Talk:Russell's Teapot

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Feminism is the teapot

Or so say the MRAs. Because things like "there exists a systemic wage gap" or "there exists systemic misogyny in promotion practices" is really as difficult to prove or disprove as Russell's Teapot. Fuzzy. Cat. Potato! (talk/stalk) 15:23, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Oh god, the comments. Fuzzy "Cat" Potato, Jr. (talk/stalk) 19:14, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Honestly, I think the MRA crowd are cargo cult atheists. They adopt our argument style, but never really the substance of it. Russel's teapot is a response to arguments of the general form "Isn't there a chance you're wrong?" No one has ever framed wage gaps that way, indeed, they are based almost exclusively on material observation. A similar behavior they engage is fallacy-spotting, wherein you engage in the fallacy fallacy to "win" arguments.

I don't mean to say that they're not true atheists. Just that they take on the stylings of people trying to present genuinely rational arguments and are confused when they are, in turn, considered irrational.

It's subtle. I don't know what to make of it, but it's definitely more than a bit corroborated by the actions of "objectors" we get here on rationalwiki. ikanreed ^{You probably didn't deserve that} 19:30, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

The Aliens

... came across Russell's comment as the 'radio bubble' reached their very sensitive Project Osma equivalent and decided they needed a flying teapot to go with their flying saucers and bedstead - they are visiting Earth to complete the bedroom fittings with tea-maker. :) Anna Livia (talk) 17:47, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Russell's Tesla

There now sits in orbit a Tesla Roadster, playing "space oddity" on a loop. This Tesla will soon orbit the sun, forever. When we rebuild our civilization after global warming is finally cancelled out by the nuclear winter, we will have long forgotten the story of the Tesla in space. But there it will be, and someone, somewhere, will make a joke about there being a car in space that no one can prove or disprove is there, yet there it will be. CorruptUser (talk) 03:34, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

Suggestion

Could Planet X, Nibiru and similar be designated 'Russell's Teapot objects'? Anna Livia (talk) 11:46, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

Russell's teapot is logically fallacious

It assumes that religious texts are not evidence for a god. While this might be true, it is conceivable that they are. Consequently it is guilty of assuming that which has to be proven, namely that religious texts are untrue. It therefore reasons in a circle.--82.40.43.68 (talk) 00:54, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

You're missing the point. God's existence can't be disproven (at least not to the satisfaction of most people who believe in God), this fact is often used to argue in favour of religion in one way or another. Russel's teapot is specifically a rebuttal of that argument, and as long as that's all it is then it's a perfectly valid argument.

Of course, the article misses the point in the exact same way. Christopher (talk) 01:03, 17 December 2022 (UTC)