In Defense of the Defenders of Reason
What happens when we call an argument a bias?
I have noticed that this takes place quite a bit on this Forum. The people who use this as an argument against a position, are actually trying to evade criticisms that are being made against the integrity of their own position. By characterizing a rational position, as an emotional position, the defender is trying to dismiss it without actually having to deal with it. The unspoken claim is that "the objector's criticisms are false because they are based on emotion." But the most extraordinary thing is that those who are leveling this characterization are actually the ones making use of an emotional argument (or at the very least, a formal fallacy). We all, for the most part, accept the premise that bias and emotion are incompetent standards to resolve philosophical questions. Thus, by characterizing a position as falling into this category, a defender can succeed at poisoning the well against the objector. This tactic is loathsome and contemptible, the defender should not merely be able to characterize the objector's position, but should have to provide a rebuttal of the criticism. Further, the fact that someone is upset by a particular criticism is not evidence that the objector has done something wrong, quite the contrary, it may well be evidence that he or she has done something right!
Another variation of this appraoch is to claim that someone has only made an argument because they're "angry." But philosophy is indifferent to this. In the first instance there is nothing wrong with justified anger, it stems from wounds and these wounds should be addressed, but there is nothing wrong with having anger against genocide, torture, the atrocities of religion or the atrocities of fascism. Tragically, there are many things in life that justify anger. Whether a philosopher speaks from anger or whether he speaks from concern is irrelevant to philosophy itself, the only thing that matters to philosophy is the nature and quality of criticism. Whether an argument is made by an angry man or a concerned man, does not matter one iota to the integrity and power of the argument itself.
When the moderators see these kind of fallacious objections being made, when they see deep offense and high emotions, they should not automatically assume that someone has done something wrong, the first response should be to assume that humans get emotional when their beliefs are challenged, especially if their sense of identity is aligned with their belief. And it is always a mistake to align one's sense of self with one's belief, this is the quickest way to become a dogmatist.
My friends, we must get to the place on this Forum where emotion is not manipulating or sabotaging philosophy, unless emotion happens to be a relevant rebuttal, pending the nature of philosophical context.
Robert Ingersoll: In Defense of the Defenders of Reason
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I have noticed that this takes place quite a bit on this Forum. The people who use this as an argument against a position, are actually trying to evade criticisms that are being made against the integrity of their own position. By characterizing a rational position, as an emotional position, the defender is trying to dismiss it without actually having to deal with it. The unspoken claim is that "the objector's criticisms are false because they are based on emotion." But the most extraordinary thing is that those who are leveling this characterization are actually the ones making use of an emotional argument (or at the very least, a formal fallacy). We all, for the most part, accept the premise that bias and emotion are incompetent standards to resolve philosophical questions. Thus, by characterizing a position as falling into this category, a defender can succeed at poisoning the well against the objector. This tactic is loathsome and contemptible, the defender should not merely be able to characterize the objector's position, but should have to provide a rebuttal of the criticism. Further, the fact that someone is upset by a particular criticism is not evidence that the objector has done something wrong, quite the contrary, it may well be evidence that he or she has done something right!
Another variation of this appraoch is to claim that someone has only made an argument because they're "angry." But philosophy is indifferent to this. In the first instance there is nothing wrong with justified anger, it stems from wounds and these wounds should be addressed, but there is nothing wrong with having anger against genocide, torture, the atrocities of religion or the atrocities of fascism. Tragically, there are many things in life that justify anger. Whether a philosopher speaks from anger or whether he speaks from concern is irrelevant to philosophy itself, the only thing that matters to philosophy is the nature and quality of criticism. Whether an argument is made by an angry man or a concerned man, does not matter one iota to the integrity and power of the argument itself.
When the moderators see these kind of fallacious objections being made, when they see deep offense and high emotions, they should not automatically assume that someone has done something wrong, the first response should be to assume that humans get emotional when their beliefs are challenged, especially if their sense of identity is aligned with their belief. And it is always a mistake to align one's sense of self with one's belief, this is the quickest way to become a dogmatist.
My friends, we must get to the place on this Forum where emotion is not manipulating or sabotaging philosophy, unless emotion happens to be a relevant rebuttal, pending the nature of philosophical context.
Robert Ingersoll: In Defense of the Defenders of Reason
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Comments (52)
Absolutely. You have historical precedent for cheering folks for expressing their thoughts, so allow me to forward the sentiment.
Quoting JerseyFlight
In the response to it, yes; in the construction of it.....not so much. Unless you want to say, the only thing that matters to philosophy is the criticism by which it is, or is not, validated.
Anyway....good O.P., even if only because I always defend reason.
When approached as such, emotion can lead to great personal insights, so I don't see why it cannot have a place on this forum.
Absolutely, this is a most excellent clarification and approach to anger.
Quoting Tzeentch
What you are talking about here is emotion in an entirely different context. The place that emotion should play on this forum, that I do not know, what I do know is that it should not play the role of displacing or invalidating arguments.
However, a different line of questioning will help in bringing out which of the two is the one who wears the pants in this relationship. Which would you prefer? Reason OR Emotion? This is an exclusive OR disjunction meaning only one must be selected to the exclusion of the other. I bet most if not all people will choose reason over emotion any day but that's just my opinion of course. I'd be very surprised indeed if people answered my question differently.
This is an important subject in rhetoric and it's nice to read your take on it. However, I strongly believe that who's at fault is not the emotional one! It's whoever lets itself take aim at emotions, rather than rationale.
Claiming "you're just saying that because you're angry" is a cheap way to escape an argument, and boy, have I learned that with my partner.
The path that leads to lasting and healthier discussions is understanding that your listener is feeling something. Feelings should be understood and only then addressed, instead of using them as bear traps around which to dance in circles.
Do I love some reasonable arguments! But it's funny, emotions many times provide so much more information about the world. Pride, jealousy, disgust; these have steered humanity since its beginning. The problem is that, to obtain information from emotions, we need to open different channels, those more fit to noise and sights rather than words and meanings.
Steered?! You might want to rethink that. Does a drunk driver steer himself at 100 mph into a tree?
Yes?
Could you elaborate?
No control, no steering.
Ah! Well, if we're talking about control and consciousness then I'd agree that not all instances have had someone steering the wheel. Makes me think about Hitler and Gandhi, though.
(By no means I'm saying that only emotions have been in control of the wheel, I'm just commenting that they have had their chance)
However, a hypnotist is trained to perceive the world as 90% irrational and 10% rational. What do you think of this?
Philosophy forums are overwhelmingly driven by emotional agendas. Rational positions are typically a thin veneer fig leaf used to hide the emotional agenda from it's owner.
I know all this because the evidence and logical calculations clearly show that I am WAAAAY smarter than everyone else! :-)
The new empty headed religion is already spreading! Praise be The Prophet!
Why?
Who has had their chance?
That they're probably on the right track insofar as understanding humans is concerned but the thing is irrationality isn't entirely attributable to emotion. Many people, myself included, aren't logicians and heck even logicians make mistakes.
:smile:
Quoting TheMadFool
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This is not settled by your feelings, nor is it settled by mine. In the present context the fault lies with the person who is trying to evade criticism (the burden of proof) through the medium of emotion.
Does fault imply decision or consciousness, then?
Are "emotional decisions" intentional?
It doesn't matter. It matters for psychological reasons of explanation, but not for the present context. The present context seeks to uphold the integrity of intellectual standards above and beyond the regress (manipulation) of emotional states.
Apply scientific rigor to the discussion, then.
This is difficult, as only a philosophical zombie could argue unemotionally, but they wouldn't argue or do anything for that matter, as they would have no emotional impetus to do so.
Peer review and a forum such as this is useful precisely to test our emotionally underpinned ideas, against emotionally underpinned counter ideas. So conflict and emotional bias is unavoidable , in my opinion. But I think the better thinkers can rise above this to some extent, if not entirely.
This is equivocates from the original point. The point is not that people must be free of emotion, but that emotional evasions are inappropriate responses to strong critical positions. One can be emotional, what one cannot do, is use that emotion as an argument against (or to evade) a valid criticism.
Quoting JerseyFlight
I totally agree with and empathize with your position - but you can see the difficulty?
Not really. Maybe if you explain more? I would only caution you to be mindful of equivocation in the sense of entering into another topic. Not that your topic would necessarily be invalid, but it might not make contact with the present position.
Reasonable discussion requires a levelheadedness, which can not be experienced in times of high emotion.
Good topic, but different from the one here.
I think our emotion and reason are attached for a reason.
Desire is in emotion
I desire to reason about things.
I desire to reason about them because of emotions.
If I don't reason about things, I will always react with emotion
If I do reason about things, I can balance between reason and emotion.
Acts ultimately require emotions, like feeling motivated.
I desire to reason about things because I care about contributing to mankinds efforts to be reasonable, with itself and others.
As you said, not the topic here. Just thought I'd chime in.
Yes, I agree with you. Further, this "affect regulation" capacity and origin has been studied at length by psychology. Super important area of knowledge.
Yes it is . I have a philosophical take on it hereI would appreciate you opinion if you find the time.
Re the topic at hand. I don't know what can be done , other then instituting some rules of engagement or such. You are probably referring to a particular incident of which I am not aware. But I have been subject to such situations myself, so understand. If reason cannot prevail there is not much point being here.
I vote for reason.
I think the moderators just need to be aware of the fact that philosophy offends people because it refutes their positivity, and not seek to ban people merely because other people are getting emotional and offended. That is not a good enough reason. A skilled debater doesn't need to call people names, he can dislodge his opponent from the basis of his own premises. But this is enough, people get super emotional when this happens. They just can't believe it, and so they do the first thing that comes natural, try to demonize the person who is refuting them, to cast them in a negative light, as a villain, as a fiend, as a fanatic. Anything to sustain their denial and sense of identity which is attached to their belief.
I come from a school of hyper critical thinkers known as critical theory (not literary theory). They would walk circles around the philosophers on this forum, I am but a novice in this domain. Critical theorists are usually well read in three separate areas: Philosophy, Psychology and Social Theory, which often includes economics as well as aesthetics. Adorno, for example, was studying Kant at the age of 16 with a highly distinguished German professor. Critical theorists are the most skilled thinkers I have encountered because they are not limited to one sphere of thought, whereas, American Philosophers, most specifically, Analytical Philosophy, is massively insecure because it only knows how to navigate a very small world of suffocating abstraction. What is missing is dialectic, what is missing is an understanding of social systems. Because critical theorists have this expanded, dialectical comprehension, it makes them exceedingly skilled in the realm of polemics. If you look at Habermas, for example, his arguments range through every field, from Analytical Philosophy, to Continental Philosophy, Sociology, Linguistics, Law, Marxism and more. Critical theory is not one-sided, it's dialectical. One must learn very quickly how to pass through systems and arguments without getting caught up in emotion. It's not personal, it's just critical. The point is to arrive at a comprehension of contextualized value. One could even call it, a systemic value.
Yes, I agree, but a qualification is in order: people claim ad hominem all the time and it's not a case of ad hominem.
"Gratuitous verbal abuse or "name-calling" is not on its own an example of the abusive argumentum ad hominem logical fallacy. The fallacy occurs only if personal attacks are employed to devalue a speaker's argument by attacking the speaker; personal insults in the middle of an otherwise sound argument are not ad hominem attacks."
In other words, someone can call me an idiot, and just so long as it is not meant as a refutation, evasion, poisoning of the well, then it wouldn't be an ad hominem, it could be abusive, but it could also be true, it just depends. Sometimes name calling can be justified, like when I say, Donald Trump is an idiot. This is actually an accurate statement based on his vast social ignorance.
Sure, but it seemed like your focus was on ad homs. They dismiss the argument through saying it is based on emotion or merely that the person is emotional. The ad hom may be implicit: 'since you are emotional, your argument is wrong', but it is present. I said nothing about insults nor did you. I thought the examples you were think of were where the person making the accusation was dismissing the position of the supposedly emotional person on the grounds they were emotional.
Rather than that they were merely saying 'oh, you are an idiot you are so emotional'.
For example...
Quoting JerseyFlight
Here the person is saying that because it is emotional (you have emotions) it is wrong. The emotions are not part of the position/argument, they are part of the person. What difference does it make to the position or the argument?
Yes, I agree. You are correct. I was just trying to qualify, to be thorough, because I know the fallacy of calling something an ad hominem when it's not comes into play. Defense and denial will use any trick at their disposal to retain the comfort of their belief.
And also without emotions we have a lot of trouble reasoning.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2014/06/17/172310/the-importance-of-feelings/
Emotions and reasoning are not neatly separated in the brain. Further you need non-rational - as opposed to irrational - processes when reasoning. Intuition and feelings of correctness, completion, having checked carefully enough, feelings that something is missing
surround and support the process of reasoning. Reasoning in human brains is not like programming. Small bits of feelings are present throughout the process and necessary for that process.
A person without emotions is severely handicapped as a thinker.
Most of the time I feel the same way but which would you rather have around you when a tiger or lion makes its way toward your family? Cold logic or warm love?
Quoting Coben
In my humble opinion the two emotions that matter the most are sorrow and joy - both, I'm led to believe, are causes of woolly thinking. Other emotions like jealousy, anger, hate, love, etc. are usually stumbling blocks insofar as clear and logical thinking is concerned.
Absolutely no question: emotions. Who is better at logic, you or a gazelle/gorilla? Emotions are motivators and make fast decisions. In that case smell or sight of lion triggers a wash of emotion: fear and motivation based on it....running or hiding or defending/protecting, depending on what the family is doing. Ever see how musk oxen deal with an approaching lion. They are not using deduction, but intuitive and emotion driven choices. Also you are contrasting emotions with logic, which I think is a problem. Emotions are neither logical nor illogical. Though obviously a gazelle or me seeing a lion is being perfectly logical in getting scared and running. You certainly don't want to stand there and do some deduction. There is a lion. Lions are dangerous. It is running toward me. If it reaches me a dangerous animal is close to me. Therefore, I will create distance between me and....
dead.
Many emotional reactions are perfectly in line with what logical conclusions would dictate. And in fact millions of years of evolution have given us a great base for making all sorts of decisions. Of course emotions can mislead us. It's a bit like comparing bicycles and hammers. But further in most situations we need them both.Quoting TheMadFoolI disagree, though I also know that what you say here can be right. Anger for example can inform reason that there is a problem with someone. In a crisis situation, someone attacks your child, it is a motivator that revs the body up to defend the child. In a workplace situation where the boss treats you unfairly it can be a signal to a distracted mind that there is a problem and then also a motivator to assert yourself/deal with the problem. Of course one can come up with situations where emotions are problematic, but one can do this for reasoned conclusions. How connected are the emotions to what is happening? How well do we use these facets of ourselves? How connected are we between reason and emotion or are these functions too separate from each other as if we have two modes of dealing with situations? (when in fact we don't)
Emotions are inevitably bound up with our ideas and perhaps reason can aid us to disentangle the emotions as well as the ideas.
The opportunities of this site give a chance for an interchangeable of ideas which should help us to stand back from our the narrow confines of our own thoughts. We can reach out, explore and embrace the development of our own ideas and dialogue with other searching minds.
The progress of society if one could call it that has been one from chaos in prehistoric times to order in modern times. This transformation of society has been mirrored by a shift in emphasis from emotions to reason. Am I correct?
I guess I'd first wish you'd respond to points I made. It's now as if they never happened and a new set of extremely complicated ideas are raised by what I think is an unclear binary chaos/order now added on top of an already complicated, but I don't think analogous, emotion/reason dyad.
First, I doubt it was chaos or we would not have survived. It was a different kind of order and a simpler one. I think, for example, that herds of zebras, say, or schools of fish, are vastly more ordered than most groups of humans. Though they lack the additions our primate brains have on top of their brains. We both have limbic systems, but they lack the parts of our brains we associate with verbal reason. But order can easily be had without those things. IOW now we have shifted to new criteria (order vs. chaos) and I think that gets extremely complicated trying to relate these to emotions and reason. And also raises all sorts of issues around the implicit value judgments. Fascists have often thought that more liberal societies are less rational precisely because there is greater diversity of actions, association, cultural options and choices, sexualities, art forms, etc.. They see this as chaos. Are they more reasonable or less reasonable than their liberal opponents? Is order the best priority/evaulation point? and what order? Modern society in the Europe and the US is vastly more complicated and chaotic (certainly by many criteria) than that of a tribe or a middle ages serf and lord society. And please don't think this means I prefer feudalism. I just think this raises all sorts of new issues without really laying that out. Japanese culture pre-interaction with the West (certainly before WW2) was vastly less chaotic by most measures than Western societies and certainly the way WEstern societies are now. Does this mean it was better or more reasonable? Does order actually correlate with reason? Creatures with incredibly small and simple brains with nearly no reasoning power can live in extremely orderly groups:ant for example.
Emotions can drive violence, but it takes reasoned arguments to get a genocide going. You have to convince the limbic system not to feel group X is human and feel empathy for them.
And animals without anything resembling our swirling cities can lead extremely ordered lives, with clear expectations being met with incredibly regularity by the other members of their groups. A coterie of prarie dogs is extremely well organized, much lower chaos than much of our modern society. The act as a cohesive group with vastly more predictable behaviors. IOW they work well as groups and rarely really hurt each other, for example. That's much futher back in evolutionary time than human brains, as far as the evolution of the complexity of human brains. I don't think order and chaos are an easy correlation with reason and emotion. And while of course I want many things ordered, I want many things vastly less ordered than some societies have had them.
I also just don't understand why for one second I must choose. Any one who thinks one should be suppressed is denying one facet of themselves. They are immersed in each other. They, in us, need each other. They have different approaches but neurologically cannot be neatly separated. And reason cannot function without emotions.
One wonders why we great philosophers are always so eager to provide criticism. That couldn't possibly have anything to do with emotions, right? :-)
I agree entirely, and would add. Ideas form beliefs, beliefs form belief systems, and belief systems form a sanity. If this is threatened, the emotional response is similar to a physical threat, in that the fight or flight reflex is triggered, and then reason goes out the window.
This is the difficulty of debate on this forum, I believe. We personally construct these belief systems, and have faith in them, and when they get knocked down it is painful. We know how personally painful it is, but we cannot know how painful it is for another. Some people feel very little pain, whilst others feel the slightest pain. For this reason, I tend to back off once I see the check mate in a couple of moves, as it is difficult to gage the stability of the opposing poster in a public forum, as a result the point is often not sufficiently made.
For this reason some rules of engagement would be useful, or at least a warning for new members, or a policy that everyone can agree on. Personally this risk element is what I find attractive about this forum. It makes me cautious about what I post, and sharpens my thoughts. And, as others have mentioned, being subjected to this risk, can result in surprisingly good new ideas.
I feel it is extremely poor form however, and well out of order, to try to ban somebody because your personal philosophy cannot reasonably stand up to theirs. That would be school yard bullying, in my opinion, not philosophy.
What an important point! Being subjected to the dysregulation can serve to sharpen one's critical abilities. I just love this and it's so very true, it forces one to innovate.
Question for you both, is it also extremely poor form to ignore and exclude people from conversations for the same reasons? If it weren't for individuals like you both, I think I'd just leave this place and not waste my time with pig ignorant bullies who are too stupid to realise their envy of you is the reason they don't like you. If they took but one second pull their heads from their ass, they might see that you are equal to them and that their mental midget superiority complexes do more harm to themselves than they do to you.
I have learnt a lot in my short time here. Don't let a few bad apples spoil the exprience for you.
Just a few months ago the common theme was to question the validity of reason being a method for obtaining truth. It seemed to me that there was an "infiltration" of reason-deniers whose aim was to discredit reason itself in favor of subjective, emotional interpretations of evidence for our origins and relationship with the world. "Subjective truths" is a commonly used oxymoronic phrase around here.
Religion and politics and ethics are philosophical domains rife with emotion. Most of the problems in these domains stem from confusing their subjective "truths" with objective ones.
A most excellent point. None of us are immune from this because we are emotional beings. The point however, to speak in Hegelian terms, is to use the mediation of thought against the immediacy and mindlessness of emotion.