ad hominem (V)
I decided to take a different track ...
I think, generally, there are 3 reasons for disagreeing with a philosophical argument: it is logically wrong, it has the physical facts wrong, or it is immoral. There may be other reasons, perhaps the argument is un-aesthetic, i don't know, i don't claim to list an exhaustive list, but these are the feelings of disagreement i most often feel.
When I disagree with an argument what i disagree with is a specific claim. But as i have tried to show, when talking about such topics as "all ravens are black" in the previous posts, is that any claim/statement has, logically, multiple other unstated claims co-extensive with it. The same is true of the negation of such claims.
Specifically, here, i am concerned the relation of the disagreement with a claim to that of the inherent disagreement with the speaker of that claim. To say "this claim is wrong or misguided" is equally to say "this speaker, at least once, has said wrong or misguided things". The "at least once" is only a most favorable translation here, for the best of cases. Generally, the equivalent statment is "you, the speaker, (at least sometimes) say things that are wrong or immoral". No matter what is my intention by disagreeing ... maybe i wish to make someone's argument better, or just to show them what "is really on the end of their fork", whatever ... it remains the case that all disagreement impugns the speaker, the only question is to the degree it so does.
This is true for all correction statements, it is not just for philosophy. In the case of the most simple corrections ("you mean next Friday, yes, not this Friday?") the matter is generally quickly cleared up. There are no bad feelings. (Though there are cases, there are people, who seem to need to correct others with an intro such as "you're so stupid" or, 3rd person "look what the liar had to say today" ... the latter quite common in the political realm.)
Philosophy is more difficult a case. When i make a philosophical statement, that statement very likley has my personal investment within it. When replying to the philosophical statements of others we generally remain aware of this touchiness ... it is akin to telling a person that their hero or loved one is not the person they think that they are. But even this last sort of (sometimes necessary) cruel ... it is not a topic among stangers and mere acquaintences. The critique of heros and loved ones is left to other loved ones.
Philosophy is the worst of both worlds in this respect. Many of us feel a duty to try to impart our knowledge or wisdom to those others that we see genuinely striving to know more than what they already believe to be true. The "genuinely striving" phrase is key here, we don't take up discussions with generic loudmouths, or those like Born-Again Christians whose only real goal is to make converts. When we feel the duty, it is the duty to help those trying to move on. It is the teacher's instinct, but also, hopefully, the student instinct ... as the hope is to gain a bi-directional flow of discourse that helps ourselves as well as the other.
(When one reads what i post on other blogs, i hope it stands out, the method of intermixing question with argument. The questions are not traps, they are the hope to understand another view. They are the attempt to learn more, to make the impartation of wisdom a two way street.)
The feel of being on the defensive in a philosophical debate is going to be the feel of being attacked ad hominem. But this is often due to the nature of the philosophy more than an it is to what has been said in an individual case. It is the nature of philosophy that one is deeply invested in one's philosophical claims. Often, that is what is "doing the work" when one feels attacked. The question to my mind is, "is there a principled means by which one can determine when one is really subject to some form of an ad hominem argument, and/or when one is merely feeling the bite of the nature of philosophical discussion?" I think there is such a principled means.
The way out, i think, is to stop and ask, when one feels the pang of an attack, what is the purpose of the statement that affects one so. I say "pang" because i, at least, can physically feel it when it happens. I feel the capillaries dialating. I feel myself lose focus on the argument presented and feel the strongest urge to reply to the offending statement, isolated from the argument, immediately.
Wittgenstein, in a letter to Norman Malcolm, was speaking about the need for philosophy to make one more conscientious. What he said in that regard i think applies here too. " ... thinking about these things is not thrilling, but often downright nasty. And when it's nasty then it's most important."
To recognize that one feels attacked, and that one feels the attack to be ad hominem ... yet to work to interpret the statement or phrase that caused the feeling, to interpret the phrase as not merely ad hominem (i say "merely" in the spirit of Kant, as in the implication of his phrase "not to use the other merely as a means and not at all as an end" [that is quoted from memory, so probbaly not quite correctly]) ... if one can parse that feeling away from the role of the statement within the argument presented as a whole ...
[sleep overcomes me at this juncture]
I think, generally, there are 3 reasons for disagreeing with a philosophical argument: it is logically wrong, it has the physical facts wrong, or it is immoral. There may be other reasons, perhaps the argument is un-aesthetic, i don't know, i don't claim to list an exhaustive list, but these are the feelings of disagreement i most often feel.
When I disagree with an argument what i disagree with is a specific claim. But as i have tried to show, when talking about such topics as "all ravens are black" in the previous posts, is that any claim/statement has, logically, multiple other unstated claims co-extensive with it. The same is true of the negation of such claims.
Specifically, here, i am concerned the relation of the disagreement with a claim to that of the inherent disagreement with the speaker of that claim. To say "this claim is wrong or misguided" is equally to say "this speaker, at least once, has said wrong or misguided things". The "at least once" is only a most favorable translation here, for the best of cases. Generally, the equivalent statment is "you, the speaker, (at least sometimes) say things that are wrong or immoral". No matter what is my intention by disagreeing ... maybe i wish to make someone's argument better, or just to show them what "is really on the end of their fork", whatever ... it remains the case that all disagreement impugns the speaker, the only question is to the degree it so does.
This is true for all correction statements, it is not just for philosophy. In the case of the most simple corrections ("you mean next Friday, yes, not this Friday?") the matter is generally quickly cleared up. There are no bad feelings. (Though there are cases, there are people, who seem to need to correct others with an intro such as "you're so stupid" or, 3rd person "look what the liar had to say today" ... the latter quite common in the political realm.)
Philosophy is more difficult a case. When i make a philosophical statement, that statement very likley has my personal investment within it. When replying to the philosophical statements of others we generally remain aware of this touchiness ... it is akin to telling a person that their hero or loved one is not the person they think that they are. But even this last sort of (sometimes necessary) cruel ... it is not a topic among stangers and mere acquaintences. The critique of heros and loved ones is left to other loved ones.
Philosophy is the worst of both worlds in this respect. Many of us feel a duty to try to impart our knowledge or wisdom to those others that we see genuinely striving to know more than what they already believe to be true. The "genuinely striving" phrase is key here, we don't take up discussions with generic loudmouths, or those like Born-Again Christians whose only real goal is to make converts. When we feel the duty, it is the duty to help those trying to move on. It is the teacher's instinct, but also, hopefully, the student instinct ... as the hope is to gain a bi-directional flow of discourse that helps ourselves as well as the other.
(When one reads what i post on other blogs, i hope it stands out, the method of intermixing question with argument. The questions are not traps, they are the hope to understand another view. They are the attempt to learn more, to make the impartation of wisdom a two way street.)
The feel of being on the defensive in a philosophical debate is going to be the feel of being attacked ad hominem. But this is often due to the nature of the philosophy more than an it is to what has been said in an individual case. It is the nature of philosophy that one is deeply invested in one's philosophical claims. Often, that is what is "doing the work" when one feels attacked. The question to my mind is, "is there a principled means by which one can determine when one is really subject to some form of an ad hominem argument, and/or when one is merely feeling the bite of the nature of philosophical discussion?" I think there is such a principled means.
The way out, i think, is to stop and ask, when one feels the pang of an attack, what is the purpose of the statement that affects one so. I say "pang" because i, at least, can physically feel it when it happens. I feel the capillaries dialating. I feel myself lose focus on the argument presented and feel the strongest urge to reply to the offending statement, isolated from the argument, immediately.
Wittgenstein, in a letter to Norman Malcolm, was speaking about the need for philosophy to make one more conscientious. What he said in that regard i think applies here too. " ... thinking about these things is not thrilling, but often downright nasty. And when it's nasty then it's most important."
To recognize that one feels attacked, and that one feels the attack to be ad hominem ... yet to work to interpret the statement or phrase that caused the feeling, to interpret the phrase as not merely ad hominem (i say "merely" in the spirit of Kant, as in the implication of his phrase "not to use the other merely as a means and not at all as an end" [that is quoted from memory, so probbaly not quite correctly]) ... if one can parse that feeling away from the role of the statement within the argument presented as a whole ...
[sleep overcomes me at this juncture]
posted by Thomas F. Schminke at 12:17 AM
2 Comments:
Blah, Blah, Blah, Blog
I had included "aesthetic disagreement" in my notes but left if out of the posted draft. I guess that'll teach me.
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