(October 13, 2010 at 3:59 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: You may not classify personal attacks as Ad Hominem but they do nothing to add to the Logical Validity of the argument (aslo are against forum rules) so essentially they are just as fallacious.
It's not really about opinion. An ad hom is an insult used to refute someone else's argument. For example, "You're an asshole, therefore you are wrong." That is an ad hom, by the only definition. Being against the rules doesn't make an insult fallacious. It just makes it a no-no.
I do think that insults can add to the "logical validity" of an argument on rare occasions. However, they are largely unnecessary.
