Revision as of 00:16, 27 October 2017

So called #NameTheTrait was(is?) a logically invalid (non sequitur) argument with implicitly logically contradictory (inherently false) premises for veganism created by vegan Youtuber Isaac Brown a.k.a. "Ask Yourself", and popularized by his pupil Richard Burgess a.k.a. "Vegan Gains" a vegan bodybuilder and Youtuber.

The formal argument was structured as such:

Argument for animal moral value:
P1 - Humans are of moral value
P2 - There is no trait absent in animals which if absent in humans would cause us to deem ourselves valueless.
C - Therefore without establishing the absence of such a trait in animals, we contradict ourselves by deeming animals valueless
Argument for veganism from animal moral value:
P1 - Animals are of moral value.
P2 - There is no trait absent in animals which if absent in humans would cause us to consider anything short of non-exploitation to be an adequate expression of respect for human moral value.
C - Therefore without establishing the absence of such a trait in animals, we contradict ourselves by considering anything short of non-exploitation(veganism) to be an adequate expression of respect for animal moral value.

To explain the primary non sequitur fallacy simply: C does not follow from P1 and P2 because nothing in the argument asserts that moral value must be based on a material trait as P2 implies. You can agree with P1 and P2 and still reject the suggested conclusion (that animals are of moral value) without any contradiction.

There are numerous other fallacies, contradictions, ambiguities, and instances of intellectually dishonest word usage in the argument which this article will outline (there are more problems with the argument than there are statements in it). This article will explain in detail how the argument fails, and why it should not be used.

The argument CAN be corrected (see correction) by adding in missing premises and clarifying the meanings of certain terms, as well as replacing the second half, but it remains confusing and cumbersome, and there are better and simpler arguments for animal moral value available which should be preferred.

Burden of Proof

As an outreach argument, the burden of proof for answering criticism from a growing number of vegans and non-vegans and demonstrating how this argument is sound falls upon Isaac. If people perceive the argument as invalid, it fails at its goal regardless of its validity: that is if the argument's purpose is to convince people to go vegan rather than providing the basis for operating a cult (in which case, as with internal theistic arguments, it does not need to be sound, it only needs to be confusing enough for people to convince themselves it is sound if they want to believe it in order to establish a self-congratulatory in-group who sees "the truth", and an out-group of deniers, which is what seems to be happening with Isaac's fan-base).

Isaac has consistently failed to engage with formal and symbolic examinations of his argument, calling them equivalent to "Chinese" and insisting on blind faith that they have been translated incorrectly without understanding them. It must be stressed that his inability to back up his argument and respond to criticism is not an excuse for failing in his obligation to do so. Beyond that, he has also engaged in blocking critics and misrepresenting arguments presented in "plain English" he asks for against #NameTheTrait, responding selectively when he does by dismissing them as "retards" or with the same responses on loop that those same critics have already addressed as fallacious.

Extraordinary Claims

Symbolic Logic

Issues

1. P1 only says humans have moral value, not that some humans do. Human may range from vegetative states to a fertilized egg. This in itself seems to contradict the notion of a value giving trait other than the arbitrary "human" status. If you want value to be based on another trait, your first premise can't make that impossible.

2. P2 says there is no trait of such description, but even if so, there is no premise that says moral value must be based on such a trait at all. Moral value could just be fiat, or the tautological and irreducible non-natural trait "moral value" itself. As such, the conclusion does not follow from the premises; the argument is a non sequitur.

3. "Human" and "we" in this argument has no clear meaning, and any example of a trait applied to you (like having your consciousness transferred into a biologically non-human body) might just cause us to change our understanding of what human means (anything with a human consciousness) to maintain consistency so that nothing could cause you to stop being human, even "once human always human", thus making "human" an unfalsifiable answer for moral value, or the change may cause us to reject the application of "we" to the new entities (e.g. reduced to the intelligence and capacity of a cow, we may consider what makes us ourselves to be gone and this to be equivalent to death anyway, so take no issue with the loss of moral value).

4. P2 is also clearly false when non-sentient animals are included. Animals range from sponges to humans, and do not broadly share any trait beyond phylogeny (like with "humans" as a blind category).

5. The second part of the argument fails in the same ways the first part does, in addition to:

6. The first part of argument, if corrected, might establish animals have some value, but does not establish equal value in part one. Part two then attempts to take that spectrum of value and convert it into an absolute: non-exploitation. It should convert a spectrum of value into a spectrum of acceptable exploitation, from no value = total exploitation fine to fully functioning human level value = no exploitation acceptable. Logically, animals like cows would lie somewhere in between where some exploitation would be acceptable, while their interests would also have to be considered somewhat to limit that exploitation (i.e. animal welfare, which already exists and does not conclude in veganism).

7. P2 in the second part is also just outright false. Human exploitation is considered acceptable; that exploitation is just limited to certain pragmatic bounds by law in modern democracies, not for moral reasons so much as because people don't want to be exploited, e.g. contract law, no human trafficking, etc. People buying and selling cows does not seem to increase the chances of you being bought and sold. The trait: societal membership and pragmatic human rights.

In practice, the formulator of the argument also makes a number of other errors.

1. Isaac claims you don't need more premises to require a non-arbitrary trait for P2, because you can take something like "arbitrary value" or "fiat" and just "feed it through the argument" to show a contradiction. This is comparable to the theological circular reference to prove god from scripture and scripture from god, e.g. justifying the existence of God by referring to the Bible, and giving the Bible authority because it's God's word.

2. Isaac claims this argument works in any meta-ethical system (subjectivist, objectivist, whatever), because it's just a "consistency test". He doesn't realize the meta-ethical implications of his hidden premises. (He claims to be a subjectivist, although his definition of these terms is colloquial and incorrect in the context of philosophy because it generates contradictions and false dichotomies of its own)

3. Isaac seems to believe "logical inconsistency" means the same thing as a double standard. His followers have claimed this explicitly, and he regularly uses this example to dispute "human" as the source of moral value (paraphrasing): "What if aliens came to Earth to eat Humans, would that be OK? Would you give in and let them eat you, or resist them? If you would resist, you're contradicting yourself." He is not understanding that the claim that the value is "humanity" is absolute; the aliens are wrong according to that, the value given is not "is a different species". He tries to generalize the statements like that, by saying "species" instead of specifically "human species", because it seems he believes the issue of contradiction comes down to double standards (or he's trying to play word games and misrepresent people's answers to trick them).

4. As per above, he also doesn't seem to understand that people can accept something as ethical but still not do it. Even if we believed aliens were in the right to come to Earth and eat us, that doesn't mean we wouldn't try to save our lives despite that. It also doesn't mean we'd be in the wrong to save our own lives (people usually don't claim farmed animals are in the wrong for resisting). To make that work, a premise would have to be added to alter the argument, defining "consider ourselves valueless" clearly in behavioral terms as "not try to defend our own interests". And of course that really narrows down the meta-ethics the argument applies to.

Correction

WIP

Argument for sentient animal moral value:
P1 - Sentient Humans are of moral value
P2 - There is no trait absent in sentient animals which if absent in sentient humans would cause us to deem ourselves valueless.
C - Therefore without establishing the absence of such a trait in sentient animals, we contradict ourselves by deeming sentient animals valueless
Argument for veganism from animal moral value:
P1 - Animals are of moral value.
P2 - There is no trait absent in animals which if absent in humans would cause us to consider anything short of non-exploitation to be an adequate expression of respect for human moral value.
C - Therefore without establishing the absence of such a trait in animals, we contradict ourselves by considering anything short of non-exploitation(veganism) to be an adequate expression of respect for animal moral value.