Klarinet Archive - Posting 000982.txt from 1998/12

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: [kl] Opinions and Arguments
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 1998 14:37:23 -0500

Your opinions are your own.

Your arguments aren't.

There is nothing much you can do with an opinion except acknowledge it,
or express another opinion, leaving the original one unaltered.

But there is something that you can do with an argument: criticise it.
Indeed, it's important to do so, because you might improve it. And to
criticise an argument, you obviously have to read it.

Now, a criticism of an argument is also an argument, and can itself be
criticised. It is *not* just an opinion.

And, because to criticise any argument you have to read it, it is an
especially valid part of criticising a criticism to show where a critic
has failed to address the argument they purported to have criticised,
or where they have addressed instead some other argument they have made
up.

So, I personally expect to have my arguments criticised -- indeed, I
invite such criticism -- but I retain the right to argue against those
criticisms for not addressing my arguments, as and when they do not.

Of course, there is much of value here that is not argument at all.
Opinions, advice, humour ... it's very rich.

But I would nevertheless like to think that the list would support me in
this attitude to postings that do constitute argument. It would also be
some support to the tottering structure of rational discourse in our
world.

Now, beyond that, I want to announce a personal choice -- I am making a
New Year's resolution.

Last year's arguments are last year's arguments. There are still a few
unaddressed nonsenses wailing away out there, but, let them be. In the
future, though, if the necessity arises, I undertake to point out, and
continue to point out (gently to begin with) failures to adhere to the
standards of rational discourse, even when (or perhaps that should be
especially when) the person posting happens to occupy an important
position in an institute of higher education, or has a strong influence
over the young and/or inexpert. I encourage others to adopt the same
attitude towards 'argument' postings, including my own.

What's more, should the arguments escalate, and when in the end pointing
out failures of logic itself fails -- far from agreeing to avoid using
ridicule, my resolution is that I positively reserve the right to switch
to using ridicule in order to discredit unsound thinking and unsound
posting.

However, I undertake to exercise that right only very rarely, and in
extreme circumstances, because I'm quite a reasonable chap, actually.

But sometimes,....unprofessional? You ain't seen nothing yet.

Now, it's Roger who calls me unprofessional, isn't it?

Well, in his case, he's probably turning over a new leaf himself, I
shouldn't wonder.

Happy New Year, Roger. (And to the mice, who reappeared at the end of
your last but one post, I noticed:-)

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN family artist: www.gmn.com
tel/fax 01865 553339

"Believing Truth is staring at the sun
Which but destroys the power that could perceive."
.

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