Words Poorly Used #37 — Logic

A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.  — Mark Twain

And a logic fallacy, unencumbered by facts, can jet around the Earth three times while logic is still gathering facts.  A politician can create a meme while it takes at least one legislative cycle to put him back in his place — assuming a static law can even do such a thing.  Someone posted on Facebook today that we could just find the “state” and then defeat it with logic.  I responded “the state lives in a thicket of logic fallacies. If you ask them a question they can’t answer, they classify the hole in the information.”  Anyone who wants to play unfairly with logic, has a natural advantage over any who would fight fairly with logic.  The logician must take time to observe, the logician must take time to consider hypotheses, the logician must assemble premises.  The ant-logician merely needs to put the logician on her back foot, having to fend off logic fallacies.  No time remains for doing the necessary preparation.  No wonder nearly all debate today has deteriorated into arcade games in which the tokens are ad hominem, straw man, red herring, false dilemma, and etcetera.

Kilgore