Originally posted by DasaAs far as I am concerned, there's nothing wrong, spiritually speaking, with eating meat. But I understanding your personal reasons for not wanting to eat meat. I even understand how not eating meat is a central tenet of your belief system.
Instead of taking the essence of the post and acknowledging the truth it contains........
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The post that was quoted here has been removedHello, feeling cranky today?
You are rather wide of the mark here, well short of your usual standard,
Lets just say I have voted (legally) a plurality of times and leave it at that.
A circular argument is one where the premise and the conclusion are the same,
with the one supporting the other, or really supporting itself.
Dasa's argument, was as follows.
"Anyone who eats meat will never develop love of God - because eating meat is evidence
of living in ignorance and ignorant people cannot develop love of God."
This contains the premise [P1] "eating meat is evidence of living in ignorance"
And the premise that [P2] "ignorant people cannot develop love of God."
And then the conclusion that [C] "Anyone who eats meat will never develop love of God"
The conclusion and the premises are not the same.
And the conclusion is a logical result of the premises.
IF P1 and P2 = True THEN C = True
Thus the argument is not circular.
Admittedly he states the conclusion before the argument, but that doesn't make the argument flawed,
Or circular.
It is flawed, just not logically.
The logic is fine, but the premises are unsupported assumptions.
Now if you disagree with this analysis and think I am wrong then I would be interested to know why.
Rather than simply have insults and derision directed at me when I am essentially agreeing with you and
mearly quibbling over a technicality. Albeit a relevant one.
It doesn't become you, it's juvenile, and ironic given that is what you just accused me of being.
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Originally posted by FMFApology accepted, and no harm done.
Late last night. I was drunk. My apologies. It was me who asked for the post to be removed when I read it this morning!
I am curious as to whether you still disagree as to dasa's argument being circular.
But feel free to respond in your own time. I'm in no rush, and aught to head to bed now anyway.
Originally posted by googlefudgeDasa's argument is circular because it just assumes what it is endeavouring to prove. It fails as a proof because it will only be seen as being true by those who already agree with its conclusion.
A circular argument is one where the premise and the conclusion are the same,
with the one supporting the other, or really supporting itself.
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Originally posted by FMFHeh, no I'm not quite gone yet.
Nine minutes was too slow for you?
However I still feel that the problem is not of circular logic, but of assuming his premises.
However I will come back to it tomorrow when it's not 2 am....
And I don't use However at the beginning of ever sentence.
Originally posted by googlefudgeI agree that it is not circular logic. However, as you say both P1 and P2
Hello, feeling cranky today?
You are rather wide of the mark here, well short of your usual standard,
Lets just say I have voted (legally) a plurality of times and leave it at that.
A circular argument is one where the premise and the conclusion are the same,
with the one supporting the other, or really supporting itself.
Dasa's argument, come you, it's juvenile, and ironic given that is what you just accused me of being.
are untrue - IMO - so C can not be concluded from P1 and P2. It is flawed
logic, not circular logic. But you are wasting your time arguing about it
with FMF.
P.S. I think it falls under the following category:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question
Originally posted by RJHindsIf we accept all of the premises of Dasa's argument, then we already accept the argument’s conclusion, so it cannot be claimed that we have been persuaded by Dasa's argument. His definition of "ignorance" is not a definition per se, it is the exact interpretation of the word "ignorance" that he needs to assert in order to make his assertion about what "ignorance" is or causes. Maybe my interpretation of circular logic is loose. Begging the question is just another kind of circular logic.
I agree that it is not circular logic.
Circular reasoning, or in other words, paradoxical thinking, is a type of formal logical fallacy in which the proposition to be proved is assumed implicitly or explicitly in one of the premises. For example:
"Only an untrustworthy person would run for office. The fact that politicians are untrustworthy is proof of this."
Such an argument is fallacious, because it relies upon its own proposition — "politicians are untrustworthy" — in order to support its central premise. Essentially, the argument assumes that its central point is already proven, and uses this in support of itself.
Circular reasoning is different from the informal logical fallacy "begging the question", as it is fallacious due to a flawed logical structure and not the individual falsity of an unstated hidden co-premise as begging the question is.
—http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_logic
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Prior Analytics II,57b,18
"Circular and reciprocal proof means proof by means of the conclusion, i.e. by converting one of the premises simply and inferring the premis which was assumed in the original syllogism: e.g. suppose it has been necessary to prove that A belongs to all C, and it has been proved through B; suppose that A should now be proved to belong to B by assuming that A belongs to C, and C to B-so A belongs to B: but in the first syllogism the converse was assumed, viz. that B belongs to C. Or suppose it is necessary to prove that B belongs to C, and A is assumed to belong to C, which was the conclusion of the first syllogism, and B to belong to A but the converse was assumed in the earlier syllogism, viz. that A belongs to B. In no other way is reciprocal proof possible."
Prior Analytics II,64b,34:
"Now begging the question is none of these: but since we get to know some things naturally through themselves, and other things by means of something else (the first principles through themselves, what is subordinate to them through something else), whenever a man tries to prove what is not self-evident by means of itself, then he begs the original question. This may be done by assuming what is in question at once; it is also possible to make a transition to other things which would naturally be proved through the thesis proposed, and demonstrate it through them, e.g. if A should be proved through B, and B through C, though it was natural that C should be proved through A: for it turns out that those who reason thus are proving A by means of itself"
—taken from the discussion page for the wiki article
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Clearly, circular reasoning and question begging are similar. No premise actually has to be false for question-begging. A deductive inference can be valid, but unsound.
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Now, as to Dasa’s argument, re-ordering it as googlefudge suggests, and re-wording slightly:
(1) Anyone who eats meat is an ignorant person;*
(2) Ignorant people cannot develop a love for God; therefore
(3) People who eat meat cannot develop a love for God.
* Dasa actually says that eating meat is “evidence of” ignorance; but I assume in the re-wording here that he takes that evidence as conclusive (from other comments he has made)—just to tighten the inference.
Replacing the actual language with variables, and tightening just a bit more:
(1) All x are y;
(2) No y can l; therefore
(3) No x can l.
If premise (1) were “all y are x”, then I think the inference would be fallacious (affirming the consequent). As it stands, I think Dasa’s argument is valid (though unsound).
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EDIT: I see that RJ mentioned "begging the question"; when I started this, I thought that might be right. Unless I have missed (or mis-stated) something, I now think not, per the above. [I am not really a logician, so maybe I have misconstrued something in my analysis.]
EDIT 2: Re googlefudge's comments about "unsupported premises"--that would seem to get to a "turtles all the way down" type of thing; I think Aristotle's langauge about trying to prove what is "not self-evident" by means of itself is clearer.
Originally posted by FMFYeah, I suspect that's likely. 🙂 I actually started that little exploration above to see if it was circular or question-begging; I surprised myself (if I'm correct) when I broke it down (I'm no great shakes as a logician). The "masks of rhetoric" that we use--myself included--sometimes make it difficult (or at least laborious) to identify formal and informal logical fallacies: especially when we've spotted them clearly in similar rhetoric in the past.
Oh well. I've drawn attention to Dasa's circular arguments so often I seem to have misapplied it on this occasion as a result of being a bit dozy.
Nevertheless, unless a link can be demonstrated between meat-eating and ignorance, the argument still seems unsound (false), even if valid.
