38 votes

Is attacking an argument because it's machine generated an ad hominem fallacy?

It is fallacious to make the formal argument that a conclusion is false because of its provenance. It not fallacious to dismiss an argument out of hand because it comes from a source which is well ...
g s's user avatar
  • 3,068
20 votes

Is this a fallacy: "A woman is an adult who identifies as female in gender"?

A woman is an adult that identifies as female in gender. A fallacy is an argument that is specious but persuasive. You have presented no substantial argument which often takes the form of first ...
J D's user avatar
  • 20.4k
19 votes

How does "if p, then q" compare to "p only if q"?

In simple cases at least, "if p, then q" and "p only if q" have the same truth conditions. But this is not the same as saying that they mean the same thing. Typically with ...
Bumble's user avatar
  • 22.1k
16 votes

Is this a fallacy: "A woman is an adult who identifies as female in gender"?

"A woman is anyone who identifies as a woman" is a definition, not an argument (it defines what "woman" means). So it cannot be fallacious. But it's circular*, which means it's not ...
NotThatGuy's user avatar
  • 4,600
13 votes

Is this a fallacy: "A woman is an adult who identifies as female in gender"?

It isn't an argument, so cannot be a fallacy. It is merely a definition. A definition can be useful or not. It can be a prescriptive definition or a descriptive definition. Prescriptive definitions ...
James K's user avatar
  • 297
12 votes
Accepted

Is attacking an argument because it's machine generated an ad hominem fallacy?

See genetic fallacy. In brief: This fallacy avoids the argument by shifting focus onto something's or someone's origins. It's similar to an ad hominem fallacy in that it leverages existing negative ...
Futilitarian's user avatar
  • 3,996
12 votes

Is attacking an argument because it's machine generated an ad hominem fallacy?

Are we really dealing with an argument if the text is generated using a method that does not involve any kind of reasoning or understanding about the subject? ChatGPT only generates sequences of ...
Jani Miettinen's user avatar
11 votes

Is this a fallacy: "A woman is an adult who identifies as female in gender"?

The following definition is not circular: A woman is somebody who says they are a woman. This definition proposes a test, "do they say they are a woman?", to determine if somebody is a ...
kaya3's user avatar
  • 719
9 votes

How do we know we've defined a thing properly when all definitions have exceptions?

Do not expect to find a perfect definition. A definition is an expression of the meaning of something (the problem of the thing, what is a thing, is another), and meanings are intended normally for ...
RodolfoAP's user avatar
  • 6,660
8 votes

Is attacking an argument because it's machine generated an ad hominem fallacy?

The problem with the philosophical ideal of judging every argument on its merits is that a human lifetime is not long enough to do it, by very many orders of magnitude. Like it or not, you will reject ...
benrg's user avatar
  • 1,109
7 votes

What is the name of the philosophy that believes one should do whatever they want?

Here is a blog post proposing a concept of "hedonic nihilism", which comes very close to what is described in the question. Hedonic Nihilism is an amalgamation of two philosophical ideas. ...
Brian Z's user avatar
  • 1,102
7 votes

Cause-effect fallacy

It could be that you are simply referring to the fallacy of confusing cause with effect. If you go outside and notice that it is raining and many people are holding umbrellas, you would be correct to ...
Bumble's user avatar
  • 22.1k
7 votes

Cause-effect fallacy

I'm not sure that your two examples are of the same species, or that they necessarily are both fallacies. Let's apply the principle of charity to interpretation, and see what happens. Example 1 ...
J D's user avatar
  • 20.4k
7 votes

Can you explain clearly the difference between race and ethnicity?

Alright, first from Race (SEP): The concept of race has historically signified the division of humanity into a small number of groups based upon five criteria: (1) Races reflect some type of ...
J D's user avatar
  • 20.4k
6 votes

Help understanding this bit of philosophy in this paper

First of all I fear you're overthinking this way too hard. Like computer science often borrows terms from philosophy because both are dealing with the relation between abstract logical entities and ...
haxor789's user avatar
  • 4,317
6 votes
Accepted

What is the rigorous definition of free will?

The general problem is that we know intuitively what free well is, though as of right now we still don't seem to have a clue how it works. And without an understanding how it works we have a hard time ...
haxor789's user avatar
  • 4,317
6 votes

How do we know we've defined a thing properly when all definitions have exceptions?

Several options to define a word. 1. Explicitly define a word in any arbitrary way you want and then use it according to your definition. This method often works for new terms that you invented, such ...
causative's user avatar
  • 10.7k
5 votes

How To Distinguish Between Philosophy And Non-Philosophy?

Your question assumes that the word 'philosophy' is unambiguous and that philosophy is a field with clearly defined boundaries. Neither of those assumptions is valid. If we restrict ourselves to the ...
Marco Ocram's user avatar
  • 9,163
5 votes

Why should a person care about what happens to the world now?

"You will be better off if you do this" is a statement of fact, not a statement about duty or obligation. It's just something that is true or false, without telling you that you should do ...
NotThatGuy's user avatar
  • 4,600
5 votes

How, in layman's terms, should this Conifold argument against illusionism be interpreted?

Conifold is a philosophically sophisticated thinker who runs laps around me, to be sure. I would agree that the term 'illusion' is meaningless, and Conifold is taking to task illusionism since it ...
J D's user avatar
  • 20.4k
4 votes
Accepted

Why should a person care about what happens to the world now?

If I was attempting to inform someone that they should care about the current situation, how can I best do that? The facile answer is, "Via logic and evidence", for we know of no more ...
Futilitarian's user avatar
  • 3,996
4 votes

How To Distinguish Between Philosophy And Non-Philosophy?

I'm writing this from the perspective of someone who used to study and work in the context of academic philosophy for over a decade. Philosophy means love of wisdom. In both western and eastern ...
Philip Klöcking's user avatar
  • 13.1k
4 votes

What is the name of the philosophy that believes one should do whatever they want?

Thelema is is a Western esoteric and occult social or spiritual philosophy and new religious movement founded in the early 1900s by Aleister Crowley (1875–1947), an English writer, mystic, occultist, ...
Agent Smith's user avatar
  • 2,814
4 votes

Help understanding this bit of philosophy in this paper

See you're still at it. Good for you. Hoare is a biggy in mathematical correctness strategies in developing software in computer science; he has a logic named after him, and is in the Turing Award ...
J D's user avatar
  • 20.4k
4 votes

Is this a fallacy: "A woman is an adult who identifies as female in gender"?

No This definition is logically self-consistent and non-circular. It matches how some native speakers of English use the term, but not others. One reason many people prefer it is that “biological sex”...
Davislor's user avatar
  • 816
4 votes

How, in layman's terms, should this Conifold argument against illusionism be interpreted?

Conifold's main argument could be framed as follows: Illusion means that something seems to be the case but actually is not ontological reality. Illusionism claims that mind, free will, and generally ...
Philip Klöcking's user avatar
  • 13.1k
4 votes
Accepted

What is the standard name for this mild form of dualism?

This is called Emergentism, specifically emergentism with regards to physicalism, the idea that the mental is composed wholly of the physical, but not reducible to it. https://plato.stanford.edu/...
Chris Sunami's user avatar
  • 25.8k
4 votes

Is attacking an argument because it's machine generated an ad hominem fallacy?

I do not dismiss ChatGPT arguments because I know them to be invalid. I decide to not bother to engage with them because experience has shown them to usually not be worth the effort. It is an argument ...
JonathanZ's user avatar
  • 138
3 votes

Narrative, what is it?

Two cents. A narrative as used (mainly) in postmodern discourse has the meaning of "theory" or "explanation" about the state of affairs, whatever that may be. A grand narrative or ...
Nikos M.'s user avatar
  • 2,123

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