Post: #1

Basically the opposite of ad populum (ex. "Most people believe X, therefore it's true).

Basically the fallacy assumes that since the average person is dumb, something must be true if it disagrees with the mainstream.

ex. "Everyone says that the 9/11 terror attacks were done by Islamic terrorists. But 99% of people are idiots who believe whatever the news tells them. People who think for themselves however know that 9/11 was an inside job".

Post: #2

It's still argumentum ad populum, because the reasoning channel is still "X consequence flows from the fact many people believe a particular fact Y."

The logical fallacy flows from the idea that something is more likely because a lot of people hold that view. To say then that something is not likely because a lot of people hold that view is still arguing the correctness of an idea from the idea's degree of popularity.

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #3

I believe it's called "being a raging faggot"

Post: #4

Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

Post: #5

What you're describing could be characterized as "snob appeal." Google it.

In your example, you're saying that you should believe 9/11 is an inside job because most people are sheep, but you're not. Since you're better than the average person, you must conclude that everyone else is wrong.

It's used in ads all the time.

Post: #6

We have a saying:
"Just because one billion Chinese believe in something, doe's not make it less stupid"

Post: #7

I have liked every post in this thread so far, because everyone has said something that made sense. Here's the problem for me with logical fallacies:

There are so many different names for them and ways to look at it.

Is argumentum ad populum the most correct phrase to use? Is this the formal logical term, and the others are more informal? Certainly I would imagine it would be the most effective in an argument, not only because it is true, but because if you whip out some polysyllabic Latin on someone who isn't ready for it, they just tend to fold.

I like the sound of Galileo Gambit though, too. It has a hint of ultimately justified rebellion to it, and you are putting yourself in some serious company if you use it.

"Snob appeal" is good too, but I don't think it is a description of a logical fallacy; it is more of a psychological summing up of the people likely to fall for the fallacy.

I like the saying about Chinese people. That one would be fun to say to a Chinese person, or better yet, to a Korean, implying that you think they are Chinese. That would give them a chance to correct you, and you could look at them skeptically and say:

"Not Chinese huh? Well you didn't have any trouble finding Pearl Harbor!"

Does that count as winning an argument? Getting them so distracted that they forget all about it? And am I a racist if I like to confuse people from other cultures?

See, this logical fallacy stuff is a hard knot to untangle. And realistically, I am going to have to say that the Eel said it in the most enjoyable and satisfying way of anyone.

Post: #8

I think trying to whip out the latin would just result in a response of "Are you, like, larping Harry Potter or something?"

Post: #9

(02-11-2016 03:41 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  I think trying to whip out the latin would just result in a response of "Are you, like, larping Harry Potter or something?"

Try this one, then, it usually gets a reaction because people don't read adjectives: "Resorting to argument from popularity is an intellectually dishonest debating tactic."

Which any debating tactic other than addressing the facts or addressing the logic is.

And if they say they're not debating with you, point out: "You're saying X. I'm saying that's not correct. We are by definition debating."

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #10

A true debate is like a unicorn. Hypothetically it can exist but it's never been observed in the wild. What we see in the wild as debates are just competitions to see who can interrupt the other person the most times.

Post: #11

Call it - "Brawndo".

It's what plants crave. It's got electrolytes.

Post: #12

(01-26-2016 01:16 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

It wasn't nobody believed Galileo, so much as it was Galileo irritated everyone he talked to and the current technology of the time could not conclusively prove that he was right. And because this happened during the Inquisition, which was the response to a certain people that everyone was pissed off at for advocating unfettered immigration (sound familar?), it has been brought up over and over again.

Post: #13

(02-12-2016 10:41 AM)kleyau Wrote:  

(01-26-2016 01:16 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

It wasn't nobody believed Galileo, so much as it was Galileo irritated everyone he talked to and the current technology of the time could not conclusively prove that he was right. And because this happened during the Inquisition, which was the response to a certain people that everyone was pissed off at for advocating unfettered immigration (sound familar?), it has been brought up over and over again.

Also, Galileo wasn't, in fact, right. He was challenging the Ptolemaic model of the universe - that everything in the universe revolved around the Earth. But he was challenging it with a heliocentric model of the universe ... i.e. that everything in the universe revolved around the Sun.

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #14

(02-12-2016 10:26 PM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:41 AM)kleyau Wrote:  

(01-26-2016 01:16 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

It wasn't nobody believed Galileo, so much as it was Galileo irritated everyone he talked to and the current technology of the time could not conclusively prove that he was right. And because this happened during the Inquisition, which was the response to a certain people that everyone was pissed off at for advocating unfettered immigration (sound familar?), it has been brought up over and over again.

Also, Galileo wasn't, in fact, right. He was challenging the Ptolemaic model of the universe - that everything in the universe revolved around the Earth. But he was challenging it with a heliocentric model of the universe ... i.e. that everything in the universe revolved around the Sun.

Well, Galileo did have a name that alliterates with "gambit". I guess you could say "Hubble Trouble" but I don't think he got the same blowback over the Big Bang.

Post: #15

(02-12-2016 10:40 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:26 PM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:41 AM)kleyau Wrote:  

(01-26-2016 01:16 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

It wasn't nobody believed Galileo, so much as it was Galileo irritated everyone he talked to and the current technology of the time could not conclusively prove that he was right. And because this happened during the Inquisition, which was the response to a certain people that everyone was pissed off at for advocating unfettered immigration (sound familar?), it has been brought up over and over again.

Also, Galileo wasn't, in fact, right. He was challenging the Ptolemaic model of the universe - that everything in the universe revolved around the Earth. But he was challenging it with a heliocentric model of the universe ... i.e. that everything in the universe revolved around the Sun.

Well, Galileo did have a name that alliterates with "gambit". I guess you could say "Hubble Trouble" but I don't think he got the same blowback over the Big Bang.

Well, part of that might have been because the guy who first proposed the idea of the Big Bang was actually a Belgian Catholic priest.

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #16

(02-13-2016 01:56 AM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:40 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:26 PM)Paracelsus Wrote:  

(02-12-2016 10:41 AM)kleyau Wrote:  

(01-26-2016 01:16 PM)BortimusPrime Wrote:  Galileo Gambit - No one believed Galileo, and he was right all along. Therefore since no one believes me I must be right.

It wasn't nobody believed Galileo, so much as it was Galileo irritated everyone he talked to and the current technology of the time could not conclusively prove that he was right. And because this happened during the Inquisition, which was the response to a certain people that everyone was pissed off at for advocating unfettered immigration (sound familar?), it has been brought up over and over again.

Also, Galileo wasn't, in fact, right. He was challenging the Ptolemaic model of the universe - that everything in the universe revolved around the Earth. But he was challenging it with a heliocentric model of the universe ... i.e. that everything in the universe revolved around the Sun.

Well, Galileo did have a name that alliterates with "gambit". I guess you could say "Hubble Trouble" but I don't think he got the same blowback over the Big Bang.

Well, part of that might have been because the guy who first proposed the idea of the Big Bang was actually a Belgian Catholic priest.

Yeah, good luck rhyming Lemaître.

Post: #17

Dat Fallacy Tho Lemaitre?

Lemaitre Logic?


...this thread has been comprehensively derailed.

God save us from people who mean well. -storm

Post: #18

Okay, what about this fallacy, one my dad always used when I was a kid.

If I say, "I didn't ask to be born," he would come back with, "No one can know for sure, maybe you did ask to be born."

It's like he would act, when it suited, that there was a radical unknowability to the world which could make anything he said possible, like he could turn basic empiricism on and off at will.