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Begging the question is NOT "Brings up the question". It is assuming a question that is not asked and assuming it to be true.

See:
http://www.nizkor.org/features...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://www.logicallyfallaciou...

Which brings up the question of why /. editors didn't fix that :)

Ehud

You are a fucking idiot. Is that better? And that's not an ad hominem. It's an insult. "You are wrong because you are uninformed" is an ad hominem.

THat you don't know what an ad hominem is, yet lecture others on it makes you a fucking idiot (again, not an ad hominem). An ad hominem requires that the argument be depreciated due to the [personal insult], not just that personal insults are used.

You should really learn the big words, before you start using them. It just makes you look like a fucking idiot. http://www.nizkor.org/features... has a better definition than the one you gave. It's not just an insult. That's an insult. An ad hominem is an attack on the logic, through the person. "Why should we listen to you, you can't even tie your own shoes" isn't an insult (or is a mild one), but is a clear ad hominem. "Fuck off you prick, you are just wasting my time" isn't an ad hominem. It in no way depreciates the argument made. It's a simple insult.

I'm trolling because I know the definitions of the hard words you are misusing, or so you ad hominem goes. For someone that doesn't like them, you seem to use them quite commonly.

I can't see any possible way that legally prescribed and obtained drugs can be used to prosecute someone, and I don't care if they are abusing them.

"Legally prescribed" and "legally obtained" are not necessarily the same. If you have four doctors in four states prescribing you the same medication because you're reselling them, that's illegal (being obtained under false pretenses), even though each individual prescription might be legal within its state (good faith by the doctors). As for a fishing expedition, the government is actually only explicitly prevented from "unreasonable searches". If law enforcement has can lawfully see something (like for instance, if you openly dispose of a suspiciously large number of prescription bottles), they can use that evidence against you.

Similarly, they are now asking for lawful access to the databases to find suspicious prescriptions. Even if the database access is legal, it would not be direct evidence of a crime. Rather, it would be probable cause, usable to get a warrant to do more thorough searches.

We're sure that a high number of picture messages translates to a high probability of nude selfies.

...but that's not likely probable cause. You'll need to do better than that to convince a judge.

Let's just grant ourselves the ability to access everyone's phone GPS data all the time just in case someone might be ignoring the speed limits. Too bad if Speedy wasn't the one operating the vehicle at the time you saw his GPS showing 75 in a 70 zone.

This one's closer, but to actually accuse someone of a crime, all of the crime's condition must be proven to the court. Proving that Speedy was operating the vehicle will turn out to be rather difficult, and the case would be dropped.

See where your argument starts to fall apart? If you turn a blind eye to government over-reach because you find the crime they're chasing to be abhorrent then soon they are granting themselves permission to do all sorts of other things.

I'm not suggesting any blind eyes. I'm suggesting that the justice system is actually fairly robust, and can stop most abuses, as it has for the last 250 years or so. It is, of course, constantly improving, and I am not suggesting it is perfect.

The slippery slope argument isn't trotted out so frequently because it's untrue.

Yes, actually, the Slippery Slope Fallacy is very much untrue. It is only valid in cases where a positive feedback mechanism is well-defined and with no interruption mechanism, but that's very rare in practice. In all of the examples you've given here, there are existing mechanisms in place to make abuse difficult, and prevent punishing an innocent person. That's the interruption mechanism. There's also no reason to assume that allowing the government to pursue one crime will result in bypassing the debate for their power to pursue other crimes, so there's no positive feedback.

No, it's on you.
http://www.nizkor.org/features...

Or in words your intellect can grasp: i am rubber, you are glue, bounce off me, back to you.

you couldn't actually provide any evidence.

You can't demand, I prove a negative.

Do you have evidence now?

The burden of proof is on you — we aren't living in your totalitarian dream land. Not yet, anyway.

You want me to change my way of life — you still have to convince me. You wish to appeal to authority of "scientific experts" — fine, but you have to establish their credentials first. Pointing out successful scientific predictions made by that bunch earlier is necessary (though not sufficient), if you wish to go that route.

You once mentioned someone named "Arrhenius", who, according to you, successfully predicted something about CO2 in the 19th century. How is that relevant to today's "climate scientists" and their peculiar inability to make a successful prediction remains unclear.

But we already know, you'd rather use police than scientific arguments, so kindly drop the pretense and simply denounce me as a "denialist fraud" to the Democrat Attorney General near you. When I'm sent to Gulag for it, you may expect my house as a reward. That's the best way to "save the planet", is not it?

I didn't miss it, I ignored it as its a nonsense attempt at a semantic trap.

I'm sorry, but arguing with a clear understanding of the terms is what slines do.

Language hasn't caught up with the reality of what transgendered people go through.

Is transgenderism so new a phenomenon, that language "hasn't caught up"?

mental health professionals diagnose gender dysphoria as an actual condition

Sorry, but that's merely an appeal to authority. And a highly questionable authority too — not only because most of their experiments can not be verified, but also because politics would cause any "health professional" disagreeing to lose his license, job, and access to pornography.

There's no "species dysphoria".

Says who? How anthropocentric and speciist of you!

And what about the White woman "identifying as" Black? Why should be fired from a "colored-only" job, but a muscular penis-owner be allowed into a women's bathroom?

An "appeal to authority" requires that the person not be an authority on the subject.

If he and the other enthusiasts are authorities on Sunbeam Tigers then it is not an appeal to authority. I suggest that if they felt strongly enough to attempt a factorial edit in regards to Sunbeam Tigers, then they are very likely authorities on the topic.

The question is, under what circumstances do you get to decide whether or not the person has authority.

Nice guide here: http://www.nizkor.org/features...

(note - I'm arguing from prior knowledge of this fallacy, but I did look up the guide to post a link for others to read more)

Perhaps you might look into what slippery slope actually means. A slippery slope fallacy argues that if A happens then B will inevitably happen. In this case your premise that requiring picture will inevitably lead to requiring DNA is the slippery slope fallacy. Pictures do not lead to DNA. By the way, we already require pictures on driver's licenses. The GP was refuting your slippery slope argument not making one.

its just Mi the Ignorant Bigot

Ah, ad-hominems, they prove everything!

no matter how many times he's proven wrong.

If I really had been, you would've included those link-pairs I asked for — for everyone's benefit... In fact, you would, likely, have linked to the post refuting me on this matter in your signature! But you can't, because it was never done. So far two people tries to answer my challenge and both failed.

About that global cooling theory: One article in Newsweek 40 years ago.

Here is another, just FYI.

http://www.nizkor.org/features...

Wrong. The burden is yours to prove your case. I am not claiming to predict future climate. That is your claim. And that claim requires you to provide a validated climate model that can make such predictions with some level of accuracy.

Absent that, you have no grounds to make predictions at all.

Provide one now.

If someone calls themselves a chef or a foodie, it may not make them right when they say how long you should boil pasta, but it means their opinion about it IS based on care, thought, and knowledge

Wow, is that ever a crock. So, a person calling themselves a foodie means they've have exercised "care, thought and knowledge"? If I call myself a world champion surfer, does that mean I've ever waxed a board? Appeals to authority are one of the most dishonest forms of fallacy:

http://www.nizkor.org/features...

An Appeal to Authority is a fallacy with the following form:

Person A is (claimed to be) an authority on subject S.
Person A makes claim C about subject S.
Therefore, C is true.

But maybe you're just not familiar with logical fallacies. Well, that's something about which I know a thing or two to snatch a phrase from esteemed computer tech Marlin Schwanke. And you will not find an "ad hominem" anywhere in my post. If you think you also know a thing or two about fallacies, I invite you to point mine out. The purpose of my post was to point out the fallacy via sarcasm. There was no ad hominem. I didn't say Marlin Schwanke was stupid, or that all computer techs are stupid or that he's somehow a bad person or a Republican. I just pointed out the absurdity of claiming this authority as if it meant something.

I'll just bet you're a computer tech, too. And that, my friend, you can take as an ad hominem.

http://www.nizkor.org/features...

Fallacy: Appeal to emotions. h.264 has hardware support because the few that seek rents from it (the eight MPEG-2 patent owners -- Fujitsu, Panasonic, Sony, Mitsubishi, Scientific Atlanta, Columbia University, Philips and General Instrument, CableLabs and certain individuals) have organized hardware support, as a good investment. When open codecs are dominant, they too will supported more widely by hardware and these eight companies will have to follow. References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP9
http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/02/googles-vp9-video-codec-gets-backing-from-arm-nvidia-sony-and-others-gives-4k-video-streaming-a-fighting-chance/

Why the government? Because my other option (if we remove government) is to come over to your house and shoot you. I don't think we want to live in THAT world.

Of course not, but that's what called a false dilemma fallacy. For just one narrow slice of the private law alternatives, look into any of the innumerable proposals of books from the Rothbardians. You can probably find hundreds of academic lectures on YouTube for free (here's the first hit on my search results).

...when the fact emerge that they were defying [Secret, Unaccountable, Undemocratic] court orders.

Cold Fjords subservient cheerleading to power never ceases to entertain. Obviously the operators of the Cold Fjord account have learned absolutely nothing from history, or are on the wrong side. See: "Means Used by the Nazi Conspirators in Gaining Control of the German State". Quote: "To make certain that cases with political ramifications would be dealt with acceptably and in conformity with Party principles, the Nazis granted designated areas of criminal jurisdiction to the so-called Special Courts (Sondergerhte)."

I don't think anyone but the crazy wingnuts think that governments should be deprived of intelligence. The issue here isn't really that the NSA has these vast powers. After all, we've known this was likely long before 9-11, and historians have even pointed out that the Lincoln Administration had moved to gather information from all telegraph transmissions, so this has been around for a helluva lot longer than the Internet.

The issue is accountability. ...

The issue is very much one of the NSA having these vast powers. It goes way beyond what they are allowed by the US Constitution, however much they would like to interpret it otherwise.

I don't think anyone but the crazy wingnuts think that governments should be deprived of intelligence. The issue here isn't really that the NSA has these vast powers. After all, we've known this was likely long before 9-11, and historians have even pointed out that the Lincoln Administration had moved to gather information from all telegraph transmissions, so this has been around for a helluva lot longer than the Internet.

The issue is accountability. ...

The issue is very much one of the NSA having these vast powers. It goes way beyond what they are allowed by the US Constitution, however much they would like to interpret it otherwise.

I don't think anyone but the crazy wingnuts think that governments should be deprived of intelligence. The issue here isn't really that the NSA has these vast powers. After all, we've known this was likely long before 9-11, and historians have even pointed out that the Lincoln Administration had moved to gather information from all telegraph transmissions, so this has been around for a helluva lot longer than the Internet.

The issue is accountability. ...

The issue is very much one of the NSA having these vast powers. It goes way beyond what they are allowed by the US Constitution, however much they would like to interpret it otherwise.

Really? They would argue against the statement that there are far fewer women auto mechanics simply because they are auto mechanics? Some how I think you are wrong on that and a simple perusal of the yellow pages, local professional licensing boards, or the ASE is sufficient to show you are wrong. You are engaging in the fallacy of spotlighting.
 
The reason they have a show is because they are the exception, not the rule. Most motorcycle mechanics don't build custom bikes, so most don't have a show. Most fishermen don't brave the North Pacific in freezing temperatures do they don't have a show. Most people don't purposefully try out dirty, disgusting jobs, but the guy who did had a show.

Yeah, because the current scheme ... isn't an impediment to interoperability at all.

Careful of two wrongs make a right.

which would have never happened if the stores of yesteryear hadn't first gotten the RIAA comfortable with digital distribution, then weaned them off the DRM teat

Yet we've already been through all this, know that DRM-free distribution is the most successful sales model, and nearly all the movie companies own record companies and know this already. So it's not the same situation - this time they realize the status quo but also realize that they want to control the player and tell people how, when, and where they can enjoy the content they acquire.

It seems to me that you have labeled this as a fallacy known as "appeal to belief" incorrectly. The 97% are not just anybody, but are papers from peer reviewed journals. These are authorities. The argument in this case is an appeal to authority, but it is not a fallacious appeal because in this case, the ones claiming to be authorities in fact are so qualified.

The study is just another case in point demonstrating the strong consensus among climate scientists that AGW is real.

Thank you. Also known as appeal to belief. 98% of Americans believe in God. Therefore, God must exist.

Now, let's all play 'Call me a denier for asking a question.' (AKA Appeal to ridicule) Let's assume for a moment that a rise in atmospheric CO2 is attributable to man. Let's assume our current atmospheric CO2 is close to 400ppm. If 400ppm CO2 is causing global warming, then can someone please explain to me how the Earth's climate was cooler during the late Ordovician period when CO2 was about 4400ppm?

how EXACTLY is Bitcoins not a pyramid scheme?

When Bitcoin is done mining all of the coins in the chain, there will be a usable digital currency (assuming no flaws are discovered).

When a pyramid scheme is done building, all of its value collapses.

Both share the aspect of rewarding the early investors, but let's not make a composition error here.

Good thing ethicists are better people than everyone else and aren't susceptible to logical fallacies like appeal to authority. Ethics can and has been used to justify eugenics, slavery, and genocide.

I am skeptical that humankind is causing more than 50% of whatever it is that contributes to global warming.

As I said, I can't stop you from calling this "skepticism," but you are basically ignoring the actual evidence, and asserting, without any sort of proof, an alternate hypothesis that there is (1) some as-yet unknown mechanism that makes human-induced warming is less than the models predict, (2) a different as-yet unknown mechanism that accounts for the observed warming matching the warming predicted by the models, and (3) yet another as-yet unknown mechanism that prevents the factors that amplify the forcing of mechanism 2 from also amplifying the greenhouse effect. Let me suggest perhaps you should exert your skepticism on that.

Saying "well, maybe human factors account for half of the warming" may sound like a reasonable compromise position-- "well, each side has points, so the true situation should be about halfway between"-- but this is in fact a logical fallacy known as "argumentum ad temperantiam", or "the fallacy of the mean." http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/middle-ground.html Turns out that the truth is not always halfway between two positions; particularly when there is extensive evidence for one side, and no evidence at all for the other.

Hence, if we magically shut down everything for a year, global warming will still continue, but more than half per year of what it was before.

If we magically shut down everything for a year, global warming would continue due to the carbon dioxide that we've already put into the air-- the effect is cumulative, and has a lag.

I am not saying that we aren't contributing to global warming. I am saying that I personally don't believe we are responsible for most of it.

Your "personal beliefs" are fine; just don't confuse "I personally believe" with "the evidence suggests."

...I don't favor bans of inefficient light bulbs, but I do favor excise taxes on them. I don't favor plastic bag bans, but I do favor excise taxes on them.

As it happens, in the United States the word "tax" is such a politically poisonous word that it is vastly easier to actually ban something than it is to tax it, even though a tax would allow greater freedom of choice and becthe preferred solution for everybody involved.

Let go back to the good old days when an employee that lost a hand in a machine could be shown the door and children were allowed to work 60 hours a week.

Nothing like a false dilemma to start off the day.

There are other solutions for those problems, most notably lawsuits.

However, if for the child, a job that pays in exchange for 60 hours a week, represents a financial boost, that could be a good thing. It's better than languishing in poverty.

Even the the good old days of the 1950s where life expectancy was 20 years less so there was no need to take care of those useless old folks.

Life expectancy mainly rose because of medical improvements, and I think it's only about ten years since 1950.

It has never been illegal to neglect people and allow them to die.

Let's go back to the days when business was allowed to dump TCE and dioxins into aquifers and people had no recourse. Let's all wax nostalgic over the days when the Cuyahoga river could support a good fire.

This is probably better handled through expensive high-profile lawsuits. They are damaging and tend to force companies to pre-emptively avoid infraction. I am not opposed to regulation in this area but feel it could be better handled than the red-tape snarl that is today's regulation. I might be in favor of an agency that did for-profit lawsuits...

Your fallacy is: false dilemma.

Why? Because you assume that if the government doesn't do quality control, then it won't be done (not that it does such a good job anyway). But consider Underwriters' Laboratories, or Consumer Reports. Ah, but people aren't surge protectors, you say! This is true. Can you think of any occupations—even ones where lives might be at risk—where people can practice without government approval (or did in the past without more harm than is caused by licensure)? One common to Slashdot members, perhaps, even?

De facto standards tend to be better than de jure: good ones are used, bad ones are discarded. If you want to go to an AMA-certified doctor, go to one; but don't forcefully stop people from doing business with otherwise-certified or even non-certified doctors, even if those certifications are questionable. It's none of your business.

Daily Mail, therefore inadmissible as evidence in reasonable debate.

That's a genetic fallacy.
Perhaps The Atlantic is more acceptable. A comparable story is linked here http://idle.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3171579&cid=41592303

Anonymous is good, no doubt, but I'd say that pseudonyms are often better because a pseudonym, even if they are personally unknown, helps set context. Comments on issues which are complex often can't realistically be partitioned to be exhaustive in themselves. For some people here, at least, I'm familiar with their basic worldview from their other posts, and their comment or argument can placed in that wider context for deeper consideration, at least implicitly.

I'm way to memory challenged to keep track of my own world view, let alone that of the people who's posts I read or reply to.

I suggest it's sort of intellectually dishonest if you evaluate a posting in a certain way based on who posted it rather than what was posted.
Ideas should be evaluated based on their content rather than their source.

After all, isn't checking who posted something sort of running afoul of the Fallacy of Ad hominem?

That said, I tend to discount AC postings unless the subject matter is one where they might have a legitimate need to hide, so, in a sense I'm guilty of the same thing.

Sort of. Since Apple, the original article, and nearly everyone who has commented says it's against the law, the burden of proving otherwise is actually on the person claiming otherwise. You're espousing an unsupported theory, and it's not our responsibility to prove you wrong. When you're arguing against consensus, the burden becomes yours, perhaps not from a legal viewpoint, but it does shift.

Regardless, you are incorrect.

Your argument that "no one else is doing it" is a straw man.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem-tu-quoque.html

No, they weren't journal entries (allowing automatic submission of journal entries as stories is an idiotic idea, frankly.) Of the 3 things I submitted, on was a legitimate story which I thought was interesting and had a tech angle that was frankly better than the stuff we're getting now. The other 2 were complaints about the site, and apparently submitting them is the only way to get any attention, as the "editors" seem to be completely uncommunicative and unresponsive to most direct queries.

I can bitch about bad stories because I've been around long enough to recognize bad ones. I don't post submissions because that's not my primary interest. I was iffy on the PS2 forgeries, and since it wasn't accepted, I took that as a lesson learned.

Nice try with the Poisoning the well attack, though.

I've always had Excellent karma on Slashdot for years until I made a post that the believe that evolution occurs is not in direct opposition to the belief that there is a Creator/God.

I was down-modded like crazy and people came out of the woodwork to make personal attacks.

My wife tells me of how she was harassed while working at a Jesuit university for believing in God, because she was in a lab. Fellow Jesuit employees spoke of how only absolute idiots would believe in God, and how it is an absolute accepted fact amongst intellectuals that God cannot exist.

I still maintain that if it is a great offense to believe in the existence of God (which cannot be tested), then it is equally a great offense to believe definitely in the inverse of something that cannot be tested.

I think most intellectuals who believe in God hide their beliefs out of fear and shame that they will be judged and ostracized for that belief. I would assume that intellectuals would easily spot the logical fallacy that judging a belief solely on the merits of the stupidest people who believe in it doesn't hold water.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/guilt-by-association.html

Biased info? I mean, you linked to Media Matters. But I'm not one to lean on fallacious arguments.

Why, yes I can, Dora, as if it mattered. And this isn't a popularity contest, where the countries you like are the ones that matter. Here's why Indonesia sucks, and here's why Ethiopia sucks, and why Equatorial Guinea sucks, and why Gabon sucks. I haven't even touched on their poor economies, or poor literacy. And BTW,this is why YOU suck.

That's not an argument from authority, that's the definition of an ad hominem argument. Instead of attacking the message, you attack the messenger.

For another relatively contemporary example, there are people right now claiming that we should ignore all the economic advice of John Maynard Keynes because he wrote something that might conceivably be construed as anti-Semitic when he was 17.

You can think RMS is a nutjob, but it's quite possible that RMS is a nutjob and also right about the importance of Free Software.

> General use PCs have proven to become virus/worms/problem infested in the hands of "normal" users..

This. Normal users have lived with the crapware infested mess that is "general PCs" for years, and they HATE IT.

Macs are general use PCs and have proven to be virus/worm/problem free for years in the hands of "normal" users. Winblowz users might hate their machines, but buying an iPhad and walling yourself off from Pulitzer prize winning writers is not the only option.

When they said nobody needed multicore processors

[citation needed]

[{Fallacy:Appeal to authority}]
(Protip: It does not make something more true or false, if person X links to person Y stating it with quotes and "Intel said" around it, than if person X states it directly. Maybe you hung in Wikipedia mailing lists for too long.)

From a slaves perspective, yes, I would say there was some fascism going on.

No, you are now using a false dilemma to support your point.

Exchange of resources in a trade is capitalism - hence the word trade.

Redistribution of resources within a social group is - wait for it - socialism.

Dad bought the bucket of fried chicken from KFC with a capitalist exchange. When he got home he had the exclusive market in fried chicken for the household. He redistributed the chicken through means of socialism to Mom and little Sally but Junior hadn't taken out the garbage like he was told. Junior ran and took out the garbage thereby earning his chicken, so Junior exchanged his labor for chicken. See what Junior got was a mixed bag, he didn't actually fully earn the chicken since it was partially his trash in the garbage can, but he did contribute by taking out the trash of others as well. Junior did for the whole of the family and in turn the family is doing for him, he's in a murky gray area between socialism, communism and capitalism at this point, but we're not going to argue which fits best, we're gonna eat some chicken.

See fallacy - appeal to ridicule.

None of my simplified definitions disagree with the more complex dictionary ones, they're simply broken down for those like you to understand.

First, clearly you didn't read my reply to the previous commenter who used the "false sense of security" fallacy. Actually, the "false sense of security" argument can be many fallacies, linked below:

Appeal to belief. e.g. Many people claim it gives a false sense of security, therefore, it must. Show that it actually has that effect before you use it as your premise. A hypothetical premise only gives a hypothetical result.

Begging the question. e.g. Giving people "false sense of security" makes them less safe assumes that they have the knowledge and ability to do something useful to mitigate the risk AND that they would do something different if they didn't have that "false sense of security. However 95+% don't have that knowledge, and evidence is that most don't change their behavior even after they've been informed of the risks. The assumption is false, therefore, the conclusion is fallacious.

Composition. e.g. Because I/we/technical users possess the knowledge and ability to recognize security risks, all users would behave the way I/we would. Your/Our behavior (or theoretical behavior) does not represent what most users will actually do.

Ignoring a common cause. e.g. Users are careless when they think they're safe, therefore, they are careless because they think they're safe. In fact, most users are either always careful, or always careless, regardless of whether they think they're safe.

First, clearly you didn't read my reply to the previous commenter who used the "false sense of security" fallacy. Actually, the "false sense of security" argument can be many fallacies, linked below:

Appeal to belief. e.g. Many people claim it gives a false sense of security, therefore, it must. Show that it actually has that effect before you use it as your premise. A hypothetical premise only gives a hypothetical result.

Begging the question. e.g. Giving people "false sense of security" makes them less safe assumes that they have the knowledge and ability to do something useful to mitigate the risk AND that they would do something different if they didn't have that "false sense of security. However 95+% don't have that knowledge, and evidence is that most don't change their behavior even after they've been informed of the risks. The assumption is false, therefore, the conclusion is fallacious.

Composition. e.g. Because I/we/technical users possess the knowledge and ability to recognize security risks, all users would behave the way I/we would. Your/Our behavior (or theoretical behavior) does not represent what most users will actually do.

Ignoring a common cause. e.g. Users are careless when they think they're safe, therefore, they are careless because they think they're safe. In fact, most users are either always careful, or always careless, regardless of whether they think they're safe.

First, clearly you didn't read my reply to the previous commenter who used the "false sense of security" fallacy. Actually, the "false sense of security" argument can be many fallacies, linked below:

Appeal to belief. e.g. Many people claim it gives a false sense of security, therefore, it must. Show that it actually has that effect before you use it as your premise. A hypothetical premise only gives a hypothetical result.

Begging the question. e.g. Giving people "false sense of security" makes them less safe assumes that they have the knowledge and ability to do something useful to mitigate the risk AND that they would do something different if they didn't have that "false sense of security. However 95+% don't have that knowledge, and evidence is that most don't change their behavior even after they've been informed of the risks. The assumption is false, therefore, the conclusion is fallacious.

Composition. e.g. Because I/we/technical users possess the knowledge and ability to recognize security risks, all users would behave the way I/we would. Your/Our behavior (or theoretical behavior) does not represent what most users will actually do.

Ignoring a common cause. e.g. Users are careless when they think they're safe, therefore, they are careless because they think they're safe. In fact, most users are either always careful, or always careless, regardless of whether they think they're safe.

First, clearly you didn't read my reply to the previous commenter who used the "false sense of security" fallacy. Actually, the "false sense of security" argument can be many fallacies, linked below:

Appeal to belief. e.g. Many people claim it gives a false sense of security, therefore, it must. Show that it actually has that effect before you use it as your premise. A hypothetical premise only gives a hypothetical result.

Begging the question. e.g. Giving people "false sense of security" makes them less safe assumes that they have the knowledge and ability to do something useful to mitigate the risk AND that they would do something different if they didn't have that "false sense of security. However 95+% don't have that knowledge, and evidence is that most don't change their behavior even after they've been informed of the risks. The assumption is false, therefore, the conclusion is fallacious.

Composition. e.g. Because I/we/technical users possess the knowledge and ability to recognize security risks, all users would behave the way I/we would. Your/Our behavior (or theoretical behavior) does not represent what most users will actually do.

Ignoring a common cause. e.g. Users are careless when they think they're safe, therefore, they are careless because they think they're safe. In fact, most users are either always careful, or always careless, regardless of whether they think they're safe.

The Good only exists because it is part of God's essential nature. In some sense, God is identical to the ultimate standard for goodness (i.e. "God is Love".)

In some always unexplained sense. This seems to me to be a patent case of special pleading, and sounds a lot like, "Shut up, you're wrong, even if I don't know quite why!"

If the "Good" is separated from God, any moral codes or laws become arbitrary rules without moral force or ultimate meaning. (i.e. "If there is no God, everything is permissible").

Consider chess. There are certain fundamental 'rules of the game' that define it. An 8x8 board, 8 pawns per side that move in certain ways, two rooks per side that move in other ways, castling, the initial configuration of the pieces, etc. Now, there is no rule that you can't sacrifice your queen in the first few moves of the game. It's illegal to move your king to a threatened square, but it's perfectly acceptable by the rules to stick your queen in front of a pawn at the start of the game.

However, if you want to win the game, you shouldn't do that. There are almost no situations (at least, assuming evenly-matched opponents) where giving up your queen at the start will lead to your victory. Similarly, it's rarely a good idea to move your king out to the center of the board. It's usually a bad move.

Note words like "shouldn't" and "bad". They are value judgements. They prescribe 'oughts'. They are not part of the 'rules' of chess. From where do they come? From the combinations of two things - first, the rules and structure of chess, and second, from the player's desire to win the game. They are strategic rules.

We have physical laws, and we have human desires. "Oughts" - strategic rules - morals - arise from those two things. Some basic game theory, and voila - cooperation, etc. I contend that I am ethical and moral, that people in general are ethical and moral, because the alternative is running naked in the woods fighting over scraps of food. That's not an "arbitrary" at all.

And as to 'meaning' - meaning to whom? I think this essay makes a very cogent point:

To say that some event means something without at least some implicit understanding of who it means something to is to express an incomplete idea, no different than sentence fragments declaring that "Went to the bank" or "Exploded." Without first specifying a particular subject and/or object, the very idea of meaning is incoherent.

Yet too often people still try to think of meaning in a disconnected and abstract sense, ending up at bizarre and nonsensical conclusions. They ask questions like: What is the meaning of my life? What does it matter if I love my children when I and they and everyone that remembers us will one day not exist? But these are not simply deep questions without answers: they are incomplete questions, incoherent riddles missing key lines and clues. Whose life? Meaningful to whom? Matters to whom? Who are you talking about?

Once those clarifying questions are asked and answered, the seeming impossibility of the original question evaporates, its flaws exposed. We are then left with many more manageable questions: What is the meaning of my/your/their life to myself/my parents/my children? These different questions may have different answers: your parents may see you as a disappointment for becoming a fireman instead of a doctor, and yet your children see you as a hero.

And if anyone had a heart attack on a train this weekend, and no one was able to call for assistance, you would have been charged with criminal negligence and sent to prison.

A Red Herring fallacy if there ever was one.

Appeal to authority is not always fallacious. For instance, if your mechanic says "The reason your car is overheating and your smelling combustion products in your coolant is because your head gasket is blown", he is speaking as an authority, and is very likely right.

From http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-authority.html:

This sort of reasoning is fallacious when the person in question is not an expert. In such cases the reasoning is flawed because the fact that an unqualified person makes a claim does not provide any justification for the claim. The claim could be true, but the fact that an unqualified person made the claim does not provide any rational reason to accept the claim as true.

You know, sort of like how pseudo-skeptic organizations will find some guy with a physics degree who denies AGW, thus committing a fallacious appeal to authority.

http://nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html

Rather than attacking the science, attack the person's source of funding.

If a parent is required to care for their child, rather than drop it in a dumpster, is that slavery?

Parents have a duty to care for their child, they are not required to do it. That is a pure straw man argument.

When I am required to stop at a red light, is that slavery?

Stopping at a red light does not take anything away from anyone, so this example fails utterly.

Everyone in this world relies on the labor of others. That isn't slavery,

It is not slavery if people work for each other voluntarily; this is what you are deliberately missing out. You need to miss this out because if you do not, you are admitting that you are a supporter of the violent theft of people's work, money and property for the "greater good".

Requiring people to help each other out is how society has worked for all of human history.

That is a lie, and the logical fallacy known as 'Appeal to Tradition':

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-tradition.html

Im sorry that I rubbed you up the wrong way, but the logic of this air tight. You may be for the theft of other people's resources. Fine. Just admit it and be done, instead of flailing about with your ill thought out arguments.

And then all kids, and all senior citizens, and felons, and immigrants

The Slippery Slope fallacy in its purest form.

The caretakers of the elderly are often elderly themselves. There is a need here.