It seems to me that the logical fallacies aren't really at fault here. If you're the one who wants to change someone's mind, then you're the one who has to engage on grounds they're going to find persuasive. The buyer; the person who wants something; pays - in discussion as much as in any other area of life. What are you shared objectives? What do you stand to lose if you don't change your mind? What do you stand to gain if you do?
Complaining about the standard of dialogue seems likely to be unproductive. Sceptics have been doing that with regard to Christians for years and it doesn't really seem to have gotten them anywhere - there's little incentive.
So, that in mind, it seems that you'd do better working the argument in the author's piece in reverse:
Someone tries to appeal to emotion, gets a logical fallacy claim back in return. If you assume that there are many different types of speech, and that you're not really in a logical argument, then what does that tell you about them?
Well, the first thing it tells you is that that person cares very strongly about a consistency principle - or at least the outward appearance of one - that they probably want to appear reasonable. What can you think of that's likely to be in their personal life that they're going to feel the same way as you do that a consistency principle is going to work in favour of?
What's the obvious pickup with a lot of sexism? 'Would you want someone talking like that to your mother or sister?'
Of course, that sort of pattern - consistency response to an emotional appeal - is going to come up in areas where people just don't care about very much other than appearing reasonable fairly frequently. I seem to recall one description of debating with Christians that went something along the line of 'Making fun of born-again Christians is like hunting dairy-cows with high-powered sniper rifles.'
We all get a cheap laugh from it, probably, but is hunting dairy cows really a productive activity for a smart person? IME people with stuff to do don't spend a lot of time on such things - it seems unlikely that scepticism would be a large part of their identity.
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However, If you're getting that response a lot wherever you go, maybe the problem's you.
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A good example of this is, in fact, that piece above. What's the actual prevalence of people being unreasonably called out on logical fallacies? I've not seen it a lot. That may just be because I'm one of the people who does it and most of us seem to tend to appear reasonable from the inside. But equally it may be because the prevalence is actually low. So, the basic premise on which the author is attempting to appeal, the supposed shared experience? I'm not going to find that convincing on an emotional level or a consistency based one.
Complaining about the standard of dialogue seems likely to be unproductive. Sceptics have been doing that with regard to Christians for years and it doesn't really seem to have gotten them anywhere - there's little incentive.
So, that in mind, it seems that you'd do better working the argument in the author's piece in reverse: Someone tries to appeal to emotion, gets a logical fallacy claim back in return. If you assume that there are many different types of speech, and that you're not really in a logical argument, then what does that tell you about them?
Well, the first thing it tells you is that that person cares very strongly about a consistency principle - or at least the outward appearance of one - that they probably want to appear reasonable. What can you think of that's likely to be in their personal life that they're going to feel the same way as you do that a consistency principle is going to work in favour of?
What's the obvious pickup with a lot of sexism? 'Would you want someone talking like that to your mother or sister?'
Of course, that sort of pattern - consistency response to an emotional appeal - is going to come up in areas where people just don't care about very much other than appearing reasonable fairly frequently. I seem to recall one description of debating with Christians that went something along the line of 'Making fun of born-again Christians is like hunting dairy-cows with high-powered sniper rifles.'
We all get a cheap laugh from it, probably, but is hunting dairy cows really a productive activity for a smart person? IME people with stuff to do don't spend a lot of time on such things - it seems unlikely that scepticism would be a large part of their identity.
#
However, If you're getting that response a lot wherever you go, maybe the problem's you.
#
A good example of this is, in fact, that piece above. What's the actual prevalence of people being unreasonably called out on logical fallacies? I've not seen it a lot. That may just be because I'm one of the people who does it and most of us seem to tend to appear reasonable from the inside. But equally it may be because the prevalence is actually low. So, the basic premise on which the author is attempting to appeal, the supposed shared experience? I'm not going to find that convincing on an emotional level or a consistency based one.