Plane down in Mississippi-Sad
- Thread starter Possum
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I think I have to agree with Mooney Fan, that was a subtle attack on the person (perhaps not intended as such). Here is a definition3393RP said:
“stu·pid·i·ty
noun
behavior that shows a lack of good sense or judgment.
"I can't believe my own stupidity"
synonyms: lack of intelligence, unintelligence, foolishness, denseness, brainlessness, ignorance, mindlessness, dull-wittedness, dull-headedness, dullness, slow-wittedness, doltishness, slowness, vacancy; More
the quality of being stupid or unintelligent.”
So that only applies to behavior which is by definition performed by a person. Thus the original statement really meant that people who use that phraseology are engaging in a behavior that shows a lack of good judgement or sense.
And certainly stating that someone’s understanding of sentence structure is deficient is an attack on that person.
Well, I always try to keep my posts strictly on the topic itself. In my view, and strictly logically speaking, any introduction of the personal characteristics of the speaker is an ad hominem fallacy.3393RP said:
Such remarks do not address the topic itself and are easily misconstrued in public fora - as yours was above. Criticizing the speaker in a public forum will often be received as an attack, whether intended as such or not.
Certainly this was not an egregious or bad example, but since there was an additional criticism about understanding sentence structure made, I thought perhaps the actual ad hominem should be noted, if one wants to be strictly correct.
