Tuesday, May 27, 2008

argumentum ad hominem

"I think that guy has a good idea. Let me tell you..."
"No, wait, which guy? What's his name?"
"XYZ"
"What's his position?"
"Adviser to the government, among all"
"OK, I got it. It must be a crazy idea. I don't want to hear his argument. Whatsoever!"
"You sure you don't want to hear his idea? Just the idea"
"Hell no. His argument MUST BE bad. Because he's close to the government".
"I see. So who should we listen to?"
"Anyone opposing the government. Students, street protesters, politicians, populist newspapers, pick any of them. As long as they oppose the government"
"No matter what their arguments are?"
"What are you a philosopher? Of course we don't need to know their arguments. They MUST BE good"

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Put it in one of the chapter of your novel.. :-)

But you must add a lot of suspense otherwise your novel become very cheesy. Indonesian politician are so predictable :-D

Anonymous said...

And then they will shout: WELCOME RALPH NADER!!! We want you to become our independent presidential candidate!!!

Aco said...

Anonymous, yes maybe I should put it in the dream novel. Of course I will throw in some suspense. Or sex scandal.

Ralph Nader? Oh let's not get started with him :-)

Anonymous said...

Many cases are in autocorrelation situation. That's why people used to apply autoregressive function... :)

Arya Gaduh said...

Dendi:
I was just thinking the same thing. Either autocorrelation or statistical (Bayesian) updating. ;-)