From: ian glendinning (psybertron@gmail.com)
Date: Mon May 23 2005 - 10:27:36 BST
Funny's not a word I'd use Mark.
I did venture the opinion earlier that to hold partisan political
debates about national and international affairs was pretty pointless
on a forum inhabited by the arch-but-unsubtle-rhetorician.
Platteral shifts not only deflect any meaningful argument, but also
put distortions of what you actually say in front of others - and off
the memes run. Selling Chomsky to Platt is very "coals to Newcastle"
(nope, wrong metaphor, but least offensive one I could think of) -
anyway - a lose-lose battle I would have thought.
You need to start with someone just slightly left of Platt - like
Genghis Khan perhaps - and work from there.
Brave effort though :-)
Ian
On 5/23/05, Mark Steven Heyman <markheyman@infoproconsulting.com> wrote:
> On 22 May 2005 at 9:36, TFP wrote:
>
> Nothing I've read in the MD has ever been more hilarious than MSH's 4-page
> polemic purporting to prove that unless you read and/or agree with Noam
> Chomsky you cannot possible be considered a genuine philosopher.
>
> msh:
> One of the many tactics employed by TFP is to deliberately
> misunderstand or misstate a point of contention in order to ridicule
> it. Often, as here, the point to be ridiculed is a complete
> fabrication. This tactic is sometimes referred to as the Platteral
> Shift, in honor of its inventor.
>
> The point made in my previous post, with ample evidence, is that a
> faux philosopher denigrates or ridicules someone else' contributions
> to philosophy, and then, when questioned, refuses to provide evidence
> and argument in support of his libelous opinions.
>
> Another variation of the Shift is to repeatedly ridicule the ideas of
> another and then, when asked for evidence, say "This is a forum
> dedicated to the work of Robert Pirsig. What does this have to do
> with Pirsig?" For example:
>
> "Howard Zinn is a Marxist and I don't believe anything he says."
>
> "What evidence do you have that Zinn is a Marxist?"
>
> "This forum is about Robert Pirsig, not Howard Zinn."
>
> OR
>
> "I don't believe any reports issued by anti-American organizations
> like Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch."
>
> "What makes you think they are anti-American?
>
> "What does this have to do with the Metaphysics of Quality?"
>
>
> And round and round he rides the Carousel...
>
>
> Best to all,
> Mark Steven Heyman (msh)
> --
> InfoPro Consulting - The Professional Information Processors
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>
> "Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder 'why, why,
> why?' Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he
> understand." - Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle
>
>
>
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