You are right about at least one thing. What I think about the truth doesn’t change the truth. But what you or I think about the truth can change us. Perhaps you don’t find that relevant. I do.
At this point I would ask the reader to take note: Vlad did not defend his false generalization (“Protestant apologists lie”) in any statistically meaningful way. He does not because he cannot. He has one data point based on facts in which we generally agree, the sourcing integrity incident. The rest are claims he has made that the rest of us cannot verify. However, even if we could verify each and every specific instance he claims, it would be far short of the sample size necessary to prove his point.
Now I have tried and failed to elicit a defense from him that can be inspected for its truthfulness. But at every turn he has offered only his private stash of anecdotal evidence and from these meager holdings he apparently expects me to accept his grand conclusion as self-evidently true.
I ask him therefore to accept as self-evidently true the following syllogisms, which follow his form exactly:
Syllogism 1:
Minor Premise: Springfield Reformer (SR) has Catholic family members who both advocate and practice abortion (sadly true, BTW).
Major Premise: SR’s Catholic family members accurately represent all other Catholics.
Conclusion: Therefore all Catholics advocate and practice abortion.
Syllogism 2 (same idea with a much larger sample set):
Minor Premise: A number of Catholic priests have been convicted of sex crimes.
Major Premise: Each of these priests is an accurate representative of priestly behavior.
Conclusion: Therefore all catholic priests are sex criminals.
For syllogism 2, there are, I believe, many more data points than anything vlad has adduced for his perniciously false generalization, which takes the exact form as those given above:
Vlad’s Syllogism:
Minor Premise: Some FReepers and a Protestant youth pastor have lied in the course of defending Protestantism and/or criticizing Catholicism
Major Premise: Those FReepers and that youth pastor are an accurate representation of everyone who either defends Protestantism or criticizes Catholicism.
Conclusion: Protestant apologists lie.
I hope everyone can see the pattern here. In every case, the defect is NOT in the facts of the minor premise, but in the unwarranted leap beyond those limited facts into the utter fantasy (and blatant falsehood) of the major premise. No conclusion based on such a weak foundation should be trusted, let alone regarded as self-evident, and wilfully promoting such a faulty conclusion constitutes at minimum a reckless disregard for the truth and therefore qualifies as defamatory.
For example, assuming there were even as many as 3000 legitimate cases of priests being caught in sex crimes, that still represents less than 1% of the total population of priests in the world (a little over 412,000 by some accounts). No serious scholar would attempt to use a sample of 1% to prove anything about a given group. It is laughable, Vlad.
Oh wait, I know, it’s irrelevant, right? Right.
Just like the Catholic family members of mine who like and practice abortion. Wouldn’t you argue my sample size is too small to draw my conclusion that all Catholics are advocates and practitioners of abortion?
No need to reply. I already know you consider these analogies irrelevant, immaterial and to be thrown out and disregarded because, well, just because. You never give me the “because” part, Vlad, probably because I am a Protestant and therefore unworthy. So I hope you will forgive me for my poor ability to fill in the gap. You’ve given me precious little to work with, other than your version of the Piers Morgan “How dare You!” defense.
And I have to admit. A content-free defensive tactic like that does save you a lot of work. You never have to actually address the vicious defects in your assertions if you simply declare any challenges irrelevant. Nice work if you can get it. I’m from more of a low rent district. I actually feel an obligation to try and make my case based on a fair handling of the facts and the logic. I know you don’t believe that. But you’re wrong. No I’m not. Yes you are. No I’m not. Oh Pulease.
“Vlad did not defend his false generalization (“Protestant apologists lie”) in any statistically meaningful way.”
Protestant apologists? I said PROTESTANT ANTI-CATHOLIC BIGOTS lie. Now you’re reducing that to “Protestant apologists”? How intellectually honest is that on your part?
Examples:
“anti-Catholic OUTRIGHT LYING.”
“many of the Protestant anti-Catholics here lie”
“Protestant anti-Catholic bigots.”
“Protestant anti-Catholic bigots lie”
“two or three Protestant anti-Catholic bigots”
“Protestant ANTI-CATHOLICS lie”
Now, on THREE occasions you have used “Protestant apologists” or just “Protestants” when I clearly am referring to Protestant anti-Catholic bigots. Again, how intellectually honest is it to use a term I never have in your accusations against me?
“He has one data point based on facts in which we generally agree, the sourcing integrity incident.”
That is simply not true - as I have demonstrated to more than one Protestant poster here already. The fact that I don’t share it with you does not mean I have only “one data point”. You see one of the other people I shared more information with is actually someone I respect even though we always disagree.
“Now I have tried and failed to elicit a defense from him that can be inspected for its truthfulness.”
Quite frankly that’s not true either. What you have done thus far is to say that the proof I gave you for one case was only about “source integrity” when it was clearly not only about that. Anyone who would take a clear cut case of outright lying and reduce it to a question of “source integrity” sure seems little interested in truth.
“But at every turn he has offered only his private stash of anecdotal evidence and from these meager holdings he apparently expects me to accept his grand conclusion as self-evidently true.”
Expect you? The only think I expect you to do is to act as you already have. I knew how you would handle this from the start. That’s not mind reading. That’s just from years of experience.
As you point out, though some may, and i am sure some do or are ignorant, yet so RCs, as shown here on FR, and without apology, but does not mean all do. That they are generally bound to defend Rome, and wrest Scripture in so doing, and are hyper touchy about anything that disturbs their image of Rome, and thus reject evidence to the contrary, can be said to be generally true based on collective evidence.
But you are trying to be reasonable, which is often a challange here.
A well needed lesson. Thanks.