Great comments on new #namethetrait video

[DrSinger]

I think we could pretty easily run down every plausible interpretation and show a road map of everywhere it dead ends, and then prove it's a non sequitur or at best circular logic in all of those cases.

I agree that we could do this. But I'm not sure it's necessary, since we can prove that the argument as stated fails. And in all these examples the only trait that's really under consideration is moral value itself, which isn't really what is supposed to be examined by the argument.

I think the distinction of 'deeming something valueless' and that something actually being valueless is something we should talk about (which is something we have ignored thus far, I think) .

imo the essence of the argument is

P1: humans with natural trait 't' have moral value
P2: some group of nonhuman animals have natural trait 't'
C: nonhuman animals have moral value

(t usually being sentience)

Which of course doesn't follow because there's nothing to say 't' is what gives moral value in every set.

He was working from a 27th of October version and got less than a 1/3 of the way through. Here's the transcript for future sourcing:

http://philosophicalvegan.com/wiki/index.php/Talk:NameTheTrait

At a glance, there doesn't appear to be anything new or of substance. Funnily enough he seems to implicitly agree that his argument is a non sequitur if you 'accept arbitrary tho'

[mkm]

At a glance, there doesn't appear to be anything new or of substance. Funnily enough he seems to implicitly agree that his argument is a non sequitur if you 'accept arbitrary tho

There is a lot of "gold" in this video, he even admits that he doesn't get the difference between formal and informal arguments, and calls separating them autistic. Mostly he repeated the same mistakes that are already addressed, including invalid generalizations. Still fails at addressing formalization into FOL (or any logic of choice). Trying to argue with him is like beating a dead horse at this point.
Another funny thing, though irrelevant in that context, is that he said that "proof by contradiction is going to work within any logical framework" which is not the case. It just shows how he really pulls most of things he says out of his ass

[Nightcell001]

proof by contradiction is going to work within any logical framework

oh god...

[PhilRisk]

I think there is something wrong with the formalization, concerning deeming something valueless:

P2: ¬ ( ∃t: ( ∀x: A(x) ⇒ t ∉ T(x) ) ∧ ( ∀y: H(y) ⇒ ( t ∈ T(y) ∧ ( ∀q: ( T(q) = T(y) \ { t } ) ⇒ ¬ M(q) ) )

The problem is, that in order to be correct, there have to be the object of the being with one trait less.
Because the whole sentence needs to be false. For every trait, if a human has it there has to be a strange being making the conditional
'∀q: ( T(q) = T(y) \ { t } ) ⇒ ¬ M(q) )'
wrong. This means that it has to exist an have moral value.

I think that is not a correct interpretation, because the original version is concerning counterfactual cases. The problem is the material conditional.
I think a modal expression would do it. But this would make the model for interpreting it correctly way more complicated as the question is, what worlds are related to. I think the conditional is a necessary conditions. That means that even if the object still has moral value but does not exist in the world in question but only in a related possible world P2 is right. Actually this a well known problem for the material conditional if talking about causation or similar connections, which should hold in counterfactuals. I think it is a pity, I did not came up with this earlier.

P2: ¬ ( ∃t: ( ∀x: A(x) ⇒ t ∉ T(x) ) ∧ ( ∀y: H(y) ⇒ ( t ∈ T(y) ∧ ( ∀q: ( □ (T(q) = T(y) \ { t } ) ⇒ ¬ M(q)) ) )

The question is, what is it good for. Only a handful of people is able to understand the meaning of the symbols. Therefore, it might not be very fruitful to try to give an as best as possible formalization. But it is fun, I think .
Now the counterfactual strange beings do not have to exist in the actual world but only as possible beings.
For every trait any human has, it possible to loose it and imagine that the resulting being still has moral value. Some of these resulting creatures might be animals (if the lost trait is being a human, and all humans are animals), but strange one. It does not follow, that any animal in the actual world has moral value.
If one additionally grants that beings with the same traits has the same moral status, it does still not follow, that any animal in the actual world has moral value as no animal in the actual world has the same traits as a human being (minus one trait).

Edit: Actually, this is also a solution to the problem, that one cannot take one single trait apart in the actual world. It can be perfectly possible in possible worlds.

[brimstoneSalad]

Thanks NonZeroSum, I'll look through the transcript.

I agree that we could do this. But I'm not sure it's necessary, since we can prove that the argument as stated fails.

I think we should edit the Wiki to kind of start with that onen(the Virtue Vegan debunk), because that's a great argument, but it could look like a nitpick, and I think we should expand with other interpretations in the steel-manning section. Maybe not at much length, but kind of how I did in the last post.

I think the distinction of 'deeming something valueless' and that something actually being valueless is something we should talk about (which is something we have ignored thus far, I think) .

Yes, we definitely need a section on what. Where do you think it should go?
It could be mentioned in the steel manning section, but then maybe a longer paragraph on it in issues with the argument?

Edit: Actually, this is also a solution to the problem, that one cannot take one single trait apart in the actual world. It can be perfectly possible in possible worlds.

Remember also that in practice sets of traits, both negative and positive, are allowed. E.g. the trait of "having horns" vs. lacking them, or a combination of traits "looking like a cow", "being a cow" etc.

I'm not sure if that affects anything, but it's probably important for a faithful interpretation.

[brimstoneSalad]

I got to "summary" so far. Made a few updates.

Of anybody has read it: is there anything that looks more urgent I should read first? It will probably take a couple days to make all of the updates at this rate.

[DrSinger]

At a glance, there doesn't appear to be anything new or of substance. Funnily enough he seems to implicitly agree that his argument is a non sequitur if you 'accept arbitrary tho

There is a lot of "gold" in this video, he even admits that he doesn't get the difference between formal and informal arguments, and calls separating them autistic. Mostly he repeated the same mistakes that are already addressed, including invalid generalizations. Still fails at addressing formalization into FOL (or any logic of choice). Trying to argue with him is like beating a dead horse at this point.
Another funny thing, though irrelevant in that context, is that he said that "proof by contradiction is going to work within any logical framework" which is not the case. It just shows how he really pulls most of things he says out of his ass

lol autistic maybe the vid is worth watching then, I might throw some of those quotes in the article if I can find them. I don't think AY will have any mathematically or philosophically competent fans remaining anymore. He's basically added 'logic tho' and 'non sequitur tho' to his list of 'invalid arguments'.

It reminds me of stefan molyneux is his claim to have proven objective ethics or what he calls universally preferable behaviour with 'you cant object to UPB without invoking UPB!!!!'.

[brimstoneSalad]

Another funny thing, though irrelevant in that context, is that he said that "proof by contradiction is going to work within any logical framework" which is not the case. It just shows how he really pulls most of things he says out of his ass

Probably the most sensible and minor mistake he made, since to avoid that you'd have to find a system that doesn't use the law of the excluded middle, or has some other odd restriction, and paraconsistent and other such types of systems aren't terribly useful in the context of discourse, only really something for mathematics and computer science.
I think you could argue that rejection is unnecessarily restrictive and doesn't constitute logic itself in the general sense, but a subset for a particular use.
Not to start a "my system is best" logic war.

The fact that he thinks he proved a contradiction at all is of course absurd, though.

It reminds me of stefan molyneux is his claim to have proven objective ethics or what he calls universally preferable behaviour with 'you cant object to UPB without invoking UPB!!!!'.

That's a good comparison.
Pretty much only an argument you can use for laws of thought.

[DrSinger]

P2: ¬ ( ∃t: ( ∀x: A(x) ⇒ t ∉ T(x) ) ∧ ( ∀y: H(y) ⇒ ( t ∈ T(y) ∧ ( ∀q: ( □ (T(q) = T(y) \ { t } ) ⇒ ¬ M(q)) ) )

Would that change anything with regard to the proofs we have given? Also I'd be interested to know what people think of the cases given in the symbolic logic section that show how NTT fails.

Yes, we definitely need a section on what. Where do you think it should go?
It could be mentioned in the steel manning section, but then maybe a longer paragraph on it in issues with the argument?

I would probably have a section like

Proving NTT fails as a formal argument

- Summary/mini intro
- Steel-Manning P2 (explaining the issues with deeming etc., explaining why we have chosen the interpretation we did)
- Proof in First Order Logic

I'm not sure if that affects anything, but it's probably important for a faithful interpretation.

I think how his argument is actually used in practice is like

[1] Humans with trait 't' have moral value
[2] Humans without trait 't' do not have moral value
[3] Some nonhuman animals have trait 't'
[4] These nonhuman animals have moral value

where 't' is a trait other than moral value itself.

It depends if we want to focus on just debunking NTT as presented or coming up with every possible interpretation and debunking them also. I think it should be a balance of both

[brimstoneSalad]

Here we go:

Uros_Dinic.jpg

Confirmation that he still insists it follows from the premise.

Also, confirmation on what I was saying about traits. A human could be rendered a cow in this argument, according to Isaac.

EDIT: It seems like we may be literally talking about temporal transformation of a being. In which case, it's easy to say the new being still has moral value because it was imbued with it from the previous being having moral value. Having been human at one point is not a trait that can be taken away in such a thought experiment.