Hi there
With reference to the definition of a strawman, what I disputed Struan was your inclusion of the
emotive and provocative phrase "cleverly twisted into an insubstantial and highly simplistic
caricature" none of which is mentioned in Warburton's definition which I had in front of me then
and now. I would also question Warburton's (and your own) use of the term caricature, although I
suppose this would depend upon a precise definition, as a strawman is really little more than a
misrepresentation of a position for the purpose of disputation. It is not _necessarily_ presented in a
disreputable, malicious, grotesque, dishonest, cleverly twisted, insubstantial, highly simplistic (or
other adjectival phrase) manner. This is also shown in the examples that Warburton provides and
in his comments.
HORSE
> I'm using the term strawman here as being no more than an inaccurate representation of an
> opponents view and not necessarily "..a position of an opponent [that] is cleverly twisted into
> an insubstantial and highly simplistic caricature of its target...".
I did, however, fail to specifically include "for the purposes of knocking down the position that has
been set up" although as I did include this in my final paragraph I would have expected the link to
have been made, so the fault, also excuseable, appears to be, at least in part, due to your own
misinterpretation and misreading of my position. Incidentally, I'm not sure that Dr Johnson would
take too kindly to being dismissed as a serious philosopher, although perhaps not a professional
one.
The position still remains that your representation of Pirsigs position is itself a strawman. The
examples that you provide are presented without context and misrepresetative as a reading of
Pirsigs comments on the same pages show.
A quote that you missed from Warburton in the strawman section was:
"Over-confidence in your own position may lead you to treat dissenting views as easy targets
when in fact they may be more complex and resistant to simple attacks."
Hope I'm not being too bloody-minded.
Horse
PS
As Chris Lofting and the Puzzled Pachyderm (hi chaps) have both made excellent and highly
coherent refutations of your entire post I, and I'm sure many others, would be interested in seeing
how you would reply to both of them.
PPS
I was most interested to see this in your initial post:
"Mind and brain are one and the same so the 'link' is superfluous, coming, as it does, from
confusion about the question."
as it gives much greater insight into your true philosophical position - which is more than you have
done in most of your posts to MD. Do you also subscribe to the idea of "folk psychology" as either
a valid position or theory. Just interested.
On 23 Dec 2000, at 19:39, Struan Hellier wrote:
> Greetings,
>
> Nice idea Horse, I almost wish you were right. However, you are wrong. A
> strawman is a specific, if unusual, philosophical term with precisely the
> definition I gave it. Unusual, mainly because serious philosophers do not
> indulge in it. Your definition of a strawman is, in fact, a definition of a
> misrepresentation; a rather more simple, less interesting, but excusable
> fault.
>
> I suppose you still need corroboration so I give you Nigel Warburton's
> definition from his book, 'Thinking':
>
> "Straw Man: a caricature of your opponents view set up simply so that you
> can knock it down. Literally, a straw man is a dummy made of straw for
> target practice. Setting up a straw man is the opposite of playing devil's
> advocate. It involves a degree of wishful thinking stemming from widespread
> reluctance to attribute great intelligence or subtlety to someone with whom
> you strongly disagree. While it is often tempting to set up and topple easy
> targets, this activity has no place in critical thinking."
>
> Now to any reasonable analysis, this is precisely what Pirsig does at every
> turn. Being a fan of rhetoric, I would have expected him to be pleased with
> his excellent strawmen and suspect that he secretly is. I can now see that
> your misunderstanding caused you not to recognise the strawman critique as
> valid, Horse. Unless bloody-mindedness intervenes, I'm sure that you will
> now be able to accept it.
>
> Some of the most outrageous strawmen from Pirsig are (references are from
> the Black Swan Edition, 1991) :
>
> 1) 'All the universe is composed of subjects and objects and anything that
> can't be classified as a subject or object isn't real' (pg121) - Again,
> nobody has ever believed this. Gravity is seen by almost everybody as real
> ESPECIALLY the 'man in the street'. Likewise time.
>
> 2)'(SOM) . . insist(s) upon a single exclusive truth' pg122 - Rubbish. It is
> 'true' that water is composed of hydrogen and oxygen. It is also 'true' that
> water is wet. In another sense, it is 'true' that 2+2=4 and it is also true
> that 3+1=4. That H20 is water is a scientific truth and, while the genesis
> story is not a scientific truth, it is a religious truth. A fictional story
> is not literally true, but it contains a kind of truth. Of course SCIENCE
> insists upon one TYPE of truth, funnily enough this is known as scientific
> truth, but you will not find a scientist who doesn't recognise the truth of
> her love for her husband - unless she doesn't love him. And, of course,
> science is not a metaphysics, it is a tool and so this is not a metaphysical
> position. I have 'taught' this one to 13 year olds. The majority find it to
> be stark staringly obvious and usually 'taught' me instead.
>
> 3) 'Because they can't classify it (the platypus) experts have claimed there
> is something wrong with it' (pg125) - ??????????? Pah, Humbug!!!
>
> 4)'It has to make this fatal division because it gives top position in its
> structure to subjects and objects' (pg184) - Time? again!
>
> 5)'Free will v Determinism' (pg186) - This is a strawman as determinism and
> free will are widely seen not to be logically exclusive. Likewise
> indeterminism is no guarantor of free will, nor does it even make free will
> more likely. The 'mythos' of the 'man in the street' is that we have free
> will, so that alternative defence fails.
>
> Pirsig makes it far too easy so I shall stop.
>
> Bo. Naughty, naughty, I deliberately pointed out that no credit was due to
> me for the demise of Lila in the UK (as it obviously wasn't and I would be a
> total twat to claim that it was) and yet you still claim that I claimed it.
> No matter. I will also forgive you for following your master and inventing a
> couple more strawmen, in order to put me down, (that I don't differentiate
> between subject and object or recognise life and society). As yours is a
> metaphysics of misrepresentation, this is only to be expected. I also admire
> your SOM understanding which places the laughter as subjective and the
> facial contortions as objective; you really do have a very bad dose of
> subjectobjectivitis. Indeed, just reading it gave me an excellent experience
> of the wholeness of laughter - which is odd considering your claim that this
> wholeness can never be experienced. Well so be it, our brains work in
> fundamentally different ways; if the moq cures your own rather particular
> metaphysical angst then I congratulate you on having found it and hope that
> it helps you to enjoy a great Christmas.
>
> Boas Festas
>
> Struan
>
>
>
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