Diaphanitas

"Argumentum ad Metaphoram"
"Appeal to Metaphor"

Greta Christina has a great article about this:

( !!! )

LWotP: metaphora -ae f. "metaphor."

"Argumentum ad Mephitem"
"Arguing for the Skunk"

That's right:

McWhorter’s Mephitological Argument

Of what use is half a stink?

I love it!

LWotP: mephitis -is f. "skunk."

"Argumentum ad Saxa"
"The Appeal to Rocks"

Last year, I made this post:

Quoddam Argumentum Vexans contra Atheismum

In that post, I say this:

( ... )

From now on, I am going to call this the Argumentum ad Saxa, The Appeal to Rocks.

"Argumentum ad Melonem Aquosum"
"The Appeal to a Watermelon"

Cute:

( Pellicula )

LWotP: melo aquosus "watermelon."

"Argumentum ad Curam"
"The Appeal to Care"

One of PZ's new posts reminded me of something:

Now I'm a “firebrand”!

( ... )

In there is the Argumentum ad Curam, the Appeal to Care. It usually goes something like this:

Okay, fine, you don't believe in God. Why then do you spend so much time fighting against it? Why do you care about it so much?

Yeah.

( ... )

Laci has a good video:

( Pellicula )

"Argumentum ad Cogitationem Desideriosam"
"The Argument from Wishful Thinking"

Nice:

http://gretachristina.typepad.com/greta_christinas_weblog/2009/08/is-that-it.html

LWotP: cogitantio -onis f. "thinking."

"Argumentum ad Arbores"
"The Argument from Trees"

Look look look look:



"Trees exist, therefore God exists."

I love it!

LWotP: arbor -oris f. "tree."

"Argumentum ad Accentum Britannicum"
"The Argument from a British Accent"

Something Melissa and I were joking about:

"I have a British accent, therefore everything I say is automatically correct."

Nice!

"Argumentum ad Precem"
"The Argument from Prayer"

Amusing:

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Persecutionem!"
"Argument from Persecution"

Interesting argument:

http://unreasonablefaith.com/2009/04/08/god-exists-because-christians-are-persecuted/

( !!! )

LWotP: persecutio -onis f. "persecution."

"Argumentum ad Solacium"
"The Appeal to Solace"

Greta Christina has a lengthy but good response:

( Plures )

LWotP: solacium -i n. "solace."

"Argumentum ad Horologificem Paleyi"
"The Appeal to Paley's Watchmaker"

William Paley's watchmaker argument is one of the widely-used arguments used to prove the existence of a deity. Sometimes this argument is rephrased as "Just as a painting needs a painter, the creation of the universe needs a creator of the universe." I have three major objections to this argument.

( Res )

LWotP: horologifex -icis com. "watchmaker."

"Argumentum ad Evidentiam Nonexistentiae Dei"
"Appeal to the Evidence of God Nonexistence"

Here is a common argument:

( Res )

"De Gulielmo Paley..."
"About William Paley..."

I am reading an excerpt from his Natural Theology in my Biological Sciences History course.

He is fun.

'Cause a man-made watch is just like a non-man-made universe!

LWotP: horologium -i n. "watch."

"Argumentum ad 'Woo'"
"Appeal to 'Woo'"

One of my hobbies is listening to podcasts done by people in the online atheist and freethinking communities. I enjoy most of those podcasts, but even among those there are a few that tend to irritate me for a number of reasons. One of the reasons I have in mind right now is the tendency for certain podcasts (especially those done by a certain smokin hot' group and another goddamned one...) to weaken the term woo-woo (or its shortened version woo) in such a way that it becomes essentially another way of saying something like "some belief that I find unusual that another person accepts; it can't be proven true to my satisfaction with scientific data." "Woo-woo belief" is so that it is simply another way of saying "strange belief." And so, all of us believe in some kind of woo-woo, regardless of how rational we consider ourselves to be, and it is therefore acceptable to ask another person "What kind of woo-woo do you believe in?" or "What is your woo-woo?" (Someone might as well ask me "Have you stopped beating up your wife Melissa yet?)

( ... )

"Argumentum ad Esum Infantulorum"
"Appeal to the Eating of Babies"

"They eat babies!" seems to be the standard thing that you say about a group you don't like.

"Atheists eat babies!"

"Catholics eat babies!"

Et cetera.

LWotP: esus -us m. "eating."

"Argumentum ad Islamophobiam"
"Appeal to the Fear of Islam"

PZ Myers posted a response to a "review" by some goofball named Rod Dreher about the desecration issue. The goodball just basically whines and moans about the thing. But, as Myers mentions:

[N]owhere does he mention the cause: the violent over-reaction of Catholics to a student in Florida walking away from Mass with a communion wafer, and the subsequent uproar calling for expulsion and punishment from Bill Donohue.

Figures, eh?

There is one particular part of Dreher's "review" that annoys me especially:

If P.Z. Myers had any guts, he would put out a call for someone to send him a Koran so he could blow his nose and wrap fish in it. After all, it's nothing but frackin' ink on paper, right? So what's stopping you, Big Man? It's easy to shit on what Catholics regard as sacred. But just try doing the same thing to what Muslims regard as sacred. Let's see what you're made of.

I have been hearing things like this from Christians more and more lately. They seem to be saying "What, Mr. Atheist? You criticize us? But do you really have the guts to do the same thing to a Muslim?" I am going to call this the Argumentum ad Islamophobiam, the Appeal to the Fear of Islam.

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Falsitatem Possibilem"
"Argument from Possible Wrongness"

I have been wanting to discuss one particular question that theists like to ask atheists. Richard Dawkins is asked this question in a Q&A that went on after one of his lectures:

( Pellicula cum Dawkins )

The question is this: What if you're wrong?

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Stalinum"
"Argument from Stalin"

In dialogues in which speakers discuss criticisms of religion, one of the most common counter-criticisms to atheism goes something like this:

The greatest atrocities in the twentieth century were committed by atheists in the name of atheism.

It is so common that some atheists have come to expect it to be mentioned at least once during such a dialogue. It's almost like clockwork!

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Necragnosiam"
"Argument from the Ignorance of the Dead"

You know, I'm kind of tired of people saying things like...

But we really don't know what happens when we die.

As far as I am concerned, it's at best misleading, and at worst dishonest.

( Res Plures )

"Argumentum ad Lacunam"
"Argument from the Puddle"

Remember the "Fifty Simple Proofs for the Existence of God"? Well, the Iron Chariots Wiki has a section for the 50 reasons to believe in God e-mail.

Wow, I'm impressed by it! There is one section that particular interests me right now. The response to Reason 15, says this:

Response: This is an example of the anthropic principle. It commits the formal fallacy of petitio principii, assuming that hospitable features of our universe were built to support life, rather than considering that life was adapted to the undesigned features of the universe through natural selection. Douglas Adams' analogy about a sentient puddle neatly sums up the problem with this argument.

How amusing! I would refer to this "puddle fallacy" as the Argumentum ad Lacunam, the Argument from the Puddle.

Here is more information about it:

Puddle Thinking

. . . imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for.

Silly puddle! Hole is not just for you!

LWotP: lacuna -ae f. "puddle."

"Quinquaginta Approbationes Simplices Existentiae Dei"
"Fifty Simple Proofs for the Existence of God"

PZ Myers received something interesting:

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/06/i_get_email_19.php

I just got an email listing 50 "proofs" for the existence of a god. It was also sent to a large number of skeptics, and included a plug for the dumb-as-bricks author's book — she's a flea who writes an imaginary scenario in which Richard Dawkins gets psychiatric counseling…from Jesus! If Debra Rufini's imaginary dialog is as bad as this list of "proofs" — more like a collection of cliches, bad quotes, and lies — I can't imagine wanting to slog through it.

Any one of these I'd happily rip to shreds, but 50 at once? The distilled dementia herein is overwhelming, and I'm sure she counts on that.

Well, I'd love to respond to these!

This is going to be fun.

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Excusationem"
"Argument by Excuse"

A subset of the Argumentum ad Innocuitatem that I mentioned yesterday is the Argumentum ad Excusationem: the notion that it is not religion that makes people behave in horrible ways, it is that people would do those horrible things anyway, and they are abusing the religion because are just using the religion as an excuse.

Again, I am not buying it.

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Innocuitatem"
"Argument from Harmlessness"

Here is a clip showing Sam Harris going up against Bill O'Reilly:

( Pellicula )

Bill at one point says:

"A cracker that people believe is the embodiment of Jesus hurts no one... It's a matter of faith and it's a positive thing for those who believe it in a sense they try to love their neighbor as themselves..."

Augh. I really am getting tired of the Argumentum ad Innocuitatem, the Argument from Harmlessness, which is basically the claim that religion is this harmless thing that gives people answers and makes them feel good.

( Res )

"Argumentum ad Prinatheismum"
"The Argument from Former-Atheism"

Remember in my post about Dr. Francis Collins where he mentions that he used to be an atheist? Well, of course, he is by no means the only well-known theistic person who likes to bring up his former atheism. Some other famous former atheists are Lee Strobel, Alister McGrath, Kirk Cameron, and of course, C.S. Lewis. Perhaps they bring up their former atheism in order to give the impression that they have some authority on the validity of atheism because they have, um, experienced it before.

( Res )

I think I will refer to this former atheism as prinatheism, which is a term I created by prefixing the Latinized version the Greek word πρίν, "fromer," to atheism.

So, when a theistic person starts trumpeting his or her former atheism, that is an example of the Argumentum ad Prinatheismum, the Argument from Former Atheism.

"Argumentum ad Ventum"
"The Argument from the Wind"

( Res )

LWotP: ventus -i m. "wind."

"Argumentum ad Arienam"
"The Argument from the Banana"

Let's not forget the old Banana argument:

( Pellicula de Argumento ad Arienam )

If bananas were so perfect, they wouldn't spoil so darn quickly!

LWotP: ariena -ae f. "banana."