[discussion]Is my degree better than yours

[RedImperator]

I'm not so sure that an extra rule is the way to go, given the fact that such diversionary attacks are textbook examples of the red-herring fallacy, and we already have a rule against unrepentant and repeated use of logic fallacies.

The reason I feel a specific rule is needed was articulated pretty well by ShroomMan777 in the Board Culture thread. Part of SDN's culture is the "No Vendettas" policy--you can be in a howling flamewar in one thread and in a civil discussion with the same people in another. Personal attacks, however, make that almost impossible. If someone calls me an idiot, I can deal with it. If someone said, "Your family is a bunch of ignorant, blue-collar slobs", it would be difficult to impossible for me to deal civilly with that person ever again. It goes beyond using logical fallacies to creating feuds that will never be settled; not to mention, threads like fgalkin and Mr.Coffee's recent dustup are just embarrassing to the whole board.

[Darth Wong]

Well, "your family is a bunch of ignorant blue-collar slobs" is technically not an attack on a personal history, but an attack on someone's family. And you can't make all attacks on someone's background off-limits; I would hate to see a travesty like someone who's an MD getting into an argument with a lunatic AIDS denier and who isn't allowed to point out that the AIDS denier doesn't have any qualifications to talk about medicine.

[RedImperator]

Well, "your family is a bunch of ignorant blue-collar slobs" is technically not an attack on a personal history, but an attack on someone's family. And you can't make all attacks on someone's background off-limits; I would hate to see a travesty like someone who's an MD getting into an argument with a lunatic AIDS denier and who isn't allowed to point out that the AIDS denier doesn't have any qualifications to talk about medicine.

Would that actually happen, though? We're not exactly a court of law here; generally, the rules are flexible enough to prevent ludicrous results like that, and at any rate, we generally leave quite a lot up to the moderating staff to interpret. Anyway, I'm sure the wording could be tweaked so it's clear vicious personal insults based on somebody's background aren't allowed, while attacking someone's credentials is.

[fgalkin]

I have said it in the HoS thread that proudly bears my name, but I will repeat it here. It was a mistake on my part to use this sort of personal attack. My temper got the better of my judgement, and while it seemed justified at the time, I can see now it was not.

I am a moderator and I should have known better. I apologize for being part of the problem and directly contributing to the crisis, rather than part of the solution like I was supposed to.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Stravo]

Well, "your family is a bunch of ignorant blue-collar slobs" is technically not an attack on a personal history, but an attack on someone's family. And you can't make all attacks on someone's background off-limits; I would hate to see a travesty like someone who's an MD getting into an argument with a lunatic AIDS denier and who isn't allowed to point out that the AIDS denier doesn't have any qualifications to talk about medicine.

I agree Mike and I know from your debating history why it's been so frustrating to have people like Darkstar reject your points when they are based on solid engineering/scientific principles and he has a GED but I think this is in reaction to something like what was pulled on Mr. Coffee which I found objectionable where you lord it over someone that you have a graduate degree and they work with their hands in connection to someone's opinions on another's behavior or demeanor. It's not like Mr. Coffee was talking about Keansian Economic principles or debating a point on obscure Einstein relativity. Why does it matter that Mr. Coffee doesn't have an advanced degree or works with his hands UNLESS it is directly germane to what is being discussed?

Those are the instances where people can get really offended by "I'm smarter than you because I got this piece of paper that says so."

[Darth Wong]

Again however, that was a case where a clear logic fallacy was being committed. While someone with a degree arguably knows more about the subject of that degree than someone without, that doesn't necessarily mean he must be smarter in general than someone without a degree. Or to use a list form:

- MD makes person A more knowledgeable about medicine than person B
- People with MDs are generally smarter than people without MDs, as groups
- But MD does not make person A more knowledgeable about everything than person B
- And MD does not make person A necessarily smarter than person B

This is what I'm talking about elsewhere: we can cook up a lot of specific rules about various specific behaviours, but in almost every case, the specific behaviour is actually a logic fallacy, which we are failing to point out or penalize.