Quote:
Originally Posted by Orruar
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Certainly qualifications can help in an otherwise low information environment. But a 2+ hour debate is not what I'd consider a low information environment. At that point, I don't care who has what letters behind their name. If they're giving good, verifiable information, that's all that matters.
I mean, Ken Ham pointed to a bunch of people with PhDs when trying to justify his position. It was total appeal to authority bullshit, which is to be expected from a man of religion, which is the ultimate appeal to authority fallacy lol
Also, take it from someone who is working on a PhD and regularly has discussions with plenty of people ranging from undergrad students to multiple PhDs. Nobody ever says anything about what degree a person has when considering their ideas. And when discussing a paper or article or talk, I can't recall a single time where we asked "what qualifications did that person have?" It's all about the ideas. That's one of the things that really sets science and religion apart.
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Certainly. My aim was more toward the blanket nature of your statement about qualifications. In regard to the debate, you'll find we're in agreement through my previous posts that the qualification doesn't matter, because anyone can debate meaningfully. The purpose of debate is that only the argument is what should matter. What I mean when I say the blanket nature is:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Orruar
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Qualifications are a tool for confusing people who don't know how to judge the ideas.
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If this was qualified as "In a debate, qualifications are...", I could find myself more in agreement. It was merely that with what was written, it was a blanket statement that went far beyond simply for the sake of the debate.
Yeah, appeal to authority type of arguments are a classical logical fallacy, if I remember my logical fallacies correctly. I wish that Bill would have stood up and said "Appeal to authority. Logical fallacy. Your statements are irrelevant. My point.", I would have laughed, and still be laughing today because of it. But he was there to entertain, not to win a scored debate.
Certainly, no one says anything about a degree, I am also working on a PhD. It definitely helps you in publishing, and it does count for something when you can stand up in front of a conference room and say you are Dr.SoAndSo, rather than Mr.SoAndSo. People tend to listen up a good bit more. Whether that's good or bad, meh. It does happen though. I merely refer to that it is useful at times to act as an information shortcut, and the language presented made it sound (which I do not believe was the intent given the statement I quoted) far more rigid and unforgiving than I think was intended.