[lbo-talk] Personal Attack / Ad Hominem Argument

Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
Sat May 21 12:40:20 PDT 2005


snitsnat wrote:
>
> erm, Carrol, you forgot the fact that someone accused Pug of using lots of
> drugs when he posts.

That would still be a personal attack (i.e., an interpretation of the actual content of the posts, reasoning -- whether correctly or not -- from the posts to the person) rather than making an assertion about the person and judging the posts on the basis of that assertion. I would agree that ideally we could do without such attacks, but I don't know of anyone on the list who doesn't do it occasionally at least. They are impolite, not corrupt, as ad hominem attacks are.

What do you have against The Sandwichman?

Carrol



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list