The Red Herring Of Hypocrisy

[ObamaChristian]

How many arguments have you been in, where because you haven't done what you are saying, somehow it undermines your point.

Why does that even matter? Why do people care so much about whether or not people are hypocritics. Logically, it shouldn't undermine their point at all, but yet it does.

I can be lazy and still tell someone being lazy is bad and be correct.

 

[quatona]

How many arguments have you been in, where because you haven't done what you are saying, somehow it undermines your point.

Why does that even matter? Why do people care so much about whether or not people are hypocritics. Logically, it shouldn't undermine their point at all, but yet it does.

I can be lazy and still tell someone being lazy is bad and be correct.

I agree (except that I think that it´s rather a "tu quoque" than a "red herring" fallacy).

 

[PsychoSarah]

How many arguments have you been in, where because you haven't done what you are saying, somehow it undermines your point.

Why does that even matter? Why do people care so much about whether or not people are hypocritics. Logically, it shouldn't undermine their point at all, but yet it does.

I can be lazy and still tell someone being lazy is bad and be correct.

Depending on the argument being made, it can be very relevant. For example, if someone is trying the age old argument "atheists have no morality/there can be no morality without god", and the religious individual making the argument beats their kids and harasses people of other faiths, I'm not going to be overly inclined to agree that religion makes people moral.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

Depending on the argument being made, it can be very relevant. For example, if someone is trying the age old argument "atheists have no morality/there can be no morality without god", and the religious individual making the argument beats their kids and harasses people of other faiths, I'm not going to be overly inclined to agree that religion makes people moral.

Why goes around saying people cannot be moral without God?

 

[PsychoSarah]

Why goes around saying people cannot be moral without God?

Enough that I can't list out the names.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

Enough that I can't list out the names.

Then you should be able to list one name, right?

 

[PsychoSarah]

Then you should be able to list one name, right?

I could I suppose, if you promise not to harass the person about it. Personally, I am shocked you haven't seen it yet.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

I could I suppose, if you promise not to harass the person about it. Personally, I am shocked you haven't seen it yet.

I promise.

I also want you to look at my response to your post about omnipotence and read the article on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy about said concept.

 

[PsychoSarah]

I promise.

I also want you to look at my response to your post about omnipotence and read the article on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy about said concept.

Already responded.

Example person from the top of my head: TheyCallMeDavid

If I recall correctly, this individual has suggested atheists have no morality.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

Already responded.

Example person from the top of my head: TheyCallMeDavid

If I recall correctly, this individual has suggested atheists have no morality.

do you have a specific post you can refer me to. I would like to take a look at what he said.

 

[PsychoSarah]

do you have a specific post you can refer me to. I would like to take a look at what he said.

No, because I am not obsessed enough to keep links for what people say. I haven't talked to him for a while. He still is on though.

Why would I keep tabs on an argument which isn't rare?

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

No, because I am not obsessed enough to keep links for what people say. I haven't talked to him for a while. He still is on though.

Why would I keep tabs on an argument which isn't rare?

I think you are wrong Sarah, that is my point. It is not that Christians say that atheists cannot be moral, it is that we argue that apart from God, there is no reason to think that moral values and duties are objective.

There are atheists that live what most would consider to be moral lives. I believe this. I do not argue against this.

Bearing no relation to the above, I have yet to be shown how objective moral values and duties can exist without God.

Since the majority of atheists I have spoken with are moral relativists, they would agree with my position!

So do not mistake a person's argument that objective moral values and duties are more plausibly grounded in God than not for the argument that atheists are immoral.

They are not the same my Love. Do we understand one another?

 

[PsychoSarah]

I think you are wrong Sarah, that is my point. It is not that Christians say that atheists cannot be moral, it is that we argue that apart from God, there is no reason to think that moral values and duties are objective.

There are atheists that live what most would consider to be moral lives. I believe this. I do not argue against this.

Bearing no relation to the above, I have yet to be shown how objective moral values and duties can exist without God.

Since the majority of atheists I have spoken with are moral relativists, they would agree with my position!

So do not mistake a person's argument that objective moral values and duties are more plausibly grounded in God than not for the argument that atheists are immoral.

They are not the same my Love. Do we understand one another?

I don't think objective morality could be used by humans as such anyways, it wouldn't matter if there was a source if objective morality, because how we interpret and use it would still be subjective. I get your point, but when people follow up with statements such as "what stops atheists from running around raping and killing" or "atheists are just atheists so that they are free to sin", I don't get the impression that they are talking as you think. That you don't see it might be as a result of the fact that you yourself aren't an atheist

 

[variant]

How many arguments have you been in, where because you haven't done what you are saying, somehow it undermines your point.

Why does that even matter? Why do people care so much about whether or not people are hypocritics. Logically, it shouldn't undermine their point at all, but yet it does.

I can be lazy and still tell someone being lazy is bad and be correct.

It absolutely undermines your authority to make the point.

What you do is what you think not what you say.

 

[variant]

I think you are wrong Sarah, that is my point. It is not that Christians say that atheists cannot be moral, it is that we argue that apart from God, there is no reason to think that moral values and duties are objective.

If morality is about what people do, then why it does it really matter how "objective" the reason behind why we would do something is?

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

If morality is about what people do, then why it does it really matter how "objective" the reason behind why we would do something is?

Morality is more about what people ought or ought not to do or should do or should not do. This is the ought of moral obligation.

It is about assigning value to certain acts, labeling them as good or bad, right or wrong.

Why does it matter? This is more of a personal position I hold. It matters to me for several reasons, but you may not care one bit.

Quite simply, if morality is based solely upon the opinions of human beings, then there is nothing that obligates me to prefer a particular morality over any other except my own interests.

If morality is objective and based on the commands of a Good and Just God, then I am obligated to live a certain way and if I fail to do so, I am guilty and will be called to account for failing to live as I know I ought to have lived. For example: I would be obligated to love my neighbor as myself and if I failed to do this, I would be guilty of not living how I should have lived. I would be a transgressor. I would be a "law-breaker".

So it seems to me it matters a great deal.

All things are permitted if there is no immortality and no God to judge us for our deeds. We become gods in determining what is good and bad, right and wrong.

But if we are immortal and if there is a God to judge use (something I argue is the case) then we do not determine what is good and bad, right or wrong, but morality is something discovered, not invented, just like any other law that we discover.

It matters to me a great deal because if moral values and duties are objective, then moral relativism is false. I do not want to live according to what is false, but what is true.

Once again, none of these may seem significant to you and you might not care if God exists, or if morality is objective. There are some apatheists who do not care whether or not God exists.

So whether or not something "matters" seems to me to be an issue that is subjective. Nor would I really try to convince you to believe that these subjects matter if you are not of the opinion already that they matter.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

It absolutely undermines your authority to make the point.

What you do is what you think not what you say.

It has nothing to do with whether or not an argument is formally and informally valid, sound, contains true premises and therefore good.

Thus to say: "You are a hypocrite, therefore your argument is false", would be a non-sequitur of the ad hominem variety.

I could smoke a pack of cigs a day and present you with a deductive argument for why you should not smoke, my being a hypocrite does not make the argument false.

Would the fact that I was a hypocrite have an affect on you? I am pretty sure it would, especially if you loved smoking and did not want to stop. You might just say well you are a hypocrite, I do not have to listen to you.

And you could say that. But you could not use that as a reason to reject the deductive argument I put forth.

 

[Received]

The OP is talking about plain old ad hominem.

 

[bhsmte]

do you have a specific post you can refer me to. I would like to take a look at what he said.

I actually debated him on this topic in the formal debate thread sometime ago and trust me, he claims what Sarah is pointing out, as do others on CF.

 

[variant]

It has nothing to do with whether or not an argument is formally and informally valid, sound, contains true premises and therefore good.

Thus to say: "You are a hypocrite, therefore your argument is false", would be a non-sequitur of the ad hominem variety.

I could smoke a pack of cigs a day and present you with a deductive argument for why you should not smoke, my being a hypocrite does not make the argument false.

Would the fact that I was a hypocrite have an affect on you? I am pretty sure it would, especially if you loved smoking and did not want to stop. You might just say well you are a hypocrite, I do not have to listen to you.

And you could say that. But you could not use that as a reason to reject the deductive argument I put forth.

I didn't say it was false, I said you had no authority to make the argument. It is free to be true or false.

If you don't believe in a conclusion enough to act upon it you don't really believe it.

What you are saying is: "I don't believe the conclusion of my argument enough to fundamentally change the way I act but you should"

Arguments are for persuading, if you make one that you demonstrate that you feel is unpersuasive it is unlikely to convince.