Dear Vortex and Jed,
I post a 'cut-and-paste' from one of Jed's posts.....
NB......please see comment, below...
No, because you'd never base everything on a an appeal to authority
would you?
No, I never do. I had excellent teachers and I learned to avoid all
of the common logical errors of this type. I often point to experts,
and I defer to their authority, but this is NOT an appeal to
authority. There is a great deal of confusion about this, so I
suggest you read the Nizkor site definition carefully.
To simplify, an "appeal to authority" fallacy should more properly
called "an appeal to false authority." That is, a citation of a
person who thinks he is an authority, or claims he is, but who
actually is not. For example, suppose we are discussing
electrochemistry and you cite an opinion or statement by Bockris. You
have made a good point, because Bockris understands electrochemistry
and his pronouncements on the subject carry weight. If I try to
counter you by citing statements by Gary Taubes (from his book), that
would be an appeal to authority fallacy because even though Taubes
claims he knows this subject, he does not.
Not only should the person in question be an actual authority, he
should offer a cogent explanation for his views. If Bockris were to
say, "I'm right and I do not need to tell you why" he would be
abusing his authority. (He would never do that, but some other
experts do.) Quoting Nizkor:
An Appeal to Authority is a fallacy with the following form:
Person A is (claimed to be) an authority on subject S.
Person A makes claim C about subject S.
Therefore, C is true.
This fallacy is committed when the person in question is not a
legitimate authority on the subject. More formally, if person A is
not qualified to make reliable claims in subject S, then the argument
will be fallacious.
This sort of reasoning is fallacious when the person in question is
not an expert. In such cases the reasoning is flawed because the fact
that an unqualified person makes a claim does not provide any
justification for the claim. The claim could be true, but the fact
that an unqualified person made the claim does not provide any
rational reason to accept the claim as true.
. . .
Nizkor make other important clarifications, such as: "Determining
whether or not a person has the needed degree of expertise can often
be very difficult. . . ." I suggest you read this carefully.
Please note that logical errors of this type are well established.
Most were discovered and named by ancient Greek and Roman
philosophers. There is no point to making mistakes such as "An Appeal
To Authority" (or "Ad Verecundiam" as they said in Ancient Rome ),
"Slippery Slope" or "Appeal to Tradition" in a scientific discussion.
It is like making an elementary arithmetic error. You can easily
avoid these things with a little practice.
- Jed
Comment:
This is not meant to 'pick on' Jed....rather is an open comment to all
Vortex:
[a] We read a lot of opinion based on what the poster has read.
[b] I would like to see a post based on real experimental work.
[c] No matter if your was Richard Feynman...HE would council the comment
be based on experimentalism.
[d] If you.....personally have a history of hands on work with
...say...heat measuring...then you MIGHT be able to critique a thermal
experiment .... provided
you did your home work on the EXACT practice..... otherwise.... make VERY
sure
you state your comment is an OPINION.
I also have had grand teachers....but it took at least 5 to10 Years
of hands on work to even be able to find out if what I was taught held up.
In way more than 80 percents of the cases I found the "teaching",
while good as teaching goes....did NOTagree with reality.
NB: Looking for REAL vs Opinion on Vortex.........
Please....
JHS
