KonokoHasano wrote:Because YOU were trying beyond the extreme to fight over yours, by telling people that their arguments were merely 'strawmen' and trying to accuse people of 'fallacies' by not even really going over the character itself. Constantly taking real-world scenarios, psychological terms, and whatever else to over complicate the subject at hand and to try and prove your point.
To be frank, I'm going to have to say that I find your half-venomous response funny. You stick Strawmen and Fallacies in quotes as if you don't believe in them. Unfotunately. Logical Fallacies are not fairies. They don't drop dead just because you don't believe.
They have structures which are almost mathamatical. They are not partially right, or partially wrong, they are not vague and subjective. They do not depend on context, accuracy of information, or oppinion.
They are like a math problem answered incorrectlly.
They are flaws in the logic of the argument itself. As such, the conclusions drawn from those arguments are inaccurate, and invalid.
The definition of straw man not only shows you the structure, but explains it.
1 Person A has position X.
2 Person B presents position Y (which is a distorted version of X).
3 Person B attacks position Y.
4 Therefore X is false/incorrect/flawed.
When my argument was taken, distorted, and then attacked like it had been several times in order to prove my argument 'incorrect', it was a straw man. Attacking that distortion of my argument does not constitute an attack on my position. The distorted argument is no longer my argument at all. As the thing says, you might as well be attacking a drawing of my face on a sheet of paper. (Or perhaps, attacking a straw man dressed like me. Likely toe source of 'Straw Man'.) Thus, attacking the distortion of my argument only proves that the distorted argument is wrong, not MY argument.
If you deny it, you merely bury your head in the sand.
I'm not being mean or malicious about it. If the argument's a straw man, it's a straw man. If I sit there and argue about the straw man rather than my argument, I'm just wasting my time right? What's the point in aguring a point that's not mine? That would be stupid of me. So rather than waste my time with the side argument, I just point it out.
Of course, since I call you on your error, it naturally pisses you off. (I know it pissed me off until I got my hands on the fallacies and kept them for refference.) You want me to address the counter argument, on your terms. And in calling it a straw man, I have declared I will not, that I refuse to engage you on your terms after you engaged me on mine... And in a way, it can be percieved as flinging mud in your face. So I know where you're coming from here.
What's a guy to do? Let my argument go on distorted and screwed up, shouting pedantic nitpickery over every little detail until I turn blue in the face? Risk making people angry because I'm calling them on stuff? Respond to a flawed argument with even MORE flawed arguments? Roll over and die?
Or maybe I should just use a really extreme version of a logical fallacy known as personal attack, and call in a lance strike.
Your agument can't be right if you're a molten crater after all... heheheh.
OR CAN IT?! (DUN DUN DUN!!!)
So chill out. Maybe instead of bristling up like a porcupine, you should look at WHY I called it as a straw man. I had to have a reason to call you on it. I had to have seen a distortion of my argument to make that call.
Know what I mean?