If someone says, “Guns are dangerous, therefore you should be scared of people who carry guns.”
What fallacy is that?
Because I can say, “Hands are dangerous, therefore you should be scared of people who have hands.”
A lot of them I suppose.. correlation/causation? Simple prejudice? The main distinction is this, though:
The intent of the person carrying is, to the best of our knowledge, to be prepared for unknown circumstances - a Bear or Large Cat in the woods, a robber or other aggressor, etc. The intent of the voters in favor of confiscating guns, restricting gun ownership and restricting carrying, is to point guns vicariously at carriers and force them to disarm, and force them not to prepare for certain circumstances.
Well, in all fairness, one should be afraid of people carrying guns. But that doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t be allowed to carry guns.
And we should be afraid of people with hand too, right?
You should be aware that anyone and everyone poses a certain level of danger all the time. However, guns, by their very nature, are a more effective tool of war. But ultimately, it still comes down to whose hand and whose gun we are concerned with because the individual plays a much larger role in the threat than the tool. So it’s not so much the guns and hands that bother me, it’s the people wielding them.
Yes. That was the point I wasw making.
Yes.
It’s not so much argumentative as it is admonitory, so it can’t really be called fallacious. How “afraid” (or cautious) one should be about anything is subjective; the utterer seems to be saying that it’s preferable to be cautious rather than relaxed or impulsive under certain circumstances (being around people with guns) as opposed to other circumstances (being around people with hands), reasoning that the former poses a greater risk to the assumed goal of the listener, viz. self-preservation.
This.
Tell him he is a pussy.
guns aren’t dangerous by a sane definition of the word dangerous. guns are less dangerous to human life than driving. driving is extremely safe statistically.
I personally think it is a fallacy -in my opinion it has two logical problems 1) it looks question begging because it seems to say that dangerous things (thing which provoke fear) should be feared which is a purely circular argument. 2) it looks like its an appeal to consequences or emotions because it says that guns produce bad effects so you should be affraid of them which may or may not be true but from the POV of logic is strictly incorrect.
that’s my opinion you may find better though…
obviously guns qua guns are not dangerous. a smith&weston thats unloaded is hardly a risk to anyone. the premise is faulty
i dont know about that mr graham is the smithandweston heavy???
your right!, its supermassive!. the blackhole threatens to destroy all owned property in existance !!!
Note the argument relies on the faulty premise that one should be scared of all things that are dangerous.
A high voltage electric fence is dangerous, but I would never be “scared” of it.
You wouldn’t? Well then would you be wary of it? Careful around it?
Of course…but “scared” means frightened, fearful, alarmed–not wary or careful. Electric fences do not instill fear.
while the truth of the premise is questionable itself (resulting in a beggin the question fallacy), i’ll stick to the structure of the argument. it seems to me that the appeal to fear is somewhat transparent. the main fault lies in the progression from guns being dangerous to people with guns being dangerous. one way this can be broken down is as a fallacy of composition :
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person has gun therefore → gun = member of group (group = person’s nature and things that affect their disposition)
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member = dangerous
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therefore group = dangerous
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structure–> A is part of B
A is “x” (characteristic)
Therefore, B is “x”
i’m sure that there are many more fallacies in the argument (i can spot a few more), but this is probably the most prominent in re the structure. hope this helps
Yeah, the topic was about the structure of the fallacy and the name of it, not really about guns or people being dangerous. Very helpful. You guys are really smart, thank you all for your help.
The people on this forum are only human; topics get derailed & off-topic all the time. It’s as if you’ve never been on a forum before :\
So are pencils, should we fear people with them too???
The argument is emotive fear mongering, and incredibly inaccurate…