the rubber meets the road: HSUS is run by vegans who don't believe anyone should eat eggs, regardless of how or where they were produced.

Most recently, HSUS has opposed attempts by California lawmakers to specifically define the standards mandated by Proposition 2. The very vague language that California voters approved in 2008 gives HSUS's enormous legal team enough wiggle room to hassle farmers who don't see things HSUS's way.

Of course, enriched chicken cages could be furnished with couches, Jacuzzis, treadmills and iPads, and activists who believe in "rights" for birds would still complain about them. HSUS is among them. And its vision of what's "humane" is outside the mainstream.

Since HSUS's view is that a vegan diet is the only "humane" way to eat, this whole "cage-free" egg campaign is a sideshow. It's a temporary step toward the group's larger goal.

Much of the argument against HSUS you find here and elsewhere has to do with what they "really want." Here it includes a "monopoly" on the word "humane" (whatever that means) and forcing everyone to eat tofu-scramble rather than scrambled eggs. Often evidence is trotted out in support of this agenda comprised of quotations from employees and fellow-travelers of HSUS, not occasionally, taken baldly out of context.

Nevertheless, there's an interesting argument from true intention here that is sort of like a circumstantial ad hominem  but seems interestingly different. It looks like the structure is something along the lines of:

1. P supports policy x (cage free housing).

2. P's real intention is to adopt radical end y (veganism).

3. Therefore, we should resist policy x (cage free housing).

It's not a simple ad hominem in this form since it doesn't deny the truth of a claim, though it could be formulated as a circumstantial ad hominem. What seems to be added is an implicit slippery slope argument that suggests that because P supports y we should not allow x since it would advance y. This is the sort of argument that lots of tea-party folks seem to fall back on–Obama's real intention is to turn the country into a socialist state, Obama advocates health care reform,Therefore we should resist health care reform. But, it's certainly not limited to the right-wing. We hear similar arguments made about corporations and certain other administrations. I don't have an example to hand right now, but I'm sure we can come up with a bunch. It's really the laziest of all argumentative vices.

In the case of President Obama the "real intention" premise is so laughable that the logical flaw in the argument is overshadowed by the obvious falsity of the premise. Most of these "real intentions"premises have a cartoonish world domination feel to them. But in the HSUS case it is, perhaps, in some sense true that HSUS are advocates of veganism (or their CEO is, or many of their members are–I'm not sure how to think about ascriptions of beliefs to organizations) and maybe even want to further that end through HSUS's actions. But, even if that's true, the conclusion does not seem to follow without some additional premises connecting x and y more closely, just like slippery slopes arguments.

Nevertheless, it is a really bad argument–even if HSUS does believe that everyone should become vegan this says little about whether their opposition to enriched cage housing as less humane than free range or other cage-less alternatives is well founded. Though to be fair to Martosko he does offer appeals to several expert organizations (American Humane Association, Temple Grandin and the American Veterinary Medical Association) who do hold that enriched cage housing is humane. But, rather than engage their serious disagreements over the substantive issue, he prefers the lazy route.

Ad hominem tu quoque, Ignoratio Elenchi

War, Hypocrites, and Islam

11 Comments

Tu quoque arguments are posited on finding a contradiction or tension in the other side's position with regard to the matter at issue, and then holding on that basis that the other side is wrong or at least not qualified to speak to the issue.  I've argued elsewhere ("Tu quoque arguments and the significance of Hypocrisy" and "The truth about hypocrisy," with Robert Talisse) that sometimes these arguments are acceptable — e.g., if someone keeps contradicting himself, that's evidence he doesn't know what he's talking about.  Other times, the inconsistency of the other side is simply irrelevant to the issue (the classic example: even if your father smokes, he's right that you shouldn't smoke, and the fact that he is a smoker is at best irrelevant to the issue, and perhaps actually improves his case, as he, himself, is a testament to how addictive it is).

The tu quoque comes in a variety of forms.  The most significant differentiation to make is between the inconsistencies of speech and speech and speech and act.  The first is about a person who can't keep his story straight.  The second is about hypocrites.  Often the hypocrisy is actual — the person really says "do X" and they turn around and do not-X.  But sometimes, the inconsistency of the other side isn't something that's an actual inconsistency, just one that's likely.  One that would happen….  That is, sometimes the other side may not now be inconsistent, but if things were a little different, the other side would be singing a different tune.  So you say, "You say that now, under these circumstances, but were the shoe on the other foot…"  Colin called this phenomenon subjunctive tu quoque.

I've been on the lookout for it and for a few varieties, and I've found an interesting one in Sam Harris's The End of Faith (Norton, 2004).  Harris makes the case that we (in the West) shouldn't be too hard on ourselves for all the just war norms that we bend when we fight against Muslims.  His reasoning is perfectly subjunctive tu quoque.  First, in defending the way Israel deals with Palestinian aggression:

Ask yourself, what are the chances that the Palestinians would show the same restraint in killing Jews were a powerless minority living under their occupation and disposed to acts of suicidal terrorism? (2004, 135)

Harris uses the same form of reasoning when mitigating blame for disproportionate use of force in Iraq:

If the situation had been reversed, what are the chances that the Iraqi Revolutionary Guard, attempting to execute a regime change on the Potomac, would have taken the same degree of care to minimize civilian casualties? What are the chances that Iraqi forces would have been deterred by our use of human shields? (2004, 146)

The reasoning is appealing, but it doesn't support the conclusion that it's OK to be more cavalier in war with Muslims.  Jus in bello isn't affected by how the other side would be treating you, if they had the upper hand.  If it's unjust to wage war indiscriminately, it's unjust; and the fact that the other side has a clear inclination toward injustice may be a good reason to be at war with them, but it is not a reason to break the rules of war.

This said, I do want to retrieve what's appealing about the reasoning.  It does seem wrong for someone to insist on the rules of war when it's also clear that they, themselves, would not feel bound by them were they the dominant power.  It seems, first, dishonest.  And second, it seems like the use of moral argument is strictly strategic, instead of moral.  The most that would follow from the Harris arguments would be that there is a member of the discussion who is not an honest arbiter. 

One final thing is that these subjunctive moves carry a weird burden of proof, that it seems, is difficult to satisfy.  It's one thing to show that someone's a hypocrite — all you need to show is that he said "Do X" and then show that he did not-X.  But how do you show that the person, after having said "Do X" would nevertheless would, if circumstances were different, would do not X?

David Brooks, hollow man, Straw Man

You can fool some of the people all of the time

1 Comment

Here's David Brooks in 2009:

You wouldn’t know it to look at me, but I go running several times a week. My favorite route, because it’s so flat, is from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol and back. I was there last Saturday and found myself plodding through tens of thousands of anti-government “tea party” protesters.

Now again Sunday:

There are liberals who call conservatives racist as a matter of tactics, too. That happens, as well. Listen, I was out jogging, you wouldn't know it to look at me. I was out jogging (LAUGH) you wouldn’t know it to look at me, I was out jogging on the mall. I was at a Tea Party rally, Tea Party rally. Also there was a group called the Back– Black Family Reunion, celebration of African American culture. I watched these two groups intermingle. Sitting at the same table, eating– watching concerts together. Among most of those people, there was a fantastic atmosphere of just getting along on– on a warm Sunday afternoon.

Thought that was funny–the line about running.  I guess it's funny because Brooks looks like every guy his age who engages in some kind of light sporting activity–so it's not surprising that he's a jogger.  Anyway.  The first passage continues:

Then, as I got to where the Smithsonian museums start, I came across another rally, the Black Family Reunion Celebration. Several thousand people had gathered to celebrate African-American culture. I noticed that the mostly white tea party protesters were mingling in with the mostly black family reunion celebrants. The tea party people were buying lunch from the family reunion food stands. They had joined the audience of a rap concert.

Because sociology is more important than fitness, I stopped to watch the interaction. These two groups were from opposite ends of the political and cultural spectrum. They’d both been energized by eloquent speakers. Yet I couldn’t discern any tension between them. It was just different groups of people milling about like at any park or sports arena.

And yet we live in a nation in which some people see every conflict through the prism of race. So over the past few days, many people, from Jimmy Carter on down, have argued that the hostility to President Obama is driven by racism. Some have argued that tea party slogans like “I Want My Country Back” are code words for white supremacy. Others say incivility on Capitol Hill is magnified by Obama’s dark skin.

First, let me make one quick point about race.  There's no reason to believe that celebrating African-American culture puts you at the opposite side of the political and cultural spectrum from the tea party types.  Many African-Americans are culturally conservative Christians, some even fiscally conservative Republicans. 

Second, watch that next paragraph closely.  Let me rephrase: at least one person sees every conflict through the prism of race, and, many have argued that all the hostility toward Obama is driven by race.  That little slip there of the quantifier–many argue that all is your hollow man.

As anyone with even a passing acquaintance with these arguments can tell you–some that some of the animosity toward Obama is driven by race.  The rest of the animosity, of course, is driven by his being a foreign-born muslim.

In all seriousness, no one maintains that the only reason many conservatives oppose Obama is race.  There is, of course, the matter of disagreement over the policies–a fact which everyone recognizes. 

Now back to the tea-partiers.  Accusations of racism have rightly been leveled against some of them.  That some of them do not engage in open race war when they encounter African-Americans does not negate that claim.  That only negates the claim that all tea partiers are itching for perpetual race war.  And no says that.   

Straw Man, weak man

Raw deal

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It's farmers' market season, so it's time for a food-related post.  Slate ran an article by a professor of science journalism on the possible ill effects of consuming raw milk.  To be more precise, Slate ran an attack on weak man arguments in favor of drinking raw milk, complete with weak man digs against other pro-organic positions.  This, I think, is especially egregious, not only of Slate but of the author, who as a professor of journalism really seriously ought to know better than to engage in such behavior.  Here's a representative graph:

And it's in this incarnation—the one that draws a cultlike following—that the raw-milk ideal becomes dangerous. They're not alone, of course; pure-food advocates in general tend to cast a romanticized glow over their favored products. We hear that old-fashioned organic produce contains more nutrients than that grown by modern agriculture, despite the fact that most research suggests that, basically, a carrot is a carrot and one spinach leaf is pretty much another (and all lose nutrients as they sit on a shelf). We hear that we should return to old-fashioned farming methods, advice that ignores the key fact that such techniques are so inefficient that they can't sustain the world's current population. There's an element of wishful thinking to many food mythologies, but—unlike the haloed status of raw milk—most don't lead directly to risky behavior or public health concerns or physicians complaining that increased consumption of "nature's perfect food" has led to a recent doubling in the number of milk-borne disease outbreaks.

I'm going to presume that the readers of Slate are not going to be all that familiar with debates about raw milk and biodynamic farming methods.  It think it's also safe to assume that the likely reader of this piece doesn't have a stake in the argument–they're not a partisan looking for confirmation of their vision of the dialectical opposition.  This fact makes the weak manning here all the more egregious.  People know, or ought to know, where a partisan agenda is being advanced.  You're a fool (and sadly many are) if you think you're going to get an honest picture of liberals from the Rush Limbaugh show.  In this case, however, one might be excused for having one's guard down.  

Now of course, it's certainly true that some advocates of raw milk are nuts (the author has picked them)–they make nutty claims without basis in any kind of evidence for the magical properties of raw milk.  Some of these nuts even dismiss the very obvious dangers of raw milk consumption with the most ridiculous of sophistries.

Nonetheless, many people drink raw milk (and in general advocate for various organic farming methods).  Some of these people have compelling arguments.  Many of them have arguments that pass the initial test of plausibility.  But you'd never get that idea from this piece.

Your argument is invalid