When you have nothing to say, say nothing; a weak defense strengthens your opponent, and silence is less injurious than a bad reply.
Charles Caleb "C. C." Colton (1780-1832) English cleric, writer, aphorist
Lacon: Or, Many Things in Few Words, Vol. 1, § 183 (1820)
More info about this quote: wist.info/colton-charles-caleb…
I've also turned on paid subscribers for my newsletter, but am going to keep all content free (obviously!)
Please share for anyone who wants updates on cognitive science, argument, persuasion and AI
I am fiddling with a taxonomy of unforced errors in philosophy and science.
Very WIP.
A big one is "Trying to define the naturally occurring".
Some big doozies in here, like "truth" and "knowledge" and "word".
Examplifying: Plato didn't create the knowledge concept. People had been talking about what they knew or did not know for hundreds or thousands of years by then. "Knowledge" then is a naturally occurring concept, and its meaning would have needed to be discovered, not defined. Two thousand years down the drain trying to fix the unfixable.
Another example is morality. People have been talking about good and bad for thousands of years. Try to discover what they mean, and be prepared for the potential of contradiction, because reality isn't axiomatic.
A very general one: Focusing on validity, rather than soundness. So many astoundingly bad arguments get a pass on a correctness of form.
Interrogate the premises.
I'd rather have this done to me than argue with people on the internet. This is also RFK Jr.'s new "modern" strategy to fight disease. Speaking of head ringing, don't forget that Monday morning alarm!
#argument : a reason or reasons offered in proof, to induce belief, or convince the mind
- French: argument
- German: das Argument
- Italian: argomento
- Portuguese: argumento / discussão
- Spanish: argumento
------------
Join our new Discord Server for language learners @ https://wordofthehour.org/discord
A quotation from Ambrose of Milan
To avoid dissensions we should ever be on our guard, more especially with those who drive us to argue with them, with those who vex and irritate us, and who say things likely to excite us to anger. When we find ourselves in company with quarrelsome, eccentric individuals, people who openly and unblushingly say the most shocking things, difficult to put up with, we should take refuge in silence, and the wisest plan is not to reply to people whose behavior is so preposterous.
Those who insult us and treat us contumeliously are anxious for a spiteful and sarcastic reply: the silence we then affect disheartens them, and they cannot avoid showing their vexation; they do all they can to provoke us and to elicit a reply, but the best way to baffle them is to say nothing, refuse to argue with them, and to leave them to chew the cud of their hasty anger. This method of bringing down their pride disarms them, and shows them plainly that we slight and despise them.
[Sed etiam ille cavendus; est, qui videri potest, quicumque inritat, quicumque incitat, quicumque exasperat, quicumque incentiva luxuriae aut libidinis suggerit. Quando ergo aliquis nobis convitiatur, lacessit, ad violentiam provocat, ad iurgium vocat: tunc silentium exerceamus, tunc muti fieri non erubescamus. Peccator est enim qui nos provocat, qui iniuriam facit et nos similes sui fieri desiderat.
Denique si taceas, si dissimules, solet dicere: Quid taces? Loquere, si audes; sed non audes, mutus es, elinguem te feci. Si ergo taceas, plus rumpitur; victum sese putat, inrisum, posthabitum atque inlusum.]
Ambrose of Milan (339-397) Roman theologian, statesman, Christian prelate, saint, Doctor of the Church [Aurelius Ambrosius]
De Officiis Ministrorum [On the Duties of the Clergy], Book 1, ch. 5, sec. 17-18 (AD 386)
Sourcing, notes, other translations: wist.info/ambrose-saint/32739/
#argument
Chances are no....
Some #advice about #argument online that will make you look WAY smarter, and be a whole lot less annoying -
Instead of demanding someone's sources, find a source that proves your own point.
This does four things-
1. It educates you on the topic better, so you have fresh info to #debate them.
2. It makes you less ignorant in case you were wrong.
3. It makes it harder for them to defend something incorrect.
4. It doesn't annoy the shit out of someone who knew what they were talking about.
"Aber #Hamburg verliert #Arbeitsplatze, wenn es #werbefrei wird!"
Nein, das ist ganz sicher nicht der Fall.
Erstens geht es bei unserem Plan nur um Regulierung. Wir werden Außenwerbung nicht abschaffen, sondern nur wieder auf ein erträgliches Maß zu reduzieren.
#Niemand braucht zappelnde Bildschirme an jeder #Bushaltestelle.
#argument : a reason or reasons offered in proof, to induce belief, or convince the mind
- French: argument
- German: das Argument
- Italian: argomento
- Portuguese: argumento / discussão
- Spanish: argumento
------------
Join our new Discord Server for language learners @ https://wordofthehour.org/discord
no warmth in your voice
utterings as cold as snow
they are only words
#mastoprompt - warm
#dailyhaikuprompt - snow
ART Titled "Only Words"
In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake.
-- Wallace Stanley Sayre (Sayre's Law)
In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake.
-- Wallace Stanley Sayre (Sayre's Law)
Another #Country Has ‘First #Dibs’ On #Greenland Before #America: Ex-Envoy
#TomHøyem, Denmark’s former #envoy to #Greenland, cited an #obscure 1917 #agreement to make his #argument.
Here's a piece in my Substack discussing St. Anselm's reasonings about what an omnipotent God can't do and why that would be the case
https://gregorybsadler.substack.com/p/anselm-of-canterbury-on-divine-power
#Anselm #Argument #Contradiction #God #Reasoning #Argument #Power #Omnipotence
„calling something logic doesn’t make it so. Calling someone rational doesn’t make it so“
I’ve been thinking for a while that, as someone who works on human rationality and rational argument, I should write a blog post on what that actually means (and, maybe more importantly, doesn‘t mean).
in the meantime, though, I found much to agree with in this piece:
Title: The magical thinking of guys who love logic
https://theoutline.com/post/7083/the-magical-thinking-of-guys-who-love-logic
"I'm gonna do it whether the #women like it or not": #Trump's #closing #argument is #Pure #toxicmasculinity.
#NikkiHaley was right that "#bromance and #ToxicMasculinity stuff" — like #wishing #TaylorSwift #dead — is #politically #risky
#ConvictedFelon #DonaldTrump #Fights To Keep Rest Of #JackSmith #Filing #Hidden After #Bombshell #Evidence #Released
#Trump’s #attorneys made a factless and unsubstantiated #argument in the brief the #appendix should be #hidden entirely and nothing should be released.
