On May 28, 9:33 pm, harrismh777 <harrismh...@charter.net> wrote: > Steven D'Aprano wrote: > > A straw man is not when somebody points out holes in your argument, or > > unwanted implications that you didn't realise were there. It is when > > somebody makes claims on your behalf that you did not make to discredit > > you, not because you don't understand the implications of your own > > argument. > > The straw-man fallacy is when you erect a "straw man" to "represent" the > actual man (or idea) which can be easily knocked down, and then you > proceed to knock it down (the straw-man) as though the "straw man" was > the actual man, or idea... proving your point as-it-were against your > opponent when in fact you have only just knocked down the straw-man... > leaving the real man standing. > > This fallacy has a couple of nuances (sometimes combined with metaphor > or analogy fallacy) and you are a master at presenting both... > thankfully you usually don't try to present both at the same time! :) > > In this present case the straw-man was not "me," rather the straw-man > was the python language itself. You chose a code-snippet (one small puny > dangle that doesn't prove a thing) and used it to speak for the entire > language! As though one code-block is enough to demonstrate > compatibility for the entire language in all of its nuances and details. > To prove something positive with a test case requires that you provide > *all* test cases, or that you provide an algorithm that accounts for > *all* test cases... you cannot prove compatibility with a code-snippet. > > On the other hand, all you have to do to prove incompatibility is to > show "one" (1) test case where compatibility fails... and of course for > the present case there are many that can be shown, in fact, hundreds of > them. > > The thing that nobody has presented here yet is that *all* the books > declare that 3.x is incompatible with 2.x/ ... some of them go out of > their way to tell the reader that they are only going to deal with 3.x > and not 2.x in any way... and others go out of their way to point out > the hundreds of nuances in details between the two languages. (and a > good thing too, for those of us who must work with both! ) So this fact > is not alluding the press... the point being not to bust anybody in the > chops, but to point out that it is not helpful to move the community > forward with a new language and get mass adoption (not just early > adopters) to lie about the differences between the two sets... yes, for > trivial code blocks that use prime constructs, integer math, and the > print statement, not much has changed. But in real world applications > of the language there are many hundreds of details that have changed or > been added (deleted) which will make life difficult for the uninitiated. > Don't mislead people by saying that very little has changed. Tell them > that the philosophy is the same (what Chris called python 'think' ) but > be honest about the details of syntax, environment, layout, and > morphology.
Bravo! PS: And yes, Steven is a master at the straw man fallacy. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
