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To: caww; Kolokotronis; wmfights; bkaycee

Strawmen.

The first and last resort of someone who has no argument against what was posted.


68 posted on 12/31/2010 4:27:24 PM PST by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: metmom

For inquiring minds on “strawman” debaters.....

The straw man fallacy occurs in the following pattern of argument:

1.Person A has position X.

2.Person B disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y. Thus, Y is a resulting distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:

1.Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent’s position and then refuting it, thus giving the appearance that the opponent’s actual position has been refuted.[1]

2.Quoting an opponent’s words out of context — i.e. choosing quotations that misrepresent the opponent’s actual intentions (see contextomy and quote mining).[2]

3.Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender, then refuting that person’s arguments — thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position (and thus the position itself) has been defeated.[1]

4.Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs which are then criticized, implying that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.
5.Oversimplifying an opponent’s argument, then attacking this oversimplified version.

3.Person B attacks position Y, concluding that X is false/incorrect/flawed.

This sort of “reasoning” is fallacious, because attacking a distorted version of a position fails to constitute an attack on the actual position.

from Wiki dee


70 posted on 12/31/2010 4:49:05 PM PST by caww
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