REIMktg

More of the same. Personal attacks, attacks on my approach, but not against the facts. Funny, I do not feel like a victim and I hardly am appealing for pity, especially around here.

I know most here do not understand my views because they are too young, have not lived, are not in tune with the current economy - Who can tell me where I am wrong in practice without reliance on unproven theories or philosophy.

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cheeseman

then what makes you any different than the supposedly ivory tower theorists you're railing against?

if your arguments were more sound and rooted in practicality than the "alternative", then everyone would be resoundingly adopting your ideas.

and now instead of proving that your argument wasn't lazy, you deliver the ivory tower special "everyone is too dumb to get how smart i am" line

personally, guerilla and monies made more sense to me.

REIMktg

1. Monies has not even posted in this thread.
2. People do not adopt ideas "resoundingly" when they are correct - we all wish this were true, but it is not
3. I have yet to say how smart I am - I know I am not nearly as "book smart" as many here

Also, all Guerilla has said is




I believe the process should be gradual, not sudden.

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guerilla

He's not going to prove anything because he can't.

I am still working on this one.

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paulieg

you are confused about what argumenta ad hominem are. you dismissed my arguments because i, supposedly, don't know anything about X or Y, instead of addressing them. that's ad hominem, even if it's not as obvious as "you're black".

i've made certain assertions, from which i then drew conclusions. you could've argued against one or more of these assertions or any part of the chain of reasoning flowing from those assertions, but you did none of those things. surely, if i know nothing about economics, philosophy or logical reasoning that should've been supremely easy.

it looks to me like *you* are trolling. address my actual arguments or don't respond at all.


yes, necessity can be abused as justification for compromise until nothing is left of the original position, cf trotsky's policy of red terror vs the original rsdlp position of abolishing prisons or the usa's policy of installing right-wing dictatorships to protect democracy against 'communism' in latin american countries. however, that's abuse, plain and simple. abuse does not invalidate the validity of use, viz use of opioids in medicine despite widespread abuse as a recreational drug.

i believe it to be wrong to exercise coercive force (on the days i'm not feeling like a max stirner ego-anarchist), *except* in self-defence. i believe it to be immoral to restrict someone's rights, *unless* he/she has voluntarily given consent to said restriction *or* his/her rights infringe upon mine. many folks believe abortion to be immoral *except* in cases of rape (graded absolutism) or incest (practicality). there is nothing wrong with an ethical position that takes circumstances into account. throughout history, unqualified application of morals has been responsible for an unspeakable amount of evil. graded absolutism rid us of most of this and my position is a generalization of that expanded to encompass something besides moral absolutes.

trains work well, but only in the presence of tracks. lungs work well, except when there's no oxygen. in a society built upon the exercise of coercive force and capitalism, the only means to compel an actor to act in the interest of the greater good is the exercise of coercive force (regulation). indeed, that is the inherent problem with such a society - exercise of coercive force begets more exercise of coercive force and encourages behaviour that does not lead to the greater good when such coercive force is imperfectly applied.

naturally, in a society built upon anarchist principles, these things we consider immoral would be unnecessary, but that presupposes the existence of such a society. there is nothing inconsistent or wrong about holding that we need a society where regulation wouldn't be necessary to keep the air breathable before removing such regulation any more than it would be wrong to hold that you need to get to the surface of the ocean before you remove your scuba oxygen mask.

you could reasonably advance the argument that such a society is best arrived at by gradual revision of the status quo in the correct direction. alternatively, you could claim that the prospects for creating such a society are made weaker by moving in the opposite direction with the status quo. i would disagree, but those are reasonable positions to hold.


i've learned enough to either agree with what you say (your responses to reimktg) or refute your arguments on the rare occasion you manage to respond substantively to my posts. it's a process though. you, however, seem to think that learning economics and philosophy can only lead to one set of positions, namely yours, and that's a very randroid thing to think.

-p

paulieg

i already have.

deficit spending and a fiat currency coupled with unsound monetary policy have created a bubble, so there will be a correction sooner or later. you have already accepted as much, as the disagreement we have is about how to manage the correction. you are claiming that such a correction can be managed and i am claiming that, although it would conceivably be desirable to do so, it is impossible.

any bubble at this stage of development requires that the markets be confident in its survival in the short to medium term. as soon as measures intended to manage a gradual correction are announced, this confidence will go away and anything and everything it's been propping up will crash through the floor. we've seen this happen time and again with previous bubbles.

-p

guerilla

Pointing out your ignorance about a topic isn't an ad hominem by any definition of ad hominem and I challenge you to produce a third party definition where it is.

Learn economics and philosophy. It will cure you of that nasty habit of asserting and concluding based on an unproven assertion.

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Moxie

Ad hominem is latin for "against the person."

"Your ignorance" is using the word ignorance as an adjective to describe a person.

Saying "your arguments here are ignorant" would not be ad hominem because ignorant in this usage would apply to the arguments themselves and not the person.

This is my understanding. I'm not trying to argue with you guerilla, lol.

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paulieg

firstly, you didn't "point out my ignorance", you simply asserted it with no proof whatsoever. in fact, you are yet to produce any substantive reply to anything i said in this thread. i'm afraid that leads me to the conclusion that like many of your randroid bretheren you are only capable of parroting talking points and are found wanting when it comes to discourse with people who actually think for themselves.

secondly, i already explained to you how what you wrote qualifies as ad hominem. since you appear to be having comprehension problems, i'll be happy to explain it again. whether i know anything about subject X has no bearing on the validity of either my starting assumptions or the logical chain that follows and consequently my conclusions; the only acceptable way to challenge them is to either challenge the veracity of one (or more) of the preconditions or one of the reasoning steps leading to the conclusions. someone knowing nothing about a subject certainly does decrease the probability that the preconditions will be correct, but while it is counter-intuitive, the probability of veracity has no bearing on actual veracity. as an example, a 15th century peasant's statement "there'll be rain today" is either true or false depending on whether it does indeed rain that day, rather than categorically false because he knows nothing about meteorology. you made an assertion about my person (whether i know something about subject X or Y *is* an attribute of my person), that assertion had no bearing on the validity of my arguments and you failed to address my arguments in any valid manner, therefore it follows that what you wrote was purely ad hominem. quod erat demonstrandum. iterum.

learn rhetorics. it will stop you looking like an ass when talking to people who weren't shoddily educated in a backward colony. see? two can play this game. it is, however, entirely unnecessary, a waste of time and incredibly bad form. i'll say it again, reply substantively or don't bother.

-p

paulieg

saying "your arguments are ignorant" might not be universally considered ad hominem - whether it is or not rather depends on how much one feels it reflects on the person in question; i don't consider this change of wording to cause a sufficient change in the semantics to alter the spirit with which the statement was made - but it is still entirely invalid and has no place in reasoned discourse. it's dismissal without cause and would not be tolerated in any strict environment. for example, you can't disprove a theorem simply by saying 'your givens are ignorant'.

if any part of the argument is so obviously ignorant, you simply state in what way and (provided you're correct) the argument is disproved. the only case in which i would be prepared to entertain such an ad hominem is if it were directed at someone claiming to be an expert and essentially arguing from authority; fighting logical fallacy with logical fallacy isn't proper form, but can be effective and at times necessary. however, i never claimed to be an expert and never argued from authority, so even this concession simply doesn't apply.

-p

guerilla

LOLOL

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