atheism, philosophy and emotional immaturity

[Mystic]

Prove that it is a fallacy to say "My doctor told me cigarettes cause cancer so based only on this, it is likely that cigarettes cause cancer". Where does fallacious reasoning enter that?

But it's not simply based on that. And that is not the argument from authority. It's like how do we know China exists or the Holocaust happened. It's on a variety of factors. When you trust your Doctor, it has to do with your knowledge of what science has achieved. Science cures diseases and illness. Infections. It makes us fly over the ocean. It works. You know that. You know the system of education is advanced. You know Doctors have to be smart to be doctors and have studied and gone through rigorous training. More over you know of the peer review of the system they are in. You know how advanced we are now. But if you lived two thousand years ago, and a Doctor then told you something, it wouldn't have the significance of what you know a Doctor's authority is now.

[jstrodel]

based on this - because of this knowledge, I consider this thing to be likely to be true

The above is perfectly true, but there has not been many people in the history of the world who have sincerely thought that because an authority says something, there is a 100% certainty that the authority will be correct in every case, so it is an irrelevant point that is designed to distract from the main point, which is the argument from authority is a perfectly legitimate probabilistic argument, unless you are trying to appeal to the authority of a doctor to settle a legal issue or something like that.

[Joel]

Alright, well to say that, it's not an argument from authority: as has been pointed out.
It's not fallacious, either.

It would be fallacious to say "My doctor said cigarettes cause cancer. Because my Doctor said it, it is true.

[jstrodel]

But those factors of the relevance and rigor of the authority are part of the argument from authority, MysticKnight. Someone could make an argument from authority to a church that had a history of 2000 years of giving authoritative pronouncements that shaped entire civilizations. That would very likely to be a good argument. The awareness of the nature of the authority is what makes it likely to be correct.

[Neo-Scholastic]

... I am much older than twenty.

Really? You don't act like it. I thought you were 13 or something.

[jstrodel]

Alright, well to say that, it's not an argument from authority: as has been pointed out.
It's not fallacious, either.

It would be fallacious to say "My doctor said cigarettes cause cancer. Because my Doctor said it, it is true.

Where are you getting the stuff from?

[Joel]

Alright, well to say that, it's not an argument from authority: as has been pointed out.
It's not fallacious, either.

It would be fallacious to say "My doctor said cigarettes cause cancer. Because my Doctor said it, it is true.

Where are you getting the stuff from?

What stuff?

[Angrboda]

[Mystic]

Well in a dispute between two people or two parties, you should show evidence if both what to know with certainty. However, to function, we have to rely on Engineers, Doctors, Teachers, etc...

But you would be surprised. Muslims often say "our scholars (generally) agree therefore it is true" all the time. I've seen so often. Or if you prove something contrary to what scholars say they will say "look so and so knows more then our scholars"...in others, it's treated as entirely impossible that most scholars would be wrong.

People do it all the time. In fact regarding 4:59, obedience to Ulil Amr being obedience to God, it was argued it had to be "scholars consensus" by a famous Sunni scholar. However, this is a fallacy. It is possible the Muslims scholars unite on error and command you to do something to disobey God. For example, they united through out most of history to kill those who insult the Prophet. Now some Muslims believe that is wrong or even I would say most Muslims believe it is wrong.

This is an example of authority uniting on something but changing over time.

Religious authority is the weakest type of authority to rely on.

[jstrodel]

... I am much older than twenty.

Really? You don't act like it. I thought you were 13 or something.

Honestly, I realize I sound really condescending, but I am just trying to share things with people I think would help them. I had a real rough time growing up. Not trying to beat anyone up or be condescending, I have made so many mistakes and done so much stupid things in my life.

I was in high school for 5 1/2 years and I dropped out of college. I am not better or smarter than anyone else and I'm not trying to be. I just realize that some of you guys don't know what you are talking about. It is not that I am trying to insult you, it is that you simply aren't aware of the right way to think about certain things, not that it is in a religious sense, it is that you unaware of how people think about these things in professional contexts.

Here is what wikipedia says:

Argument from authority (argumentum ad verecundiam), also authoritative argument and appeal to authority, is an inductive-reasoning argument that often takes the form of a statistical syllogism.[1] Although certain classes of argument from authority can constitute strong inductive arguments, the appeal to authority is often applied fallaciously: either the authority is not a subject-matter expert, or there is no consensus among experts in the subject matter, or both.[1][2][3]

^ a b c d e Salmon, M. H. (2006). Introduction to Critical Reasoning. Mason, OH: Thomson Wadsworth. pp. 118–9.
^ a b c d e Gensler, Harry J. (2003). Introduction to Logic. New York, NY: Routedge. pp. 333–4.
^ a b Baronett, Stan (2008). Logic. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall. p. 304.


Notice that even the evidence presented in the form of 3 textbooks that are cited is itself an argument from authority.