Willravel

I should probably take a crack at this thread considering how much I call people on fallacious arguments. The most common arguments I run into now are the straw-man, red herring, and slippery slope but the worst for me has to be an appeal to emotion. To me it's really intellectually giving up and throwing a tantrum. I'm not a fan of tantrums, not just because they communicate the true maturity of the arguer, but more importantly because they represent a state of "even though you're argument is perfectly logically sound, I'm right because I'm passionate". I'm fortunate in that I don't run into that around here very often, but in the real world it's surprisingly common, which is sad.

The problem is that when someone is making an appeal to emotion, unless they are a politician or lawyer, they usually are operating at a level below who they're arguing with and are coming to the realization that they're wrong. Instead of admitting they're wrong, they go on an emotional tie-raid to compensate for the weakness of their case. When I see it, I interpret it as intellectual terrorism. All conventional arguments have been exhausted and now it's become a no-holds-barred fight for what they religiously believe is right (not necessarily meaning that the discussion is about religion, but that the person's dedication to their point is so far beyond reproach).

So let's fight the intellectual terrorists there so we don't have to fight them here.

Yeah, I read that through a few times shaking my head. Shakran's law.