Thread:User talk:Armondikov/New brainstar/reply (6)

The issue there isn't pissing about words. It's the fallacy that BECAUSE you've pissed about words, the rest is merritless.

I think there is an important time and place for pissing about words. "politically correct" is a useful theory to study in ethics. Does saying "he is black" mean something different than "he is colored" or "African american". But it's an argument in and of itself, and about how things like media, which use words necessarily, have to position themselves.

Having meta arguments about what the bible really meant by "Arsenokoitai", has a place in greek language studies. It has virtually no place in theology, since theology doesn't give a shit what the bible says or said anyhow, just how individuals want to interpret it. (Theologians will spill their own blood telling you the exact opposite, but I've been in their world long enough to know they don't care what the "original" says or said. That's for biblical scholars who are more interested in things like "history" and "evoultion of religious ideas".)

But to actually argue the value of some larger idea, based only on the fact that you don't use terms the way I use terms (again, separate from trying to define terms for the sake of the argument, or come up with other terms) to me tends to say "i don't care about hte original premise" or worse "i cannot argue against teh orignal premise logically, but i don't like it so i'll divert teh whole thing". just saying....