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PIRIE, MADSEN (2006)(2015) How To Win Every Argument, Bloomsbury, London.
Ethical Superiority
Pirie:
"It is not a fallacy to be ethically superior to your opponent. It is fallacy to assume you are without supporting evidence. And the evidence must be more compelling than the fact that your opponent disagrees with you.' (92).
With apologies to the fundamentalists; with my first employment post-Secondary school, a mentor in the insurance field, taught me to never assume, because:
ass/u/me
I have taken this life lesson and applied it to my academic work.
This is similar to my concept of not guessing in academia, as much as possible.
Back to Pirie:
One party assumes to be ethical with a position and therefore the other party with a contrary position is assumed unethical. (92). This is also transferred to related morality.
But a different worldview or different opinion on a subject, does not necessarily make either position ethical or unethical.
Pire reasons this has also been called the 'Tin Man' fallacy as in the Tin Man, from the Wizard of Oz (1939) has no heart. (93). This is opposed to the 'Straw Man' fallacy. (93). The Straw Man fallacy will be discussed in a future entry, but it misrepresents an opponent's position, and then knocks that misrepresented position down. (193).
Straw Man attacks can be connected to personal (ad hominem) attacks, as in producing fictional intellectual attacks and as well, personal attacks versus an opponent.
The fallacious implementation of Tin Man/Ethical Superiority approach is easy to imagine.
The Christian accuses someone of a contrary worldview and that same worldview of being unethical and immoral. The person of a non-Christian worldview condemns the Christian and biblical and gospel views as being unethical and immoral.
However, reasonable ethical standards need to be established and then a breaking of these ethics, reasonably established for a rational critique to occur.
Not assumed.
POJMAN, LOUIS P. (1996) Philosophy: The Quest for Truth, New York, Wadsworth Publishing Company.
One party assumes to be ethical with a position and therefore the other party with a contrary position is assumed unethical. (92). This is also transferred to related morality.
But a different worldview or different opinion on a subject, does not necessarily make either position ethical or unethical.
Pire reasons this has also been called the 'Tin Man' fallacy as in the Tin Man, from the Wizard of Oz (1939) has no heart. (93). This is opposed to the 'Straw Man' fallacy. (93). The Straw Man fallacy will be discussed in a future entry, but it misrepresents an opponent's position, and then knocks that misrepresented position down. (193).
Straw Man attacks can be connected to personal (ad hominem) attacks, as in producing fictional intellectual attacks and as well, personal attacks versus an opponent.
The fallacious implementation of Tin Man/Ethical Superiority approach is easy to imagine.
The Christian accuses someone of a contrary worldview and that same worldview of being unethical and immoral. The person of a non-Christian worldview condemns the Christian and biblical and gospel views as being unethical and immoral.
However, reasonable ethical standards need to be established and then a breaking of these ethics, reasonably established for a rational critique to occur.
Not assumed.
LANGER, SUSANNE K (1953)(1967) An Introduction to Symbolic Logic, Dover Publications, New York. (Philosophy).
PIRIE, MADSEN (2006)(2015) How To Win Every Argument, Bloomsbury, London.
