Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site sjuvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!prls!amdimage!amdcad!decwrl!decvax!bellcore!petrus!scherzo!allegra!princeton!astrovax!sjuvax!tmoody From: tmoody@sjuvax.UUCP (T. Moody) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Ad Hominem arguments Message-ID: <2431@sjuvax.UUCP> Date: Tue, 22-Oct-85 08:04:30 EST Article-I.D.: sjuvax.2431 Posted: Tue Oct 22 08:04:30 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 31-Oct-85 03:31:51 EST Distribution: net Organization: St. Joseph's University, Phila. PA. Lines: 44 [] Recently, Rich Rosen made the following remark, in defense of his penchant for ad hominem argumentation: Allow to explain something here. When all you have to support your assertions is your "I say so, these are my values, these are my beliefs, how DARE you question them?", and when beliefs founded only on such assertions become the status quo in a society and impinge upon the lives of human beings, then those who would not have such beliefs be the controlling force in their lives have a right to ask why those beliefs are held, to question the assumptions that go behind them, to ask what (even subconscious) motives one might have for holding such beliefs given those assumptions. [Rosen] If a person makes a claim, in the course of a philosophical discussion, it is indeed appropriate to ask that person what evidence there is for it. If the person can muster no evidence, it is indeed appropriate to point that out. These practices are appropriate because they are conducive to understanding and, in the long run (one hopes) truth. One has the *right*, I suppose, to ask anything else one pleases. But certain questions and comments are logically incapable of clarifying, confirming, or disconfirming the claims under discussion; they can only make the philosophical atmosphere more threatening by making the participants more defensive and acrimonious. I am referring, of course, to ad hominem arguments. The motives one has for believing anything are strictly irrelevant to the truth or falsity of that belief, because these are the *causes* of the belief, not the *reasons* for it. To "ask why those beliefs are held" ought to be -- in the context of philosophy -- to ask for reasons. To seek, or impute, causes is psychoanalysis. While one has a right to practice this, it is both irrelevant and counterproductive in philosophy. It is irrelevant, for reasons adumbrated in the paragraph before this one. It is counterproductive, because it tends to turn argumentation into symbolic violence. While some symbolic violence may be unavoidable in philosophy, it seems to me that it is best to minimize it. Todd Moody | {allegra|astrovax|bpa|burdvax}!sjuvax!tmoody Philosophy Department | St. Joseph's U. | "I couldn't fail to Philadelphia, PA 19131 | disagree with you less."