Carrol wrote: > Julio, do you mean that to be a serious historianone has to ground his/her > whole argument in that kind of logical idiocy?
I admit that this is a bit idiosyncratic: Literally, *ad hominem* means "to the person." In its most general sense, *ad hominem* means that it is about you -- personally, intimately (from "intimus" = your inner most). The logical fallacy so called is just one particular application of that phrase. Here's how Marx uses the phrase *ad hominem* in a very famous piece: http://www.mlwerke.de/me/me01/me01_378.htm http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm The term Marx used in the original in German was kept in the English version. A friend from another list who does German translations for a living says that -- to his knowledge -- the only acceptable usage of ad hominem in English is to denote the logical fallacy. So, the English translation in the Marxists.org site is wrong. But I consulted with a colleague who teaches courses such as Latin, Classical Mythology, and Greek and Roman Epic, and he assured me that Marx's usage of the phrase is legit. I'm fine with this. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
