Timeline for Is there any rational justification to the counterargument "I refuse to answer your question on the basis that it is a hypothetical question?"
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18 events
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| Mar 21, 2019 at 22:43 | history | edited | Philosophist | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Mar 21, 2019 at 22:38 | history | edited | Philosophist | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Mar 21, 2019 at 14:38 | comment | added | Philosophist | @Bread well, the questions I've asked were hypotheticals and were hoping to get an answer that would clarify or show consistency. | |
| Mar 21, 2019 at 7:41 | comment | added | Bread | Probably in most of these cases they meant to say rhetorical question rather than "hypothetical". | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 21:51 | answer | added | Adam Sharpe | timeline score: 2 | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 18:05 | answer | added | Kevin | timeline score: 1 | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 17:54 | comment | added | Conifold | @Philosophist They can use conditionals as referring to generically described situations that are known to occur, then "if" simply indicates the descriptive part. There is no ironclad wall between conditionals and hypotheticals, but one can judge pragmatically which conditionals are fanciful and/or are highly unlikely to come about. | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 16:25 | comment | added | Philosophist | @Conifold On that note, I have been thinking, if a person refuses to consider all hypotheticals, how can they ever use the word "if?" I guess they would never consider that contradiction less someone pointed it out while knowing they refused to answer hypotheticals. Oo, the word "unless" would have to be stricken from their vocabulary too. | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 8:56 | answer | added | Rushi | timeline score: 2 | |
| Mar 20, 2019 at 0:21 | comment | added | Conifold | If true, this is neither a non sequitur nor a red herring, it is not a fallacy at all. One can take a pragmatic stance of dismissing questions answers to which may never matter as a matter of principle. After all, "one fool can ask more questions than seven wise men can answer". Or they can hold that such questions are only answerable when full context is available, which is impossible hypothetically. Of course, if it is only a tactical dodge, and they are happy to indulge hypotheticals on other issues, or try to make opponents do so, that's a different matter. | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 23:24 | answer | added | Cort Ammon | timeline score: 1 | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 22:00 | comment | added | Richard | My opinion is based on decades of debating experience. Even armed with a knowledge.of fallacy, rhetorical.devices and NLP techniques, argument is not a science. A person may choose to end a debate for any.reason. There are no rules. But again, if you want to influence inexperienced or hostile opponent you'd be wise to avoid analogies etc. A lot of people.are vety pedestrian, or may pretend to be. | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:49 | comment | added | Philosophist | The question here is based on whether it being a hypothetical question is what makes it valid to refuse an answer. If you don't have a rule that makes hypothetical questions bad, even if that rule is based on clear conditions, how can you argue that being hypothetical in itself is a justification for refusing to answer it? Interlocutor: "I refuse to answer your question because it is a hypothetical question." The heart of this question: "How does being a hypothetical question make it justified to refuse to answer it?" | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:43 | comment | added | Richard | Its hard to say unless you tell us what the question was. But invariably hypothetical arguments, metaphors and analogies are flawed. Often last ditch attempts, or ill thought out. In my experice its always better to walk an argument slowly.rather than make leaps. | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:37 | comment | added | Philosophist | @Richard Could you please expand? What fallacy are you arguing is the case with this or other hypothetical questions? | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:35 | comment | added | Richard | The question itself may be a fallacy? Most hypothetical questions are. | |
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:30 | review | First posts | |||
| Mar 19, 2019 at 23:01 | |||||
| Mar 19, 2019 at 21:28 | history | asked | Philosophist | CC BY-SA 4.0 |