Gallup Poll: Conservatives 42%, Liberals 21%

[daveman]

And when you say nothing that has any cognitive content, but present pure empty rhetoric -- such as calling something "bullshit" without offering a scrap of evidence that it really is -- I'm going to call you on it. Get used to it.

Your definition of "empty rhetoric" being, of course, anything that doesn't immediately and unquestioningly agree with you.

 

[daveman]

[snip empty rhetoric and ad homs devoid of cognitive content in any way pertinent to the subject under discussion]

Batting 1000 today, Dave.

You realize you're doing nothing but proving my point, don't you?

No. You probably don't.

 

[Dragon]

Your definition of "empty rhetoric" being, of course, anything that doesn't immediately and unquestioningly agree with you.

Not at all. If you look around at the threads I've responded to and started, and there are a lot of them, you'll find that I recognize plenty of cognitive content from people I don't agree with. Occasionally, I even do that from you -- like right now, or in my original response to your thread here.

"Empty rhetoric" is words that don't present any points to be answered. It may take the form of personal accusations and insults, logical fallacies, name-calling either of the person or of an idea without any evidence or argument to back it up, or a few other forms.

Your OP on this thread was not empty rhetoric. You presented a poll showing that a lot more people call themselves "conservative" than call themselves "liberal." The implication being, although I don't think you actually said this, that there are a lot more conservatives than liberals. That's not empty rhetoric; a point was actually made and some evidence presented to back it up. I responded appropriately with issue polls showing that there are a lot of liberals in this society that don't call themselves "liberals" (for whatever reason).

On the other hand, calling that claim of mine "bullshit" was empty rhetoric, because you presented absolutely nothing in the way of either logical argument or evidence to show that I was wrong.

When you present empty rhetoric, I'll call you on it. When you present something of substance that I feel like responding to, I'll respond to it substantively. And the decision between those is not whether I agree with you (as in fact I seldom do). It's whether you are, at the moment, actually saying anything.

 

[daveman]

Your definition of "empty rhetoric" being, of course, anything that doesn't immediately and unquestioningly agree with you.

Not at all. If you look around at the threads I've responded to and started, and there are a lot of them, you'll find that I recognize plenty of cognitive content from people I don't agree with. Occasionally, I even do that from you -- like right now, or in my original response to your thread here.

"Empty rhetoric" is words that don't present any points to be answered. It may take the form of personal accusations and insults, logical fallacies, name-calling either of the person or of an idea without any evidence or argument to back it up, or a few other forms.

Your OP on this thread was not empty rhetoric. You presented a poll showing that a lot more people call themselves "conservative" than call themselves "liberal." The implication being, although I don't think you actually said this, that there are a lot more conservatives than liberals. That's not empty rhetoric; a point was actually made and some evidence presented to back it up. I responded appropriately with issue polls showing that there are a lot of liberals in this society that don't call themselves "liberals" (for whatever reason).

On the other hand, calling that claim of mine "bullshit" was empty rhetoric, because you presented absolutely nothing in the way of either logical argument or evidence to show that I was wrong.

When you present empty rhetoric, I'll call you on it. When you present something of substance that I feel like responding to, I'll respond to it substantively. And the decision between those is not whether I agree with you (as in fact I seldom do). It's whether you are, at the moment, actually saying anything.

You're so funny when you lecture.