Fallacy: Ad Hominem

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html ^

[Kenny Bunk]

Salve. Hoc est punctum quod inter gentes ferro et ignis dividitur. Si dux femina facti, dicenda est ad feminam?

[MurryMom]

Paul Krugman received a $50K consulting fee from Enron.

Therefore, the millions in bribes paid by Enron to little Dumbya and untold dozens of other Repuke politicians are totally irrelevant.

[VRWC_minion]

Wrong fallacy. You demonstrated this one:

False Analogy

---

Definition:

In an analogy, two objects (or events), A and B are shown to
be similar. Then it is argued that since A has property P, so
also B must have property P. An analogy fails when the two
objects, A and B, are different in a way which affects whether
they both have property P.

Examples:

(i) Employees are like nails. Just as nails must be hit in the
head in order to make them work, so must employees.
(ii) Government is like business, so just as business must be
sensitive primarily to the bottom line, so also must
government. (But the objectives of government and business
are completely different, so probably they will have to meet
different criteria.)

Proof:

Identify the two objects or events being compared and the
property which both are said to possess. Show that the two
objects are different in a way which will affect whether they
both have that property.

References:

Barker: 192, Cedarblom and Paulsen: 257, Davis: 84

[Cyber Liberty]

Excellent example. It puts Krugman in a better position, being a pot, to call the kettle black. I didn't think you know that about that weasel, Krugman.

[Melas]

Salve. Hoc est punctum quod inter gentes ferro et ignis dividitur. Si dux femina facti, dicenda est ad feminam

My Latin is obviously horrible. I'm reading. This point divides us like iron and fire. If the leader speaks like a woman he is a woman.

[harpseal]

Therefore, the millions in bribes paid by Enron to little Dumbya and untold dozens of other Repuke politicians are totally irrelevant.

I presume you have at least some evidence of bribes paid to someone other than a Clinton or one of his associates and/or functionaries. It is interesting to note that the Enron chairman stayed at the white House during the Clinton administration. Besides aren't you one of the ones who says contibutions from the PRC do not matter unless one can absolutely prove that specific favors were granted only because of the contributions to a political campaign.

Or were you just giving us an example of an illogical untrue attack to highlight how really lame it is?

[Howlin]

:-)

[WRhine]

Well, you seem to have mastered bloviating.

LOL, this from the Master of Shilling. If you were unable to use every one of Sabertooth's list of debate fallacies (Ad hominem, Straw Man, Begging the Question, the False Dilemma, and the Appeal to Authority) the only place on FR you would be able to post is the "Day in the Life of President Bush" thread.

[Howlin]

I'm sure there are a LOT of people on here you'd like to relegate to "the other side."

After all, then nobody would ever question anything YOU say.

[Howlin]

Ah, yeah.......LOL.

[Howlin]

Or were you just giving us an example of an illogical untrue attack to highlight how really lame it is?

I'll take Door Number 2, Monty.

[Victoria Delsoul]

Ad hominem is the fallacy I see most, followed by the Straw Man, Begging the Question, the False Dilemma, and the Appeal to Authority.

You got that right Saber. Here are just a few examples from this thread, Bush says he won't legalize immigrants

"Congress took a page right out of Al Capones book. . ."

"Bush speaks with forked tongue."

"Bush is fast becoming a bigger joke than Clintoon."

"It would seem to me a bad idea to have criminals (ilegal immigrants) handling and preparing our food."

"Bush wants open borders."

"We are going to be flooded by millions of Illegals."

"Illegals are burglars, would you let a criminal to serve you food?"

"You're a typical Bush-bot. You know you can't defend the indefensible, so you resort to mindless name-calling and personal attacks... No wonder it's so easy for a pandering politician, like Bush, to make a sucker out of fools, like you."

"Bush is a traitor, he sold us out." (even though Bush hasn't done anything on this issue yet)

"Bush is a 'Judas goat'."

"The POLLS say 80 (or 90%) of the people don't want this."

"And when your doctor is giving you a prostate exam and you suddenly notice that both his hands are on your shoulders, then that's bound to be his finger in your butt because he says so, right?"

"I'm taking a chance replying to you because you appear to be an imbecile."

[anniegetyourgun]

This is an imbedded ad hominem attack designed to destroy your credibility about ad hominems.

; ]

[MurryMom]

Please reread your post (and my translations below) and you will find it includes 3 new ones.

1.I presume you have at least some evidence of bribes paid to someone other than a Clinton or one of his associates and/or functionaries. (IOW, MurryMom is stupid to believe the millions in campaign contributions paid to Dumbya and his fellow Repukes influenced their pro-Enron stands on energy policy. Dumbya hasn't admitted they are bribes, has he?)

Therefore, Dumbya didn't take any bribes.

2. It is interesting to note that the Enron chairman stayed at the white House during the Clinton administration.

Everybody does it. Therefore, the Repukes aren't guilty of anything.

Besides aren't you one of the ones who says contibutions from the PRC do not matter unless one can absolutely prove that specific favors were granted only because of the contributions to a political campaign.

A quid pro quo needs to be proved when a Repuke politician is accused of taking bribes. Because Clinton was photographed at the WH with Chicoms, we know he's guilty!

[Alberta's Child]

I have decided that there is room in politics for an ad hominem argument. No matter how "logical" his argument may be, you will never convince me that a bloated, drunken slob like Ted Kennedy is right about anything.

[mrustow]

argumentum ad vericundium

Hey, watch your language!

[mrustow]

There is a form of attack which (I believe), according to the definition you presented, would count as ad hominem, but which is perfectly acceptable in my book: attacking a person as unqualified to make the claims he presents. I am thinking of people -- professors, university and foundation functionaries, and journalists, who make bold, "authoritative" claims about subjects they have neither researched nor taught. Often the person may be savvy in a DIFFERENT field, and is seeking to transfer his authoirty tio one about which he knows all the time (it happens all the time).

This issue arises in all intellectual fields, but the one I am most familiar with, is college remediation. I have frequently been confronted with people who have never taught remedial courses, or even researched remediation, making like authorities, because they have some political power or academic authority derived from another field. I see no logical or moral problem with attacking such a person based on my personal knowledge, that he LACKS the knowledge to back up his claims. Call it the argument from lack of authority.

[DrNo]

Great idea, but why stop with ad hominem? In debate, I find that the tu quoque, argumentum ad vericundium and ergo hoc post propter hoc are the real killers.

Oh yeah? What do you know about argument?!

;^)