…Well, language, actually.
Vladimir recently wrote a piece with the above title, and as I’ve just had another experience of a silly argument, I thought I’d pinch it.
Over at Boaty & D’s they’ve been discussing morality, so I stepped in with a brief statement about the golden rule.
Irrespective of differences, there are always the core values – the golden rule if you like. Every society has a don’t murder and don’t steal element to its moral code.
I thought no more of it until a few days later Mr Rob took issue. Not with the concept, you will note, oh no…
@ Longrider
“Irrespective of differences, there are always the core values – the golden rule if you like. Every society has a don’t murder and don’t steal element to its moral code.”
Utterly incorrect. For example, for Spartan males, stealing and murder were actually requirements.
My immediate thought was “WTF!?!” Who mentioned the Spartans? I hadn’t thought about ancient civilisations and wasn’t discussing them. But I slung in a facetious riposte anyway.
Does Sparta still exist? I don’t think so.
Apparently, though, my use of the term “always” meant past as well as present tense.
@ Longrider
“always”
Is that word familiar to you at all? I’d almost forgotten how clever you are…..
The little ad hom was a reference to my irritation at Mr Rob’s use of reducto absurdum a few weeks back.
Okay, yes, “always” can be used to infer multiple tenses – so if someone always does something, then we infer that they always have and always will. What clinches it is the context in which it is used. So always did, does not necessarily mean still does, just as always does may not mean that they always did as things might have changed, and always will is no guarantee of past or present performance.
As is usual when someone misinterprets my words, I look again, just to see if it’s me, but, no, my comment is written throughout in the present tense. It takes a real twist of logic to get to the Spartans.
I recall a couple of years back I was criticised by a self-styled grammar pedant for dangling my participles and Mr Rob falls into the same trap as the anonymous commenter discussed then. Unfortunately, when pedants reach for their red editing pens with haste, anxious to squash the apparent crime against the English language, they forget that there is more to language than grammar (important though that is); there is also style, usage and context to consider. In the case of my use of “always” context is key.
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To be fair to Mr Rob, I don’t think he is a mong, he is clearly intelligent – I just couldn’t resist stealing Vladimir’s title.
I’m pretty sure that even Spartans weren’t supposed to murder or steal from other Spartans. Foreigners, yeah, but then that’s always been acceptable—it’s called war. And as the Spartans, as we know, were pretty hot on war. But not, I think, hot on murdering and stealing from each other. Which makes Mr Rob’s point sort of irrelevant in context, no?
Given that it’s anti-survival, I’m inclined to agree. The Vikings and Saxons were pretty keen on a bit of rape, murder and pillage when it came to the Celts, but tended to avoid doing it to their own.
I’m presuming that Mr Rob was referring to the annual declaration of war on the Helots. They did this so that they could cull them without it being murder. So, er, yes, I think Mr Rob’s point is null and void.
You two sure you’re not being down on Mr Rob because he tends to PWN your arses in debate?
No, because he hasn’t. The use of reducto absurdum is not debate, it’s just pedantic silliness.
There appears to be an internet belief/meme that all comments, posts articles, etc are part of a juvenile level academic debate. I suppose it’s part of the same belief system that causes similar people to confuse academic norms with scientific methodologies.
I find I tend to gravitate to sites which discuss things thoughtfully, rather than those hosting the mass debaters.
Chuckles, hadn’t ought about it like that. I tend to like an interesting discussion and don’t worry too much if people make minor errors or convey their thoughts a little clumsily. I’ve no problem with going off on a tangent if that’s the way it wants to go.
I only start to become irritated when people deliberately go off on a tangent just to be provocative. In Mr Rob’s case, I wasn’t the only one who responded with irritation at his attempt to include a non sequitur into the discussion on the death penalty. His recent decision to nitpick over the semantics of a word taken out of context and the accompanying ad hom are a response to that. It was an attempt to make me look small in the shadow of his towering intellect. In the process, though, his use of logical fallacies and diversions merely served to make him look a bit of a tit. JD’s suggestion that he has PWNed (is that even a word?) anyone is way wide of the mark. Logical fallacies are not valid debating tactics and the people who use them are not being clever. And anyone who signs off a discussion when they have failed to make their case with; “you are too stupid to understand”, merely comes across as a condescending poltroon. I understood his point perfectly and it was wrong.
On balance, if he does it again in a conversation, I’ll probably give him the troll treatment as that is pretty much what he’s doing anyway. Certainly he isn’t engaging in the spirit of the discussion thoughtfully.