[asa] True Scotsman fallacy - was Of m....

I changed the title of this thread because I didn't like the "moral high
ground" implications of the title. Besides which it begs the question "Who
is the one with the mote in his eye and who is the one with the beam?"

On 7/31/06, gordon brown <gbrown@euclid.colorado.edu> wrote:
>
> One reason that discussion of mutations of viruses and bacteria doesn't
> seem to work to convince anyone of macroevolution is that this is the type
> of evolution that is already accepted by pretty much everyone. You might
> make more headway in arguing that microevolution implies macroevolution if
> you can point to instances in which these mutations produce a more complex
> organism.

I think that this is an example of the "True Scotsman Fallacy" that Merv
mentioned earlier.

It was described by Anthony Flew in terms such as these. A Scotsman reads
in the newspaper that a horrible crime has been committed by an Englishman.
He declares to himself "No Scotsman would have committed such a crime".
Next day he reads in the newspaper of ab even more heinous crime committed
by a Scotsman. So he declares "No TRUE Scotsman would have committed such a
crime". The fallacy being that in the face of contrary evidence, you make
an arbitrary adjustment to your original premise. Furthermore that
arbitrary adjustment is ill-defined; what is a "true" Scotsman?

This is popularly contracted to a slightly different version:

A: No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.
B: Well my friend Hamish puts sugar on his porridge.
A: Well, ... no TRUE Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.

It's my view that Vernon has committed this fallacy on two counts.

When I challenged him about evolution producing "good" fruits by mentioning
the immune system and what it does to fight off infection, Vernon responded
"Ah yes, but that's micro-evolution, not macro-evolution - it's not the real
thing". i.e. it's not "True" evolution.

And how do you define "true" evolution - at what point do you say an
organism is more complex than another one? Suppose you find a single
mutation that makes an organism slightly more complex than the previous one
e.g. a gene is duplicated, the new one mutates and the new protein has a
novel use. The new organism is arguably more complex as it has more
functionality. But then you might argue, ah well, that's only SLIGHTLY more
complex, but a man is MUCH more complex than an amoeba, so you still haven't
described the real thing. And so it goes on, arbitrary adjustments in the
face of evidence that contradicts your position

Secondly, Vernon committed the true Scotsman paradox when I challenged him
about apparent "bad fruits" of the Bible, mentioning how Noah's curse on Ham
was used to justify the evil of Apartheid. The response was that such
people can't be proper Christians - obviously no TRUE Christian would
support Apartheid/fight in the Crusades/torture people as in the Spanish
Inquisition.

But what is a "true" Christian? Someone who has given his life to Christ,
accepted the free gift of Salvation through Jesus's death on the Cross.
"True Christians" still can and do behave unacceptably. All have sinned and
fall short of the glory of God. I wouldn't mind betting that in the Dutch
Reformed Church there were many sincere Christians who'd given their lives
to Christ and accepted salvation, who still supported Apartheid. Of course
they were deluded and hopelessly wrong, but that doesn't mean they weren't
Christians. It's not for us to judge.

Iain

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Received on Mon Jul 31 04:06:27 2006