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Time to learn about logical fallacies http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

AlexandrB 12y ago
The Economic Freedom Index is an index created by the Heritage Foundation itself, not some law of nature. As such it's basically political opinion - how is the organization's political leanings/bias exempt from scrutiny in this case? Edit: from Wikipedia: > An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. Note that "irrelevant fact" does not really apply here since the political biases of an organization publishing a political index are very much relevant to the discussion. For example: http://www.heritage.org/index/government-spending http://www.heritage.org/index/government-spending The position that more government spending always means less freedom is a political one, as is their choice of growth curve. > The scale for scoring government spending is non-linear, which means that government spending that is close to zero is lightly penalized, while levels of government spending that exceed 30 percent of GDP lead to much worse scores in a quadratic fashion (for example, doubling spending yields four times less freedom). Only extraordinarily large levels of government spending—for example, over 58 percent of GDP—receive a score of zero. Let's take a look at labor freedom: http://www.heritage.org/index/labor-freedom http://www.heritage.org/index/labor-freedom and http://www.doingbusiness.org/methodology/employing-workers http://www.doingbusiness.org/methodology/employing-workers Now we see that that economic freedom in this case actually means freedom for employers to exploit their workers, with negative factors like "rigidity of hours" being determined by paid vacation days. Yet nowhere are factors like regulations on non-compete and no-moonlighting employment clauses factored in. So again a political opinion on what freedom of labor means - the freedom to exploit labor rather than the freedom of labor to seek work or change jobs.
- lupin_sansei 12y ago
  No it's an index with data that you can double check along with their methodology: http://www.heritage.org/index/book/methodology http://www.heritage.org/index/book/methodology You are lazily dismissing their data and workings by attacking their character (politically bias) - the very essence of an Ad-hominem fallacy. Economic freedom is a great predictor of GDP per capita. So there is some law of (human) nature down in there somewhere: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dX5-CL7Zaac/TZfhtnxCz0I/AAAAAAAAAa0/Jy732vQDppE/s1600/gdpEconomicFreedom.png http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dX5-CL7Zaac/TZfhtnxCz0I/AAAAAAAAAa...
  - AlexandrB 12y ago
    See my edit. Their methodology is informed by their political bias. To pretend otherwise is comically naive.
  - krschultz 12y ago
    Just posting a link doesn't disprove the point. The methodology is completely based on their ideology. "The property rights component is a qualitative assessment" They score the US as an 80. Based on their own ratings, I think the US should be a 90. The [Fiscal Freedom] score is derived from three quantitative factors: The top marginal tax rate on individual income, The top marginal tax rate on corporate income, and The total tax burden as a percentage of GDP." That is pure ideological bullshit. Total tax burden as a % of GDP is an actual measure, but why is the only marginal tax rate that matters the top one? The difference in marginal tax rate is actually larger at other steps in the US Tax code, but they want to focus solely on the top one? Also, why measure the marginal corporate tax rate but not the effective corporate tax rate (as they correctly do for personal taxes). The "Business Freedom" index is trying to measure how much regulation there is - which is what you would think this entire ranking is about. It does a pretty poor job of it, though I think this is a hard task. It goes downhill from there. Thanks for the providing the link, it proves the original point that the index is ideological nonsense very well.
  - NotAtWork 12y ago
    The methodology you linked to might as well be called "how to lie with numbers". The methodology's way to assign numeric values to things doesn't relate to intrinsic things about the objects under study, but rather, is a numeric score reflecting the subjective opinion of the reviewer. That something uses numbers doesn't make it objective, and this is a prime example.
- 300bps 12y ago
  Relevant portion of original link: Ad hominem circumstantial points out that someone is in circumstances such that they are disposed to take a particular position. Ad hominem circumstantial constitutes an attack on the bias of a source. This is fallacious because a disposition to make a certain argument does not make the argument false; Essentially, you can't discount everything a particular entity says because you or others perceive them as biased. If you disagree with their position, attack the position, not the person.
  - bluecalm 12y ago
    The position was given without any argument other than authority (of Heritage Foundation). It such cases questioning the authority you just invoked is very natural and good thing for the discussion. If you want discussion about specific arguments, give the arguments (which original poster hasn't provided). You can't expect to just claim something basing it on authority and having other side investigate every point in reasoning that authority gives (and even have them explore and find points themselves) as it puts discussion in imbalance: you do nothing, but invoke authority, the other side is expected to dig deep into every point that authority makes. On the other hand if it's shown that the authority is very biased then either you show specific arguments (which the other side is not allowed to dismiss on bias of the source) or you admit defeat. That's the way to deal with arguments from authority but some posters were very charitable anyway and gave more analysis than original claim deserved. Ad-hominem refers to dismissing specific points/arguments based on who made them. Dismissing an argument from authority this way is actually correct way to handle it. The difference I hope is obvious. The other poster is wrong, misuses common terms and to top it is arrogant about it that's why he is downvoted.
- lupin_sansei 12y ago
  You've just typed all that after I called you on ad hominem. Sneaky.
veidr 12y ago
Shorthand pithy summarization is a fundamental building block of human communication, and doesn't constitute a fallacious argument. Allow me to translate what tobinfricke said: "The Heritage Foundation is hardly an objective source on the topic of the advantages of the so-called 'free market', considering the fact that they are an organization dedicated principally to promulgating and evangelizing the concept of the 'free market' (by which they essentially mean a market in which the regulatory structures that benefit incumbent businesses are preserved, but new regulatory frameworks that would affect the status quo are discouraged). Oh and, here's a link to some basic information on the topic. If I were to say to you that Frito-Lay is not an objective source about whether Doritos are delicious and healthy, that does not actually meet the criteria for argumentum ad hominem.
seanflyon 12y ago
Pointing out someone's potential bias is not a valid response to a logical argument, but it is a valid response to an appeal to authority.

The Economic Freedom Index is an index created by the Heritage Foundation itself, not some law of nature. As such it's basically political opinion - how is the organization's political leanings/bias exempt from scrutiny in this case? Edit: from Wikipedia: > An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. Note that "irrelevant fact" does not really apply here since the political biases of an organization publishing a political index are very much relevant to the discussion. For example: http://www.heritage.org/index/government-spending http://www.heritage.org/index/government-spending The position that more government spending always means less freedom is a political one, as is their choice of growth curve. > The scale for scoring government spending is non-linear, which means that government spending that is close to zero is lightly penalized, while levels of government spending that exceed 30 percent of GDP lead to much worse scores in a quadratic fashion (for example, doubling spending yields four times less freedom). Only extraordinarily large levels of government spending—for example, over 58 percent of GDP—receive a score of zero. Let's take a look at labor freedom: http://www.heritage.org/index/labor-freedom http://www.heritage.org/index/labor-freedom and http://www.doingbusiness.org/methodology/employing-workers http://www.doingbusiness.org/methodology/employing-workers Now we see that that economic freedom in this case actually means freedom for employers to exploit their workers, with negative factors like "rigidity of hours" being determined by paid vacation days. Yet nowhere are factors like regulations on non-compete and no-moonlighting employment clauses factored in. So again a political opinion on what freedom of labor means - the freedom to exploit labor rather than the freedom of labor to seek work or change jobs.

lupin_sansei 12y ago
No it's an index with data that you can double check along with their methodology: http://www.heritage.org/index/book/methodology http://www.heritage.org/index/book/methodology You are lazily dismissing their data and workings by attacking their character (politically bias) - the very essence of an Ad-hominem fallacy. Economic freedom is a great predictor of GDP per capita. So there is some law of (human) nature down in there somewhere: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dX5-CL7Zaac/TZfhtnxCz0I/AAAAAAAAAa0/Jy732vQDppE/s1600/gdpEconomicFreedom.png http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dX5-CL7Zaac/TZfhtnxCz0I/AAAAAAAAAa...
- AlexandrB 12y ago
  See my edit. Their methodology is informed by their political bias. To pretend otherwise is comically naive.
- krschultz 12y ago
  Just posting a link doesn't disprove the point. The methodology is completely based on their ideology. "The property rights component is a qualitative assessment" They score the US as an 80. Based on their own ratings, I think the US should be a 90. The [Fiscal Freedom] score is derived from three quantitative factors: The top marginal tax rate on individual income, The top marginal tax rate on corporate income, and The total tax burden as a percentage of GDP." That is pure ideological bullshit. Total tax burden as a % of GDP is an actual measure, but why is the only marginal tax rate that matters the top one? The difference in marginal tax rate is actually larger at other steps in the US Tax code, but they want to focus solely on the top one? Also, why measure the marginal corporate tax rate but not the effective corporate tax rate (as they correctly do for personal taxes). The "Business Freedom" index is trying to measure how much regulation there is - which is what you would think this entire ranking is about. It does a pretty poor job of it, though I think this is a hard task. It goes downhill from there. Thanks for the providing the link, it proves the original point that the index is ideological nonsense very well.
- NotAtWork 12y ago
  The methodology you linked to might as well be called "how to lie with numbers". The methodology's way to assign numeric values to things doesn't relate to intrinsic things about the objects under study, but rather, is a numeric score reflecting the subjective opinion of the reviewer. That something uses numbers doesn't make it objective, and this is a prime example.
300bps 12y ago
Relevant portion of original link: Ad hominem circumstantial points out that someone is in circumstances such that they are disposed to take a particular position. Ad hominem circumstantial constitutes an attack on the bias of a source. This is fallacious because a disposition to make a certain argument does not make the argument false; Essentially, you can't discount everything a particular entity says because you or others perceive them as biased. If you disagree with their position, attack the position, not the person.
- bluecalm 12y ago
  The position was given without any argument other than authority (of Heritage Foundation). It such cases questioning the authority you just invoked is very natural and good thing for the discussion. If you want discussion about specific arguments, give the arguments (which original poster hasn't provided). You can't expect to just claim something basing it on authority and having other side investigate every point in reasoning that authority gives (and even have them explore and find points themselves) as it puts discussion in imbalance: you do nothing, but invoke authority, the other side is expected to dig deep into every point that authority makes. On the other hand if it's shown that the authority is very biased then either you show specific arguments (which the other side is not allowed to dismiss on bias of the source) or you admit defeat. That's the way to deal with arguments from authority but some posters were very charitable anyway and gave more analysis than original claim deserved. Ad-hominem refers to dismissing specific points/arguments based on who made them. Dismissing an argument from authority this way is actually correct way to handle it. The difference I hope is obvious. The other poster is wrong, misuses common terms and to top it is arrogant about it that's why he is downvoted.
lupin_sansei 12y ago
You've just typed all that after I called you on ad hominem. Sneaky.

veidr 12y ago

Shorthand pithy summarization is a fundamental building block of human communication, and doesn't constitute a fallacious argument. Allow me to translate what tobinfricke said: "The Heritage Foundation is hardly an objective source on the topic of the advantages of the so-called 'free market', considering the fact that they are an organization dedicated principally to promulgating and evangelizing the concept of the 'free market' (by which they essentially mean a market in which the regulatory structures that benefit incumbent businesses are preserved, but new regulatory frameworks that would affect the status quo are discouraged). Oh and, here's a link to some basic information on the topic. If I were to say to you that Frito-Lay is not an objective source about whether Doritos are delicious and healthy, that does not actually meet the criteria for argumentum ad hominem.

seanflyon 12y ago

Pointing out someone's potential bias is not a valid response to a logical argument, but it is a valid response to an appeal to authority.