I'm sorry, I'm still not trying to personally attack anyone. I didn't even realize my comment would be interpreted as offensive rather than a statement of fact.
This is the definition of intellectual dishonesty according to Wikipedia:
"Intentionally committed fallacies in debates and reasoning are called intellectual dishonesty."
I read your argument as "this man emotionally affected me via a personal connection I have, therefore his argument is invalid" and interpreted it as a logical fallacy. I assumed you made this knowingly because that is like a super basic logic 101 fallacy. I wasn't trying to personally attack you or say anything about your character or intellect. I was just trying to point out that you had committed a logical fallacy and that I assumed you already knew this.
I should have made it more clear that "Yeah but I only have to come up with..." meant "With respect to what I claimed..."
Sorry, I really am trying to be as charitable as possible with my interpretations of these comments.
I just hate to see people conflate emotion with logical soundness and validity. Appeals to emotion are human and valid and expose interesting points, but I can't stand to see them used to tear down the intellectual value (whether or not something is logically true) of ideas.
I'm not defending him. I'm simply stating the fact that him having a bomb in his possession is insufficient evidence to convict him of the crime in question.
I am exonerated by fact. The prosecutors did not have enough evidence to convict him of a crime related to the live bomb they found.
What are you going to do to argue against that? Deny history? It already happened. He wasn't convicted.
>Again, that's the standard for criminal punishment. Not moral judgement.
I never said anything about moral judgement. I was never talking about moral judgement.
> And have you heard of civil law? Despite the high stakes that's usually decided based on the preponderance of evidence.
Unrelated. Please, do share a link where Ted Kaczynski was convicted of a crime in connection with the unplanted bombs in question, because that's what I have been talking about in this entire string of comments.
I am exonerated by fact. Ted was not convicted of a crime for the unplanted bomb because there was insufficient evidence to do so. End of story ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
No it's not. It's a technical term which means that the person is knowingly making an argument that is not valid.
See the definition of validity [0] in logic.
When I say they are "intellectually dishonest" I mean they are attempting to persuade others with an appeal to emotion in a subtly-crafted paragraph that looks like a rational argument, but technically is not a rational argument --- because it is invalid --- and they know it is invalid.
They are attempting to win by emotional persuasion rather than a series of rigorous rational conclusions.
How my statement that someone is intellectually dishonest is a personal attack, I do not know. Perhaps people skip over the "intellectually" qualifier and jump straight to the "dishonest" part?
Yeah but I only have to come up with a reasonable doubt.
It's analogous to coming up with one counterexample to disprove something in mathematics.
I can reasonably theorize that he fully intended to stop bombing people based on this "deal". There. Done. I can doubt he planned to bomb people in a reasonable way.
The onus is on you to remove all reasonable doubt. You have not done so by simply showing that there are bombs in his cabin. He could have built them before he made the deal to stop bombing people. That's a completely reasonable scenario.
I am writing now as earnestly and charitably as possible: could you tell me how what I wrote is a personal attack?
I want to engage on HN in a productive way and I do not mean to personally attack anyone.
I think the reason you were able to link to so many instances of me personally attacking someone is because I genuinely do not understand what you consider a personal attack. I thought I was arguing against ideas and statements, not attacking anyone individually.
I'd consider personal attacks to be ad hominem, which is exactly the opposite of what I am trying to do in my comment — I am trying to point out what is and what isn't a logically valid and argument.
Would you please help me understand? I'd like to learn and be able to engage in a manner that is accepted.
Just because he bombed people previously doesn't mean he intended to do it again. You have to have stronger evidence, like writings or postage stamps, to prove beyond reasonable doubt that these two bombs were going to be planted. (I'm not arguing this evidence doesn't exist.)
I don't get what the big deal is. We already have more than enough evidence from his previous plantings to convict him as a bomb planter and put him away for life. Is it just that you can't compartmentalize and separate the two things in your mind?
Ted's claim is that these people must die because they are propagating suffering via technology.
I don't see how "but proponents of technology died" is an argument against his claim that stopping technology will stop suffering caused by technology.
I'm not claiming to know the timeline, but he could have built them before "the deal", then made the deal and decided not to plant them.
Innocent until proven guilty. There is more than enough evidence to put away Teddy K for life. Lean on real evidence. Don't stretch the truth and muddy the waters for the innocent. Your line of reasoning could be used to convict the innocent.
How are you ever going to learn anything truly novel in the world if you always delegate teaching to a teacher?