Talk:Argument from authority

Complete rewrite

The previous version wasn't sourced, and was incorrect to boot. I have rewritten the article in a concise manner using three textbooks on logic for my sources. Jander80 (talk)

• [Your re-write is completely worthless; the previous version had it correct when it said (IIRC) that an argument from authority is when the claims of an authority are asserted to be unquestionable based only on credentials. 207.151.38.178 (talk) 00:00, 23 August 2011 (UTC)]

• [In addition: the re-write does not contain one succint definition or description of what an "argument from authority" is. Again the previous version had captured the essence, which is seen in my previous comment above. 207.151.38.178 (talk) 02:42, 25 August 2011 (UTC)]

Examples Started

This article needs real-world examples to facilitate understanding and use. Added one example from my website with direct reference. More examples requested for this article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adoos (talk • contribs) 06:35, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Adoos, you should know that primary research, citing your personal website, and adding personal websites to external links are all discouraged by Wikipedia's conflict of interest guidelines. Please see Conflict of interest, Citing oneself, Self-promotion, and No original research for info. AveVeritas (talk) 04:53, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

?

I don't get it. Appeal to authority fallacy is a simple subject and not reserved for people studying epistemology at university, nor are these the only people who experience it being used. I can easily explain this to anyone off the street in a sentence or two without referring to any of the things mentioned in this article.

I would just say:

If you are in an argument with someone, and they say "You are wrong because X says so", then you can simply respond by saying "Why does X say so?". If the person does not know the answer to this question, one can hardly believe this person is competent regarding what X believes. If that person himself is X, and he claims to be competent, then by definition he should have an argument for why you are wrong. If he does not, then he is not competent.

The whole point of fallacy is to not allow a person to selfishly manipulate a debate from the position of ignorance. The above 4 setence description serves this purpose. The endless mental meanderings on the article page do not. Who cares about "pancritical rationalism"? This is not a problem in real life, appeal to authority fallacy is. - T.Z.K.

The fallacy that follows from saying “Who are you to ask your work to be taken as seriously as the work of this or that other great man or woman” is called *ad verecundiam*, that is, to modesty. The reason it is a fallacy is that the stature of the person to whom the remark is directed is precisely the open question under debate. The Latin word "verecundiam" means modesty, therefore *ad verecundiam* should be rendered "toward modesty". It is effective if the debater under attack does not enjoy the status that the authority appealed to does and might be inclined to suspect that he doesn't deserve it. Deep down, we are all modest. This fallacy may be found with or without a particular authority specifically named. Tom Wayburn (talk) 03:53, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Funny, I have never heard of that fallacy before. IMO there is an issue with it though, because it requires a person to attack the authority status of a proposed authority figure just to have a chance to win an unrelated argument. This implies that if a person is right on one subject, they are right on many. An authority figure can simply be wrong on one specific topic. The above description of why appeal to authority is fallacious recognizes this by tying only the strength of the authority figure's reasoning on the current subject to his likelihood of being correct, and not his track record on related subjects. - T.Z.K.

Wonder if Wikipedia applies this to people who quote them? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 15.251.169.69 (talk) 19:27, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

People who read Wikipedia articles about logic and logical fallacies may care about pancritical rationalism. True, the rest of the article may not be of interest to many casual readers and the main points may be summed up in a few sentences, but that that is already done in the introductory paragraph.– DroEsperanto^{(t / c)} 19:43, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

For this topic, it might be appropriate to remove the call for additional references. Wikipedia is unique from professional journals. Journals are subject to a credentials bias. Unless one has a high academic degree and influential contacts in the liberal establishment, it's difficult to publish in professional journals despite all the appearances of anonoymous peer review. Wikipedia may someday become a well-referenced, meta-index for the professional journals. At least for the time being, it remains a pure scratch space where words are edited, deleted and added with little thought to who is writing. Personally, I'd like to see this one topic stand without requiring formal references to the establishment peer review process. Let the words speak for themselves. Andresswift (talk) 23:13, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

Inclusion of the phrase "Halo Effect" in the "Forms" section

I think introducing the idea of the "Halo Effect" would improve the "Forms" section as another way in which "Authority" can be used to argue in favor of an arguement.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect

99.137.251.249 (talk) 06:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)Jonny Quick

Rhetoric

Perhaps there should be mention of the fact that appeal to authority is an important rhetorical device.

The article might also mention the most com,mon new form: "According to Wikipedia..." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.150.177.249 (talk) 11:29, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure "According to Wikipedia" is the opposite of A2A.
198.207.0.5 (talk) 18:06, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Moving/title

This was moved briefly to Appeal to inappropriate authority; I've moved it back to Argument from authority. The latter appears to be a far more common term for this concept, as a quick review at, for example, Google Books will show (814 hits versus 25). If this is to be moved again, I'd appreciate if consensus were developed before doing do.  Glenfarclas  (talk) 09:31, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Fallacy

The article states, "There is no fallacy involved in simply arguing that the assertion made by an authority is true."

On the contrary, that is the fallacy in a nutshell. It is fallacious to believe the assertion must be true when your only evidence is that a certain authority made it. Without corroboration through empirical evidence, you can only conditionally accept the assertion.

The quality of the authority may make it more likely that the assertion is true, but, without actual evidence (and a competent authority will provide access to the evidence), it is not logical to argue that it is true, only that it is likely to be true. Further, it is not possible to disprove a statement that the assertion is false (note: without evidence it is not possible to prove that the assertion is false, but that is not the same thing as stating that the assertion is false and having the statement disproved).

The statement quoted is therefore simply incorrect and should be omitted from the article.
198.207.0.5 (talk) 18:04, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Why this takes a page to explain and why practically it is a fallacy to ARGUE from authority

Most people are not good at this stuff because it doesn't help them get attention from others. Some people are conditioned to develop an objective understanding of their surroundings to be better prepared. The latter group has a natural understanding of fallacies, why they are wrong, when they are used etc. For everyone else "Appeal to authority" is just a normal argument.

It is quite difficult to understand that claiming that "everyone" agrees or a person with a high social status agrees with an argument is a fallacy when to you social status is the only real truth. Expertise is also really an issue of social prowess, where a recognized expert may be quite inferior in competency to an unrecognized expert (who is perhaps even the person arguing against the expert).

For those interested in actual objective truth, there is no way to justify argument from authority in any way, shape or form. If you know that an expert agrees, you must know why he agrees. If you know why, present the argument directly, else it is assumed you are hiding ignorance and an ulterior motive. If you do not know why the expert agrees, then perhaps you are mistaken that he actually would agree in the specific situation being addressed, or perhaps the expert would be swayed by the counter arguments. Furthermore perhaps you are mistaken that the person is in fact an expert on the matter.

The expertise of the arguers and the "authority" would be determined by the outcome of the argument. At best authoritative status means the person is likely to have something influential to say on the subject. Trying to preclude someone from making an argument based on the belief that an authoritative source will disagree and win the argument is driven by the emotional need not to be deceived that the "authority" really was just that. This behavior is destructive to the spread of ideas and truth and should be recognized for the fallacy that it is no matter how it is used.

If the best you can do is to argue that someone else agrees with your belief, you shouldn't be arguing at all. -TZK —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.32.181.121 (talk) 05:10, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Translation of the Latin

To explain the etymology and preferred translations, I present the following example of argumentum ad verecundiam:

The little Oxford Latin Desk Dictionary says that verēcundia (accusative verēcundiam) means "modesty; respect; ...." That is, the meaning "respect" was current in Classical Rome, the period covered by this handy dictionary. I am no expert, but I think this makes "argument according to respect" the best literal translation, and "argument to authority" or "appeal to authority" an excellent slogan-translation, which is what is wanted here. Note that ad means "to" (in a variety of senses), not "from" (in any sense). The translation "appeal to modesty" probably has no useful meaning to someone who never heard the phrase, while "appeal to authority" explains itself, and almost implies the rebuttal. Because "appeal to modesty" fails to convey the meaning of the Latin into English, it should be considered incorrect. (I also agree that the opening paragraphs suffice for the general reader who wants to know what the phrase means and when to use it.)

By design, Wikipedia is the world's largest collection of argumenta ad verecundiam ever made. We are not supposed to say anything here without citing authorities [someone please supply the links for these].

Solo Owl (talk) 00:53, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

This article looks one-sided to me!

Governments consult prominent scientists about matters of their expertise, in order to get good advice; in principle that is wise for sure. "Appeal to authority" means to me simply that one refers to an expert opinion - IMHO, it does not necessarily imply that that opinion must be correct. However, that is what this article claims - based on what evidence?

Thus this article does not read as an encyclopedia article, but as an assay of a POV.

Compare http://info-pollution.com/appeal.htm :

"In an appeal to authority, something is claimed to be true based on the expertise of an authority rather than objective facts. [..] Such an appeal is not always a fallacy".

Harald88 (talk) 21:48, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

See also: http://skepdic.com/authorty.html

Harald88 (talk) 21:56, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

"Appeal to authority" is merely a name for the logical fallacy. I'd say that it is always a logical fallacy to claim that something is correct simply because an "expert" said it (even if they truly are an expert in the subject at hand) whilst presenting no other evidence. Their opinion does not change fact to fiction, or vice versa. Obviously, it's only a logical fallacy if they imply that what they are saying is correct simply because some authority figure said it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.60.76.162 (talk) 21:41, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

The formal logical fallacy merits a seperate section.

There is a formally recognised logical fallacy. The wikipedia article muddles the defined term "appeal to authority" with much speculation. The result is that there are many internet dwarf philosophers calling out "Appeal to Authority!" when no such fallacy has occurred. The lack of clarity of thought present elsewhere is present in this wikipedia article.

Appeal to authority is DEFINED as invocation of authority where no specific authority actually exists. That's it, nothing else. Classic example is "I'm not a doctor but I play one on TV." Now this is buried in the article about 3/4s down the page. Obvious to any capable mind given time and lack of distraction is that there are actual authorties on subjects and refering to them in arguement is not an abuse of logic. Indeed for matters of definition it is entirely necessary to refer to authority. The statements of authority on matters of definition must be taken as correct or else we will be unable to argue any assertion with confidence where there is no agreement as to what terms actually mean.

We often argue assertions of authority without recognizing it. To issue an arguement with Einstein's relativity as an assertion is no less valid than to issue an arguement with relativity as an assertion. To issue an arguement where Einstien's expertise on hairstyling is an assertion is a logical fallacy.

The only reason people read the appeal to authority article is that ther is a recognized failure in logic by this name. To not place the defined condition at the forefront reduces the quality and utility of the article. 74.203.193.5 (talk) 23:21, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Errors in opening section

The article states:

"Appeal to authority is a fallacy of defective induction, where it is argued that a statement is correct because the statement is made by a person or source that is commonly regarded as authoritative. The most general structure of this argument is:

1. Source A says that p is true. 2. Source A is authoritative. 3. Therefore, p is true.

This is a fallacy because the truth or falsity of a claim is not related to the authority of the claimant, and because the premises can be true, and the conclusion false (an authoritative claim can turn out to be false). It is also known as argumentum ad verecundiam (Latin: argument to respect) or ipse dixit (Latin: he himself said it)."

There are several errors in this section:

1) It is false that the argument is an inductive argument, since "Therefore, p is true." is not a generalized conclusion drawn from a finite collection of specific observations.

2) It is false that the truth or falsity of a claim is not related to the authority of the claimant, since although what an authority claims to be true doesn't determine what is true, what is true generally does determine what an authority claims to be true. The problematic aspect is whether an alledged authority actually is an authority in the relevant domain of knowledge, and whether their opinion is unbiased and representative.

3) It is false that the argument commits a fallacy of defective induction because the truth or falsity of a claim is not related to the authority of the claimant, since even if that were the case, the argument would actually commit a fallacy of relevance, not of hasty generalization.

4) It is false that the argument commits a fallacy of defective induction because the premises can be true, and the conclusion false, since if that were the case, every inductive argument would commit the fallacy of defective induction, since every inductive argument is such that the premises can be true, and the conclusion false.

The argument is best understood either as an invalid deductive argument, because the truth of the premises doesn't entail the truth of the conclusion, or as a good abductive argument, because the best explanation for an authority, that is, an expert in the relevant domain of knowledge, making a truth claim about some matter of their expertise, is that what is claimed to be true actually is true, unless there are reasons for thinking otherwise. Consider: A mathematician claims that e^(i * pi) + 1 = 0. Isn't his claim good reason to believe that it is true that e^(i * pi) + 1 = 0, unless there are compelling reasons for believing him to be mistaken? — Preceding unsigned comment added by NeuronalConsensus (talk • contribs) 18:11, 8 December 2010 (UTC) I agree that the opening section is incorrect in a numbers of ways. Addressing your points first: (1) This is identified as a fallacy of defective induction in Copi and Cohen's Intro to Logic. I think the idea is this: most things that experts say are true, thus, this thing said by an expert is true.

(2) I absolutely agree with this point. This entire article is marred by not clearly distinguishing between appropriate appeals to authority (appeals to experts on issues about which they are experts) and inappropriate appeals to authority (appeals to non-experts or experts on issues about which they are not experts).

(3) Hasty generalization is only one type of defective inductive fallacy. Copi and Cohen define this class of fallacies as "arguments in which the premises are relevant and yet are wholly inadequate. Remember also that some people don't understand induction as only referring to generalization from specific instances. They might also include other forms of non-deductive reasoning such as analogical as well.

(4) That part of the introductory summary should be removed. We identify formal fallacies by showing that it is possible for the conclusion to be false when the premises are true. However, this is an informal fallacy, and so this test isn't meaningful (informally fallacious arguments can be formally either fallacious or infallacious). So this doesn't identify the relevant features of the argument from authority that can make it fallacious.

Finally, it is pretty clear that the argument from authority is not meant to be a deductive argument. A deductive argument is correct by virtue of its form, but there is no formal aspect to the argument from authority that would make its conclusion correct.

I'll try to change the article itself sometime in the next few days if I have time, but as it stands right now it requires drastic changes in my opinion. --Original Position (talk) 06:39, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Much better example for the pattern of this fallacy:

This is a much better example of the pattern of this fallacy:

What A says was always accepted as correct.
A says X.
Therefore, X is correct.

Funny though, that the whole concept of “(reliable) sources” is based on this fallacy. As if “reliable” was globally the same for all life on earth. (Where “reliable” is based on what people call “authorities”, and “authorities” on how much those “authorities”’ output matched the own model of reality. [NOT some delusional “global truth” which for a two human brains can’t exist anyway.])

­— 88.77.132.150 (talk) 21:02, 9 August 2011 (UTC)