Cake or death, your choice.

The rules are subject to revision at any time. When they're updated, you'll automatically see them again upon entering any Politics thread.

.. shit.

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Mr. Parcelan came out of the closet to say:
The last rule seems a little wonky to me.

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Tough.

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Drysart stopped staring at Deedlit long enough to write:
Tough.

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Tough cake?

Also, singling out ad hominems in the long list of informal fallacies makes little sense. Do you mean simple namecalling, or the actual fallacy itself?

Logical Fallacies

• Ad Hominem - Attacks the opponent rather than the opponent. Examples: "Of course she supports bilingual education. She's a bleeding-heart liberal." or "No wonder he supports tax cuts, he's a right-wing nutjob." The Problem: Name-calling makes us question the writer's real motives or credibility.

• Ad Misericordium - Appeals to reader's/audience's emotions rather than reason. Example: "It makes no difference if he was guilty of Nazi war crimes. This man is eighty years old and in frail health, so he should not be made to stand trial." The Problem: Pity appeal feels like manipulation and distraction from the real issue.

• The Bandwagon Appeal - Plays on our fears of being left out or different. Example: "Everybody knows he's the best candidate for the office." The Problem: We're asked to "get with it" without weighing the evidence.

• Begging the Question - Assumes that something is a fact when it really has yet to be proven. Example: "That judge will probably go easy on that defendant because they are both women." The Problem: Assumes that because the judge is female, she will be more compassionate to another female, which in itself assumes that women are more compassionate than men.

• Circular Reasoning - Where the conclusion of an argument is hidden in the argument's premise. Example: "Steroids are dangerous because they ruin your health." The Problem: Steroids are dangerous because they're dangerous. Repetition of key terms or ideas is not evidence.

• False Analogy - An analogy is a comparison. Fake analogies compare two things that seem alike but really are not. Example: - The attack on the World Trade Center was the Pearl Harbor of the 21st Century. The Problem: - Although the two have similarities, they are also very different events. For example, the attack on Pearl Harbor was a military attack on a naval base while the attack on the World Trade Center was committed by terrorists on a civilian target.

• False Dilemma - A claim or solution that presents only two extremes, when a possible or practical middle ground exists. Example: I stumbled on my way up the aisle. My wedding was a disaster. The Problem: A single incident doesn't necessarily ruin the entire event. The rest of the wedding could have been quite satisfactory and enjoyable.

• Hasty Generalization - A conclusion that is based on too little evidence, or reached when the evidence itself is too broad, not factual, or not substantiated. Example: "Television has caused a significan increase in violence and sexual promiscuity in America's youth." The Problem: This oversimplifies the relationship between television and violence and promiscuity in youth, and discounts other factors that may be connected to the issue.

• Non Sequitur - Draws a conclusion that does not follow logically from the premise or previous statement leading to an error in deduction. Example: "Mrs. Marshall is a fabulous tennis player and knows how to dress with style. She comes from money. The Problem: The ability to play tennis or dress well has nothing to do with one's financial background.

• Faulty Cause-and-Effect Reasoning - (Also known as post hoc, ergo propter hoc reasoning, from the Latin "after this, therefore because of this.") Establishes a questionable cause-and-effect relationship between chronological events. It assumes that because one event happened before another, the first influenced the second. Example: "Every time Bill goes with me to Jacobs Field, the Cleveland Indians lose." The Problem: Although the Indians lose whenever Bill joins you at Jacobs Field, his presence does not cause the team to lose. It's just coincidence.

• Slippery Slope - Presumes one event will inevitably lead to a chain of other events that ends in a catastrophe - as one slip on a mountain will cause a climber to tumble down and bring with him or her all those in tow. Example: "Censorship of obscene material will spell the end of freedom of speech and freedom of the press." The Problem: This domino-effect reasoning is fallacious because it depends more on presumption than on hard evidence.

• Stacking the Deck - Also known as building a straw man, this flaw entails offering only the evidence that supports the premise while disregarding or withholding contrary evidence. Example: "Our Wonder Wieners all-beef hot dogs now contain 10 percent less fat." The Problem: Sounds like good news, but what the ad doesn't tell us is that Wonder Wieners still contain 30 percent fat.

• Red Herring - A fact that is thrown into an argument in order to distract the reader from the real issue. Example: "Jennifer isn't the sort of girl who shoplifts; she is on the girl's lacrosse team, the honor society, and she volunteers at the retirement home twice a month." The Problem: Simply because Jennifer is athletic, a good student, and a volunteer doesn't mean she isn't capable of shoplifting.
  

Edit: All that, and I forget a pair of bold tags...

Demos fucked around with this message on 10-06-2004 at 02:12 AM.

Edit: What was your reasoning for adding it?

Jens fucked around with this message on 10-06-2004 at 11:48 AM.

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Karnaj wrote this then went back to looking for porn:
The last rule sucks shit, especially in cases when people are pissed off about politics and wish simply to vent. Take gay marriage as an example: I or someone else who cares about this issue might simply be piss off at recent bans in some states, and may wish to vent about it in a flame thread. Now I could be banned for not using a politics tag(or having its rules applied to a flame thread), as this is decidedly a political issue.

Also, singling out ad hominems in the long list of informal fallacies makes little sense. Do you mean simple namecalling, or the actual fallacy itself?

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I recommend we limit these rules to discussions of electoral politics. As Karnaj mentioned, there are times it seems perfectly appropriate to discuss certain legislation, etc, using the Flame rules instead.

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El Cuchillo wrote this then went back to looking for porn:
While those can sometimes be irritating, that sort of thing can be rather subjective. Adding rules for the sake of adding rules isn't a good way to operate.

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And who said anyone wanted to add rules simply for the sake of adding rules?

Sorry, but a leap to an unsupported conclusion of the type common in such situations is quite easy to spot, and involves very little subjectivity.

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Bloodsage came out of the closet to say:
I think there should also be a rule against starting threads based around ridiculous conspiracy theories.

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The rules already adequately cover ridiculous conspiracy theories. If you can't back up what you're putting forth with solid sources, you'll get torn down.

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Jens came out of the closet to say:
outlawing stupidity is a surefire way to kill any internet forum

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I would rather have no political debate on the forums at all than the absolute stupidity that's been starting to infest the political debate here lately. There are good voices on both sides of the aisle that debate here; and they shouldn't feel threatened because they've always been able to make levelheaded arguments.

These rules are intended to get the idiots to either shape up or shut up. Either way, it's a win.

In fact, I even considered putting in a required political knowledge quiz; you'd only have 15 seconds to answer each question, not fast enough to Google around for an answer; that you'd be forced to complete before you could post in a politics thread; and your score would be shown along side every post you make in politics threads. Questions of the nature of facts of governmental procedure, which candidate supports which stances, etc. etc. No subjective questions.

I may, in fact, still decide to implement such a system.

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Drysart attempted to be funny by writing:
In fact, I even considered putting in a required political knowledge quiz; you'd only have 15 seconds to answer each question, not fast enough to Google around for an answer; that you'd be forced to complete before you could post in a politics thread; and your score would be shown along side every post you make in politics threads. Questions of the nature of facts of governmental procedure, which candidate supports which stances, etc. etc. No subjective questions.

I may, in fact, still decide to implement such a system.

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I like that idea, mind you, can it be done with a minimum of cultural bias?

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I want some of what Drysart was smoking when they wrote this:
I would rather have no political debate on the forums at all than the absolute stupidity that's been starting to infest the political debate here lately. There are good voices on both sides of the aisle that debate here; and they shouldn't feel threatened because they've always been able to make levelheaded arguments.

These rules are intended to get the idiots to either shape up or shut up. Either way, it's a win.

In fact, I even considered putting in a required political knowledge quiz; you'd only have 15 seconds to answer each question, not fast enough to Google around for an answer; that you'd be forced to complete before you could post in a politics thread; and your score would be shown along side every post you make in politics threads. Questions of the nature of facts of governmental procedure, which candidate supports which stances, etc. etc. No subjective questions.

I may, in fact, still decide to implement such a system.

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That'd be really, really neat.

An idea, though I don't know how implementable it would be: Make the quiz take keywords from the thread itself and form questions relevant to that, similar to Google's text ad system.

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This one time, at Drysart camp:
I would rather have no political debate on the forums at all than the absolute stupidity that's been starting to infest the political debate here lately. There are good voices on both sides of the aisle that debate here; and they shouldn't feel threatened because they've always been able to make levelheaded arguments.

These rules are intended to get the idiots to either shape up or shut up. Either way, it's a win.

In fact, I even considered putting in a required political knowledge quiz; you'd only have 15 seconds to answer each question, not fast enough to Google around for an answer; that you'd be forced to complete before you could post in a politics thread; and your score would be shown along side every post you make in politics threads. Questions of the nature of facts of governmental procedure, which candidate supports which stances, etc. etc. No subjective questions.

I may, in fact, still decide to implement such a system.

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That would rock. I want to showcase my complete lack of knowledge when it comes to politics. $$

(there is a reason why I avoid those threads)

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Drysart enlisted the help of an infinite number of monkeys to write:
The rules already adequately cover ridiculous conspiracy theories. If you can't back up what you're putting forth with solid sources, you'll get torn down.

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Then why did we have not only an absolutely unfounded accusation of somehow cheating at the debate, followed quickly by a letter--admitted trolling, no less--filled with anti-Bush propaganda?

How do either of those threads qualify as intelligent political discussion under the new rules?

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Bloodsage Model 2000 was programmed to say:
Then why did we have not only an absolutely unfounded accusation of somehow cheating at the debate, followed quickly by a letter--admitted trolling, no less--filled with anti-Bush propaganda?

How do either of those threads qualify as intelligent political discussion under the new rules?

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debunk them or ignore them

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Jens stopped beating up furries long enough to write:
debunk them or ignore them

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There's nothing behind them to debunk, if you'll notice--it's pure propaganda. Further, you seem content to suspend the rules of logic for only one party in a given debate--why do you think it's legitimate to post something either entirely without basis or pure propaganda. . .yet it's supposed to be given the same treatment as if it were intelligent political commentary.

The very fact that people keep quoting the fallacy that "a lot of people are saying it, therefore it must have some basis or be a legitimate topic for intelligent discussion," which simply isn't true. One should be required to lay out not only one's conclusion, but the reasoning behind it, to qualify under the new rules. But, apparently, it's perfectly okay simply to throw out an unsupported accusation and it's suddenly up to everyone else to debunk it.

That makes no sense.

All the new rules have done is make it easier to post unsupported propaganda without challenge, if the first day is any indication.

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So quoth El Cuchillo:
Just to extend Demos' list a little bit.

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Dang man, if that's just a bit, I'd hate to see you extend his list a lot.

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Bloodsage had this to say about Punky Brewster:
But, apparently, it's perfectly okay simply to throw out an unsupported accusation and it's suddenly up to everyone else to debunk it.

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yeah pretty much

i guess it's pretty tough being you :/