Notice that ALL of the responses to my initial response to Chris's "tone
policing fallacy" have been responses to a). That was the argument which
included words like "one-up-manship", "smug", "self-satisfaction",
"cowardly" to characterize what Chris was doing. This is most obviously
true in Donna's response, but it's also true of what Chris himself said,
and of responses that I have (unfortunately) received off-list.
Not one of the responses has really taken up b), the argument which says
that logic cannot be "applied" directly to scientific problems, because the
level of organization at which and the concepts and data to which the logic
must be applied are radically different, so logic itself develops as we
move from arithmetic to statistics, and still more as we move from math to
physics to chemistry to biology to socio-psychology to semiotics.
Now, in itself, these data points suggest to me that...well, that we are
human, and the "tone" in which something is said is not simply part of the
grammar (Halliday and Greaves, 2009) but also part of our semantics and
part of the context of situation Chris's attempt to imagine argumentation
where tone is not an essential part of the argument is chimerical.
As I said, I do not agree that the two arguments form a false dichotomy,
both because they are not false ("preferences" are neither true nor false)
and because they do not actually form a dichotomy ("coffee or tea?" is not,
in practice, a dichotomy, and neither is "chicken or beef?", although it
may be "logically" so).
But perhaps I do agree with Chris on one point. Chris, in characterizing my
arguments as a "false dichotomy", adds that he might choose neither or
both. I choose both.
You see, I don't actually think that the two arguments are different
arguments. I think that at bottom they are the SAME argument, which is put
in a "historical" form in a), because of the references to white men and to
the here and now of our discussion, and in a "logical" form in b), because
of the reference to "meta-logic", that is, to dialectics.
Halliday would say it somewhat differently: he would say that "logical"
arguments, and even my meta-logical argument, are just everyday language
(i.e. my aggressively intoned argument) which has been "tidied up", and he
would probably agree that tidying up "tone" is, in the long run, impossible
for humans to do: it is literally like trying to speak without any
intonation at all.
dk
2024년 3월 8일 (금) 오후 7:12, Donna Rose Miller <donnarose.miller@xxxxxxxx>님이 작성:
Quite right, Chris… we’re free to choose to read or not even unpleasant
bickering aiming at having the last word! Though an overdose can be
irritating!
Anyway, I’m all for the Voltairean principle: “I wholly disapprove of what
you say—and will defend to the death your right to say it.” Ie, maybe
agreeing to disagree is in some cases best?
Cheers to you and all,
Donna
Donna R. Miller
*Alma Mater* Professor
Department of Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures
*Alma Mater Studiorum* - University of Bologna
https://donnarosemiller.academia.edu/
*Da:* sys-func-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <sys-func-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> *Per
conto di *Dr ChRIS CLÉiRIGh
*Inviato:* giovedì 7 marzo 2024 23:34
*A:* sys-func@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
*Oggetto:* [sys-func] Re: informal fallacy of the week
David,
I post the fallacies in case scholars on sysfunc find them helpful.
Those who don't can simply delete them without reading them.
Why not let the readers decide what they do and don't read?
dr chris cléirigh
*To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education.*
— John Ruskin
====================================
Some Of My Sites
Review of *Modelling Paralanguage Using SFS*
<https://modelling-paralanguage.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Axial Relations* <https://axial-relations.blogspot.com/>
Intellectual Applications of SFL Theory
<http://informingthoughts.blogspot.com.au/>
Conclusions from Intellectual Applications of SFL Theory
<https://meta-sfl-theory.blogspot.com/>
The Opposite of Social Media <https://mental-projection.blogspot.com/>
====================================
On Fri, 8 Mar 2024 at 08:40, 데이브드켈로그/_교수_영어교육과 <dkellogg60@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Chris--
Here are two arguments against posting "informal logical fallacies"
instead of actual linguistic (theoretical and practical) work on our list.
See which you find more convincing.
a) The posting of informal logical fallacies facilitates petty
one-up-manship; it's something people (overwhelmingly white men) do instead
of real research, because it yields smugness and self-satisfaction without
responsibility--and without results. (It is also cowardly because, as we
saw with your very first example, it means you can insinuate and hint at
names instead of engaging flesh-and-blood thinkers and their actual
arguments!)
b) Informal logic, like formal logic, is simply one form of logic. But
logic is, by its very nature, an abstraction based on millenia of
historical generalization. Logic always requires some kind of mediating
system of concepts--always domain specific--before it can be applied. This
is why one kind of logic obtains in arithmetic (where differences are
always significant) and a different kind in statistics (where differences
can be insignificant). This is why we have one kind of logic in the human
sciences (where societies that look after the old, the poor, and the sick
are considered more evolved) and a different kind in biology (where the
survival of the infirm tends to devolution and extinction). As Vygotsky
said, a "Marxist psychology" would be as sterile as a Marxist mineralogy:
(Personally, I find BOTH of them convincing; I suppose that means I am
either tone-deaf or tone-unpoliced....)
dk
2024년 3월 8일 (금) 오전 6:00, Dr ChRIS CLÉiRIGh <c.cleirigh@xxxxxxxxx>님이 작성:
Dear Scholars,
Here is another informal fallacy which might prove helpful in assessing
the validity of arguments on email list discussions.
· Tone policing <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_policing> –
focusing on emotion behind (or resulting from) a message rather than the
message itself as a discrediting tactic.
dr chris cléirigh
*To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education.*
— John Ruskin
====================================
Some Of My Sites
Review of *Subjacency Duplexes* <https://subjacencyduplex.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Modelling Paralanguage Using SFS*
<https://modelling-paralanguage.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Factoring Out Structure* <https://yaegandoran.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Embodied Meaning* <https://sflparalanguage.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Lexis As Most Local Context*
<https://lexisasmostlocalcontext.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Axial Relations* <https://axial-relations.blogspot.com/>
Review of* A Theory of Syntax for Systemic Functional Linguistics*
<http://cardiff-grammar.blogspot.com.au/>
Review of *Deploying Functional Grammar*
<https://deployingfunctionalgrammar.blogspot.com/>
Review of *Working With Discourse*
<http://workingwithdiscourse.blogspot.com.au/>
Review of Bateman's Review of *English Text*
<http://master-bateman.blogspot.com.au/>
Review of *Lexicogrammatical Cartography*
<https://lexicogrammaticalcartography.blogspot.com/>
Review of *English Text* <http://discourse-semantics.blogspot.com.au/>
Learning From Mistakes
<http://thoughts-that-cross-my-mind.blogspot.com.au/>
Primate Dominance Strategies <https://attitude-in-sfl.blogspot.com/>
The Culture of the SFL Community
<https://whatliesbeneathsfl.blogspot.com/>
SFL Theory <http://systemictheory.blogspot.com/>
Sample SFL Analyses <http://sys-func.blogspot.com.au/>
Answers to Analysis Questions on Email Lists
<http://sysfling.blogspot.com.au/>
General SFL Matters <http://thethoughtoccurs.blogspot.com.au/>
Intellectual Applications of SFL Theory
<http://informingthoughts.blogspot.com.au/>
Conclusions from Intellectual Applications of SFL Theory
<https://meta-sfl-theory.blogspot.com/>
The Opposite of Social Media <https://mental-projection.blogspot.com/>
====================================
--
David Kellogg
Sangmyung University
New article with Hailing Yu in * Integrative Psychological and Behavioral
Science. *
"Hot Wind, Cold Sun: Kuhn, Vygotsky, Halliday and Metaphors in Science
and Science Education"
https://rdcu.be/dsX2E