NancyLebovitz comments on Open Thread, April 27-May 4, 2014 - Less Wrong

0 Post author: NancyLebovitz 27 April 2014 08:34PM

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Comment author: V_V 04 May 2014 10:18:20AM -1 points [-]

Sure, many informal fallacies derive from useful heuristics. The problem is occurs when these heuristics are used as hard rules, especially when dismissing criticism.

For instance, the typical 'privilege' argument is: "You are white/male/heterosexual/cisgender/educated/upper class/attractive/fit/neurotypical, therefore your arguments about non-white/female/gay/transgender/uneducated/working class/unattractive/fat/neuroatypical people are wrong."
It is reasonable that people with certain life experiences may have difficulties understanding the issues of people with different life experiences, but this doesn't mean that you need to share life experiences in order to make an informed argument. The "therefore you are wrong" part of the privilege rebuttal is a fallacy.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 04 May 2014 12:59:57PM -1 points [-]

If the argument is about how the world of people (as distinct from scientific conclusions) works, then life experiences are important information. What sort of argument about the world (say, an argument about why people are poor) should ignore life experience? Admittedly, the experiences of two people aren't enough, but at least that's a start. It's also worth checking on whether one of the people is arguing from no experience.