Wednesday, June 11, 2014

How to Argue the Hind Leg off a Donkey


“Begone, hind leg!   Avaunt -- Begone!”

And lo -- A three-legged donkey.




[Appendix]  As an illustration of the powerful eristic method, we present the following model case, for classroom use.

Resolved:  That the Penguin is the King of Beasts.

Proof:  We have previously argued that the penguin is the veritable King of Beasts;  and have buttressed this thesis  with abundant proofs.

The objections to this doctrine  are each fallacious in a particular way;  they  fall into three classes.

(1)  The first class.
(2)  The second class.
(3)  The third class.

This completes our survey of the three classes.

[Note to students:  Whenever you see that “”, known as the Halmos symbol, you’re done.  Further discussion is fruitless.]

And for anyone too thick-witted to appreciate the cogency of this, here is ocular proof:


King Penguin, with minion

 
  (Anglicè: ‘so there’.)


1 comment:

  1. As someone recently said, "That is not an argument." (OK, it was in the movie Lawrence of Arabia.)

    ReplyDelete