Talk:Chemophobia

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[edit] Appeal to nature

The article says: At the heart of chemophobia is the fallacy of "appeal to nature". This appeal makes the assumption that anything "natural" is good and anything "unnatural" is bad. This a fallacious caricature of the argument, a Straw man. The appeal is made on totally different grounds, namely on Evolution. The word "Nature" has to be understood as "Evolutionary stable system". The liberation of new, random chemicals into an environment that has reached equilibrium through long term adaptation, including the human body, has unpredictable effects. The same is valid to altering the amounts of known chemicals significantly. The industry resorts to simple denialism of the obvious risks.--Brasov (talk) 15:10, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

So, really, what you've just said is "unnatural is bad", which is exactly the thing you're claiming is a straw man argument. Scarlet A.pngpostateModerator 15:28, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Yo! Straw man!--Brasov (talk) 15:31, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Just shouting "straw man" doesn't make it so. Article says "This appeal makes the assumption that anything "natural" is good and anything "unnatural" is bad" you then try to set this up:
  • Natural = equilibrium from evolution
  • Unnatural = perturbation of that equilibrium
  • Is bad = unpredictable effects.
That's not proving that there's a straw man argument involved, that's just proving that the sentence doesn't come with your own personal dictionary-style definition of each word. Scarlet A.pngbominationModerator 15:36, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
You misrepresent my argument pretending I didn't say: "The same is valid to altering the amounts of known chemicals significantly." "Known chemicals" extends to "natural chemicals", obviously. So yes, you just debunk a caricature of my argument. Straw man!--Brasov (talk) 15:43, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
You misrepresent my argument pretending I didn't say: "The same is valid to altering the amounts of known chemicals significantly." "Known chemicals" extends to "natural chemicals", obviously. So yes, you just debunk a caricature of my argument. Straw man!--Brasov (talk) 15:43, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
I didn't pretend you didn't say it. You didn't say it. At least initially. And thanks to your inability to use the preview button, it was lost in a series of edit conflicts. As for that comment, I'm unsure as to what it means. You alter relative amounts of chemical substances and... what? Bad things occasionally happen? Indeed, occasionally good things happen too. It doesn't really tell us much. Scarlet A.pngpostateModerator 15:49, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
I didn't pretend you didn't say it. You didn't say it.. WTF? are you for real?--Brasov (talk) 16:03, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Bad things occasionally happen? Indeed, occasionally good things happen too.. No, "good things" in Evolution means better adaptations, which only happen by trial-and-error until a new evolutionary stable equilibrium is found. It usually takes extinctions to achieve that.--Brasov (talk) 15:58, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Natural = equilibrium from evolution. Induction fail. Equilibrium from evolution is natural, but nature does not imply equilibrium.--Brasov (talk) 15:52, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Brasov, please don't edit your comments after someone has replied to them. SophieWilder 15:59, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
I only removed the duplicate above, so pleass, don't lie.--Brasov (talk) 16:01, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
Is bad = unpredictable effects. Unpredictable effects = unknown risks. Phobia is "fear disproportional to the actual danger posed". In order to asses the actual danger, you need to define the risks, but they're unknown, so the use of Chemophobia is another caricature, another Straw man.--Brasov (talk) 16:12, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
The sheer mechanics of conversing with you are nearly insurmountable. You make multiple attempts at comments, causing edit conflicts, you indent randomly, you quote mine, you assert "straw man" without demonstrating it, your assertions where true are just trivial, and you're increasingly abusive. Scarlet A.pngpatheticModerator 16:37, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
"Unsurmountable" is weaselish for having all your (logical) holes simultaneously plugged. I love it!--Brasov (talk) 20:21, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
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