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Ad Hominem Arguments As Legitimate Rebuttals to Appeals to Authority

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Ad Hominem Arguments As Legitimate Rebuttals to Appeals to Authority Take My Advice—I Am Not Following It: Ad Hominem Arguments as Legitimate Rebuttals to Appeals to Authority MOTI MIZRAHI Department of Philosophy Hunter College CUNY 695 Park Ave. New York, NY 10065 Email: [email protected] Abstract: In this paper, I argue that Résumé: ad hominem arguments are not always fallacious. More explicitly, in certain cases of practical reasoning, the cir- cumstances of a person are relevant to whether or not the conclusion should be accepted. This occurs, I suggest, when a person gives advice to others or prescribes certain courses of action but fails to follow her own advice or act in accordance with her own pre- scriptions. This is not an instance of a fallacious tu quoque provided that such circumstantial ad hominem ar- guments are construed as rebuttals to appeals (administrative) authority (of expertise), or so I argue. Keywords: abusive ad hominem, administrative authority, appeal to authority, argument from authority, argumentum ad hominem, argumentum ad verecun- diam, circumstantial ad hominem, tu quoque 1. Introduction In most textbooks, arguments against the person (argumentum ad hominem) are considered fallacious for the most part. The phrase ad hominem is commonly used to name the fallacy of attacking the person who makes a certain claim rather than the claim itself. For instance, according to Copi and Cohen (1998, p. 166), the phrase ad hominem names a “fallacious attack in which the thrust is di- rected, not at a conclusion, but at the person who asserts or defends it.” According to Copi and Cohen, the ad hominem fallacy has two major forms: abusive and circumstantial. In an abusive ad hominem, © Moti Mizrahi. Informal Logic, Vol. 30, No. 4 (2010), pp. 435-456. 436 Moti Mizrahi the character of the person who asserts a certain claim is under at- tack. It is then argued that, since the character of the person who makes the claim is “defective” in some way, what she claims must be incorrect, wrong, unreasonable, etc. This is a fallacy, according to Copi and Cohen, because abusive premises are irrelevant to the truth or falsity of what the person with the alleged “bad” character is claiming. In a circumstantial ad hominem, it is not the character of the person that is under attack but her circumstances. For example, it might be argued that the circumstances of a person, such as her na- tionality or employment, commit her to a certain view on pain of inconsistency. Again, this is a fallacy, according to Copi and Cohen, because the circumstances of a person making a certain claim are irrelevant to the truth or falsity of that claim. It is not clear, however, whether or not ad hominem arguments are always fallacious.1For instance, according to Salmon, there are circumstances in which legitimate ad hominem arguments can oc- cur. For Salmon, ad hominem arguments conclude that a statement is false because it is made by a particular person or group of per- sons. Salmon (2007, p. 121) says that “Such arguments are legiti- mate only when there is reason to believe that most of the claims made by the individual or group concerning a particular aspect of that subject matter are false.”2Salmon construes correct ad homi- nem arguments as statistical syllogisms: Most of what individual a says about a particular subject matter S is false. a says p about S. Therefore, p is false. Salmon (2007, p. 121) notes that “we are not often in a position to claim that most of what an individual says about a subject is false,” since “few individuals lie about or are almost always wrong about a subject.” She gives the following examples of circumstances in which legitimate ad hominem arguments can occur: • against the pronouncements of scientific cranks; • against the exaggerated claims of salespersons; • against the credibility of witnesses who have lied under oath. According to Salmon, then, ad hominem arguments are fallacious unless most claims made by the person or group in question on the subject matter in question are false. Salmon (2007, p. 122) points 1 See, e.g., Hoaglund (1981, pp. 7-9). 2 Cf. Mackenzie (1980, pp. 9-11). Ad Hominem Arguments as Legitimate Rebuttals 437 out that this “statistical premise is hardly ever true, so legitimate cases of arguments against the person are rare.” One such legitimate case, pointed out by a number of authors, is the courtroom tactic of impeaching a witness’ testimony by at- tacking his or her credibility. For example, according to Walton (1995, p. 111): Whether an ad hominem argument is reasonable or falla- cious, in a particular case, depends on the context of dia- logue. For an attorney to raise allegations about the bad moral character or character for veracity of a witness he is cross-examining in court can be a reasonable kind of ad hominem argumentation. Indeed, Walton (2004, p. 361) prefers the term ‘direct’, rather than ‘abusive’, for the ad hominem argument, precisely because the lat- ter “suggests that this form of argument is always fallacious.” According to Walton (1998, p. 213), the argumentation scheme for the direct ad hominem argument is the following: a is a person of bad (defective) character. Therefore, a’s argument should not be accepted. Such direct ad hominem arguments may be legitimate, according to Walton (2004, p. 361), “because the attack on a respondent’s [i.e., the person putting forward the original argument] character, say for honesty, sincerity or trustworthiness, can often undermine the re- spondent’s credibility as a source.” This is the case, Walton argues, when credibility as a source is a reason for accepting a claim. Again, the classic example is when “an attorney cross-[examines] a witness to attack the character of the witness for honesty” (Walton, 2004, p. 361). In what follows, I discuss other cases of practical reasoning in which ad hominem arguments seem to be legitimate. That is to say, I wish to point to and make clear certain instances in which the cir- cumstances of a person are relevant to the conclusion of the argu- ment. First I will discuss several examples in order to illustrate the kind of circumstances I have in mind. Then I will propose that similar instances of ad hominem arguments of this sort are not fal- lacious ad hominem arguments when construed as rebuttals to ap- peals to (administrative) authority (of expertise). 2. Do as I say, not as I do As mentioned above, Salmon proposes that an ad hominem argu- ment can be construed as a statistical syllogism. If the statistical premise is true, then the argument is not fallacious. I would like to 438 Moti Mizrahi take another approach, however, and propose that there are other situations in which the circumstances of the person are relevant to the conclusion of the argument, even if we don’t know that the sta- tistical generalization actually holds. In what follows, I will argue that the circumstances of the person are especially relevant to the conclusion of the argument when the person in question is sup- posed to be an expert. Hence, when an appeal to authority is made, it might be relevant to mention the circumstances of the expert, for they might undermine her credibility as an expert. Unlike Walton’s direct ad hominem, however, the attack in this case is not a direct attack on the expert’s character, but an indirect one via her circum- stances.3 By way of illustration, consider the following: suppose that renowned moral philosopher M argues vigorously in support of an- imal rights. In virtue of her expertise in moral matters pertaining to the appropriate treatment of animals, M gives the following expert advice: “Do not torture animals.” Suppose further that, after a while, we find out that M has been eating red meat and wearing fur coats all along. Furthermore, we find out that M has been arranging underground dog fights all this time. Would these circumstances, now coming to light, make us change our minds about M’s expert advice? Would we think that M’s advice should not be heeded? It might seem that, if we were to argue in this way, we would be committing the tu quoque fallacy. This fallacy is usually consid- ered a variant of ad hominem arguments. An instance of tu quoque occurs when someone counters an attack on a particular view by accusing the person who holds it of being in a position similar to that being criticized. More colloquially, tu quoque amounts to re- sponding to an ad hominem by saying something along the lines of “Look who’s talking,” “You’re just the same,” or “You’re just as bad.”4 For example, if you accuse me of being lazy for not doing my work, I might respond by saying that you cannot call me lazy because you have not finished any of the work you were assigned to do either. Nevertheless, I propose that we should not dismiss the above scenario as an instance of tu quoque, and hence fallacious. I think that if we uncover the underlying assumptions that are involved in 3 The notion of expertise raises several epistemological problems, espe- cially in relation to testimony in the domain of science and the law. See, e.g., Kitcher (1993), Walton (1997), and Adler (2002). In this paper, I will try to steer clear of the epistemological problems. I will assume that the experts in question are indeed experts. However, as an anonymous referee of this journal pointed out, this assumption can be challenged, given the kind of examples I use.
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