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• what do you mean by 'many'? (Score:2, Interesting)

  by pdcawley (485)

  I want to see evidence of many innocent civilians being intentionally killed.

  Surely the state sponsored murder (intentional killing) of even one innocent civilian is too many. And illegal under US law if memory serves.
  
  Which begs the question of what is 'intentional killing'. If the conversation went "Doing this will probably result in the deaths of "n" innocent/non-combatant people."
  "Okay, those are acceptable losses, do it."
  Would those count as intentional killings? How big does n have to be (as a perc
  • Re:what do you mean by 'many'? (Score:1)

    by pudge (1)

    Sure, those are reasonable questions, and I have no problem discussing them. The point of the journal entry isn't to defend the US or discuss the issue at hand -- I pondered picking a different example, but this one was fresh in my mind -- but just to note that we should not fear these kinds of discussions, defining our terms, making sure everyone knows what we mean, if we really want to have honest communication.
    
    Sometimes it does descend into an endless pit of defining and redefining every word. At that
• Straight and Crooked Thinking (Score:3, Interesting)

  by Simon (89) <simon-use-perl@perlhacker.org> on 2002.06.18 9:58 (#9669) Journal

  The problem comes from the fact that many people aren't aware that they use emotionally charged words, and then go on to argue their case by begging the question given the charged nature of their words.

  "Slaughtered" is a good example. US soldiers "slaughtered" someone and, therefore, (as the unspoken assumption goes) since "slaughtering" is evil and bad, then the US soldiers are evil and bad.

  Replacing "slaughtered" with "killed" removes some (but not all) of the emotive nature of the word. There was a lovely little book called "Straight and Crooked Thinking" (now sadly out of print) which exposed this and similar fallacies. (confusion of "some", "many" and "all", for instance, and argument in a circle)

  So I agree that precise terminology in debate is fundamental. Even so, I think it's bloody annoying trying to argue with someone who has no problems coming out with "it depends on what your definition of "is" is". :)

  Reply to This

  • Re:Straight and Crooked Thinking (Score:1)

    by pudge (1)

    Yes, that's the fear, and I admit that sometimes I do that, but usually only when goofing around. Another example (from a similar discussion elsewhere) was "terrorist". That is an exceedingly difficult word to define, and I usually don't attempt to, but when someone says to me "this is terrorist and that is not" as a means to prove some nation is just as bad as another, and then I ask him to define the term, he shouldn't get mad at me for asking. :)
    
    • Even Muddier Water (Score:1)

      by chaoticset (2105)

      There are those who have an extensive theory of 'fourth-generation warfare' [d-n-i.net].

      --
      
      ------------------------------
      You are what you think.